News round-up, Wednesday, March 1, 2023

Quote of the day…

“The rest of the world’s rajahs are saying coal must stop,” said Pradhan. “But we are the rajah of our own country.”

Washington Post

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Most read…

China predicts new arms race

Japan abandons its old strategy of pacifism

Japan has announced a massive increase in its military spending, which will allow it to project its power region-wide in response to China’s ‘strategic challenge’. Its neighbours aren’t happy.

Le Monde Diplomatique by Jordan Pouille

The Special Tribunal Debate"An Arrest Warrant against Putin Would Be Immense"

In the debate in Berlin over Ukraine, many are concerned that by supplying weapons, Germany has become party to the war. In an interview, international law expert Claus Kress dispels false arguments and discusses how Russian President Vladimir Putin could be brought to justice.

Spiegel, Interview Conducted by Ralf Neukirch and Rafael Buschmann

In India, ‘phase down’ of coal actually means rapid expansion of mining

A tripling of size is planned at the fastest-growing coal mine in India

WP by Karishma Mehrotra

Hoping to make India a supply base for our global energy storage needs: Julian Nebreda CEO of Fluence 

The company's 150 MWh BESS will be commissioned by July-August in Karnataka.

MONEYCONTROL.COM BY SWETA GOSWAMI & RACHITA PRASAD

”We’ll need natural gas for years…

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but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says…

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Image by Le Monde Diplomatique: Intelligence-gathering mission: troops listen to a speech by defence minister Taro Kono in Naha, southern Japan, 11 January 2020

China predicts new arms race

Japan abandons its old strategy of pacifism

Japan has announced a massive increase in its military spending, which will allow it to project its power region-wide in response to China’s ‘strategic challenge’. Its neighbours aren’t happy.

Le Monde Diplomatique by Jordan Pouille

Kyodo News · Getty

On 27 November 2021 prime minister Fumio Kishida visited Camp Asaka, the Ground Self Defense Force (Japanese army) base north of Tokyo. He told the troops, ‘I will consider all options [for strengthening Japan’s defence capabilities], including a so-called enemy base strike capability ... The security environment surrounding Japan is changing at an unprecedented pace. Things that used to happen only in science fiction novels have become reality.’ Last December Kishida announced plans to double Japan’s defence budget to $315bn over five years, making it the world’s third largest after those of the US and China, and equivalent to 2% of GDP, in line with the NATO target.

These announcements, which fall within the framework of a new National Security Strategy released last August, have radically changed the armed forces’ remit: they will no longer be limited to defending Japan but will have the means to counterattack, and even neutralise military bases in unfriendly countries.

This hardly comes as a surprise. Last August Itsunori Onodera, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)’s national security research committee chairman, who is close to Kishida and served as defence minister under his predecessor Shinzo Abe, led a wargame with Taku Otsuka, an LDP member of the House of Representatives (the lower house of Japan’s National Diet), to determine what Japan should do if China invaded Taiwan. The Nikkei Asia’sdiplomatic correspondent Moriyasu Ken said, ‘They talked about what to do if China simultaneously invaded Taiwan and the Senkaku Islands [also claimed by China as the Diaoyu Islands]. “Oh my goodness, what should we do? Should we start by evacuating Japanese nationals from Taiwan? Do we have time to help the Americans with Taiwan?” It was total chaos. Eventually, they thought it would be best to focus on the Senkakus.’

At the time, the atmosphere in Japan was tense. A couple of days after US House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, five ballistic missiles launched by the Chinese military during exercises around Taiwan landed inside Japan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). Ken said, ‘China clearly wants to test the US-Japan alliance over the next few years. Washington’s official position is that the slightest attack on Japanese territory — say on Yonaguni Island [just 100km east of Taiwan, at the tip of the Okinawa archipelago] would be equivalent to dropping a bomb on New York.In practice, it’s not that clear-cut.’

What the Japanese know

From satellite surveillance, Japan knows the Chinese military have been training in the Gobi desert for an attack on an air base, using a mock-up of the US base at Kadena, in Okinawa. Masashi Murano of the Hudson Institute thinktank in Washington believes they would first neutralise the Kadena base if they invaded Taiwan. They would ‘[neutralise] airstrip networks in Okinawa and Kyushu early in the conflict with a salvo of ballistic and cruise missiles, along with cyber and electromagnetic disruption campaigns’ (1). The US insists that its 30,000-strong military presence in Okinawa is vital, if only to protect local residents. Last October the US ambassador to Tokyo visited the Marine Corp’s Camp Hansen to open a farmers’ market, as a source of fresh produce for military families. That may not be enough to win over the local population, who mostly oppose US bases.

A recent Japanese defence ministry white paper describes China as an ‘unprecedented strategic challenge’ and a competitor, disrupting the region’s geopolitical and military balance and threatening the Senkaku Islands and Taiwan, which Japan insists it willdefend (after occupying it from 1895 to 1945) (2). Also identified as adversaries are North Korea, which test-fired intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) near Japan throughout 2022, and since the invasion of Ukraine, Russia. Japan’s dispute with Russia over the Kuril Islands, which the Soviet Union annexed at the end of the second world war, is still unresolved.

The security environment surrounding Japan is changing at an unprecedented pace. Things that used to happen only in science fiction novels have become realityFumio Kishida

However, public opinion is by no means unanimously behind the new strategy. Ken says China has indeed increased its defence budget (by 7.1% or $229bn in 2022, compared with $768bn for the US) but believes ‘Xi Jinping didn’t strengthen his grip on power in order to make war — he did it because he’s getting ready to introduce measures to combat inequality that will be very unpopular ... with China’s wealthy, who behave like Saudi princes, with their Lamborghinis and villas in California. Xi wants Taiwan to reunite with China of its own volition, and nothing suggests that he plans to invade. A war on Taiwan will only drain China’s economy as China doesn’t have oil like Russia does, so they can’t afford to do anything silly. Xi hasn’t out ruled military intervention, but his core message is of a return to the roots of communism,’ which, according to Xi, is incompatible with war.

What the LDP’s opponents criticise most is the scale of the increase in military spending and the new strategy’s offensive element. Japan remains attached to the pacifist constitution the US imposed after it surrendered in 1945 and especially to article nine, which states: ‘The Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes ... In order to accomplish [this aim], land, sea and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained.’

Regular pacifist protests

Pacifist defenders of this principle regularly demonstrate outside the Diet building in Tokyo. One afternoon in mid-November I watched 6,000 protestors, a few with megaphones, face Japanese police equipped with little plastic speaking trumpets. Everyone remained behind lines painted on the ground and police tape. One charity worker had pockets full of pamphlets with slogans such as ‘Peace cannot be achieved by force’, ‘Military expansion is a one-way street’ and ‘Don’t let our islands become a fortress’. He was disappointed that most of the demonstrators were elderly.

‘Young people here are quite insular. Very few speak a foreign language,’ said a doctor from a large hospital in the university quarter of Gotanda.‘They live in a vacuum, focussed on their own day-to-day concerns. They aren’t aware of the real external threats. They agree with the government when it says we need to increase our defence capabilities, but tell themselves that, at the end of the day, our big strong US allies will save us.’ A youth planning to study law said that although he understood the government’s position in wanting to help the US protect Taiwan, ‘Japan’s young people won’t want to fight. Helping the Americans see off the Chinese is not for us.’ Although Japan doesn’t have compulsory military service, he could see himself joining the Self Defense Forces as a reservist: ‘If the Chinese invade Taiwan, Okinawa will be next, then Kyushu. We’ll have to defend ourselves.’

The Japanese and their government see the US as the lynchpin of national security. Kimitoshi Morihara, executive committee member in charge of foreign affairs for the Japanese Communist Party (which won 7.6% of the vote in the 2021 House of Representatives election), told me the LDP ‘don’t care’ whether Japan makes its own decisions and ‘feel no shame about being the junior partner in the alliance with the US. However, one success of long-standing propaganda by the LDP is that half the population blames the constitution for being “US-made”, written and imposed by US to strip Japan of the right to have an army ... they claim. Nationalists do care about the fact Japan cannot show its power by sending troop abroad like other prosperous countries.’

When the Communists (passionate defenders of constitutional pacifism and fiercely opposed to the new defence strategy and the US nuclear umbrella) hold a big meeting, their headquarters in Tokyo’s Sendagaya district is guarded by police. The day I met Morihara, buses filled with far-right ultra-nationalists kept driving past, with Japanese Imperial standards and Ukrainian flags fastened to their sides, broadcasting propaganda through loudspeakers.

Threats to Japan

The Japanese press talk of rallying to the US cause as if it were the obvious thing to do. Onodera says Russia invaded Ukraine believing it was a weak nation with no one to defend it: ‘Japan will not be attacked if it is strong and has allies to defend it’ (3). It’s an old saw spread overseas by Keio University professor Tomohiko Taniguchi, former speechwriter and foreign policy advisor to Abe. Last November, Taniguchi was invited to address both Asia Society Switzerland and the Council of Europe’s World Forum for Democracy in Europe, in Strasbourg. Just before that, I heard him lecture at Keio University, in Tokyo. His message was impassioned: ‘Russia, North Korea, China... Never before has Japan faced three hostile nuclear powers in series, three non-democratic countries. This coincides with the fact that our country is ageing, its population is shrinking, and the economy is not growing fast enough. It’s almost impossible for Japan alone to grow as fast as China to counterbalance its power. The only rational option would be for Japan to work closely with likeminded peers, such as our long-standing ally the US, but also with Australia and India. And increasingly with European countries, especially France, because it has the world’s largest EEZ after the US, thanks to its territories in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific.’

The fact is Japan is a US client state — militarily, economically and diplomaticallyKimitoshi Morihara

Taniguchi referred to the Indo-Pacific alliance, which Abe described in a 2007 speech to the Indian parliament on need to counter China’s growing military strength (4). Abe spoke of a ‘broader Asia’ spanning the whole Pacific, including Australia and the US. Morihara explained that this would be ‘an axis of democracies allied with the US against China. So when Japan acquires powerful long-range missiles as “deterrents” to China, these will be integrated into the US’s Indo-Pacific defence strategy. Washington will never allow us to use them independently: the fact is Japan is a US client state — militarily, economically and diplomatically.’To reduce this asymmetry, the Japanese government has, however, agreed to jointly develop a fighter aircraft with Italy and the UK by 2035 (5).

A dangerous development

Japan’s new closer relationship with the US echoes the security treaty signed in 1951, at the end of the US occupation. The official Chinese press see it as a dangerous development. Sino-Japanese relations deteriorated sharply in 2012, after the Japanese government bought three of the Senkaku Islands from their private (Japanese) owner, and Chinese naval incursions into their territorial waters became more frequent (6). Abe’s regular visits to Yasukuni Shrine, dedicated to the 2.5 million Japanese who died in the second world war, including some convicted war criminals, did not help.

Things have been calmer in recent years. Following Abe’s assassination last July, Xi even stated that they had ‘reached [an] important consensus’ on building ‘China-Japan relations that meet the requirements of the new era’ (7). But since Japan announced its new defence strategy, the tone has changed. The daily Global Times, which closely follows the Chinese government line, said, ‘Given the devastation caused by Japan’s prior defence and military upgrading in history, particularly during WWII, the present policy change will have an impact on the whole area, as many nations will have to raise their military spending, leading to a new arms race in Northeast Asia’ (8).

China is not alone in being concerned about the new policy. South Korea has bitter memories of Japanese occupation from 1910 to 1945. Old disputes are resurfacing, including the matter of ‘comfort women’ — Korean women forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Japanese army. The historical facts are disputed by war crime deniers, whose numbers in Japan are rising. Since 2017 the governor of Tokyo has refused to attend the annual commemoration of the 1923 massacre of at least 2,600 Korean immigrants falsely accused by the Japanese population(with police and army backing) of having poisoned wells and planned violence in the aftermath of an earthquake that killed 100,000 and destroyed much of Tokyo and Yokohama. The government has recently increased the budget for ‘strategic dissemination of information overseas’ (9), channelling some of it through thinktanks tasked with conveying ‘the historical truth about Japan’.

Korea’s main concern relates to the fact that Japan is clearly envisaging the possibility of using its ‘counterstrike’ capabilities to ‘attack enemy bases’, including those of North Korea — since South Korea would then face a direct threat. The South Korean centrist daily Hankyoreh asked, ‘How are we supposed to accept this reality in which Japan designates the Korean Peninsula — constitutionally our sovereign territory [under article 3 of South Korea’s constitution] — as a target for pre-emptive strikes? (10)’Even South Korea’s conservative president Yoon Suk-yeol, who is keen to build closer relations with the US and Japan, distanced himself: ‘In matters that directly affect the security of the Korean Peninsula, or our national interest, it is clear that we must be closely consulted or that our prior consent must be sought’ (11).

There is nothing to suggest that North Korea is impressed by Japan’s threats. President Kim Jong-un regularly orders test launches of ICBMs, which land in Japan’s EEZ, off Hokkaido, more than 1,000km from their launch site. But according to Morihara, the aim is not really to intimidate Japan: ‘The North Koreans are desperate to talk to the US.Theyhave an insatiable need for attention.’ Though the Self Defense Forces don’t attempt to shoot down the missiles, the Japanese people are kept informed of the threat via their smartphones and information displays on subway and bullet trains (with apologies for the delay to their journey). The authorities also keep Japanese cryptocurrency companies informed of threats from the Lazarus Group, North Korea’s largest hacking organisation. Japan’s talks with North Korea, like those of the US, are currently deadlocked.

Though Russia is now a designated foe, that was not always the case. During his first term of office (2012-20), Abe played five rounds of golf with Donald Trump but met Vladimir Putin 27 times; there were many promises of economic cooperation, though no agreement to resolve the Kuril Island dispute. The islands form a barrier between the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk, patrolled by Russian nuclear submarines; in 2016 Russia deployed a coastal missile system on the islands. It would see handing them back to a US ally as diminishing its own security.

Strategic partnership with Russia

Though Kishida backed sanctions after the invasion of Ukraine, he has maintained a strategic partnership with Russia on energy. Unlike ExxonMobil, Japanese investors have kept their stakes in Russian offshore gas exploration and production company Sakhalin-2. Japan buys around 60% of the 10 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas the company produces, meeting 10% of its energy needs. Kishida emphasises that Sakhalin-2’s gas and oil fields in the Sea of Okhotsk are extremely important for Japan’s energy security.

In Asia, Japan’s new defence strategy may damage trade relations with neighbours on which it is heavily reliant. In 2008 Japan signed a free trade agreement with the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) countries (12), helping Japanese manufacturers to offshore production. Asics has made most of its sports shoes in Cambodia since 2013; Sony has a Home Cinema System factory in Malaysia; Mitsubishi has acquired two companies that provide consumer loans via smartphone apps, in Indonesia and the Philippines, to make it easier for customers in those countries to buy its locally built cars. There are also some surprising cultural links: the city of Itami in Hyogo Prefecture recently donated an organ to St Joseph’s Cathedral in Hanoi, Vietnam. Japan is now the second largest foreign investor in Vietnam, after Singapore, and the largest importer of seafood from Vietnam.

This can sometimes lead to Japan supporting countriesthat are in difficulties on the international scene. Last October it abstained on a UN Human Rights Council resolution on alleged human rights violations by Sri Lanka. Japan is Sri Lanka’s second largest creditor after China. In return, the Sri Lankan authorities muted its response in March 2021, when Wishma Sandamali, a university graduate and English teacher in her home country who had entered Japan on a student visa planning to teach English to children in Japan, died in her cell at an immigration detention centre in Nagoya after being denied adequate medical care. She had been held for several months after it was discovered that her visa had expired when she visited a local police station to file a complaint about domestic violence.

Unlike the ASEAN countries, India has not attracted Japanese investors keen to build factories. Megha Wadhwa, a visiting fellow at Sofia University in Tokyo, notes that ‘these two nations do not have a history of serious conflict and yet ... their relationship has never risen above the level of lukewarm’ (13), even though many Indians are working in Japan. Thousands of English-speaking IT engineers have joined Japanese startups on ‘technical intern training’ visas, an immigration scheme designed to help small and medium enterprises bypass Japan’s zero-immigration policy. According to Wadhwa, ‘Indian migrants have definitely contributed to creating awareness about India in Japan and Japan in India. Over the years, India has become the IT country, one of the upcoming powers [whereas in the past] it was just about curry, snakes and Ayurveda.’ Japan and India also have a joint space programme that aims to explore the far side of the moon by 2030 — to compete with China, which landed a robotic spacecraft there in 2019.

‘It’s not necessarily high-tech’

Although Japan has aligned itself with the US strategic vision, it is affected by the US’s economic sanctions against China. Sony, which dominates the global market for CMOS image sensors used in smartphone cameras, can no longer sell them to Huawei. Yet Japan is still a bellwether of what the Chinese middle class are likely to buy.

‘And it’s not necessarily high-tech. If it does well in Japan — design, packaging, fashion, cosmetics, you name it — then Chinese consumers, and consumers in Taiwan, Korea and Thailand, will want it too. That’s a given,’ said Jérôme Chouchan, chairman of the French chamber of commerce and president of chocolate maker Godiva’s Japan and South Korea operations. Casual wear retailer Uniqlo is a striking example: of its 1,600 stores worldwide, 900 are in China, where it has been opening up to a hundred more each year. The company’s owner Tadashi Yanai, 73, is Japan’s richest person with an estimated net worth of $28bn, and keeps the Chinese government sweet by not getting involved in geopolitics or other divisive issues.

Since Hong Kong and its hedge funds lost their shine for foreign and even wealthy Chinese investors, the Japanese government has been trying to improve Tokyo’s attractiveness as a financial centre through tax incentives. It is still lagging some way behind Singapore, but the government hopes it will be a fallback for Western entrepreneurs who once saw China as the Asian Eldorado. Jack Ma, former boss of Alibaba, seems happy there.

By suddenly turning its back on pacifism, Japan has put itself at odds with China, which already has a strong presence across the region. Many Asian countries are reluctant to choose between China and the US (which promises to protect them). What will be their attitude towards Tokyo now?

Jordan Pouille

Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

…Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

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Image: Germán & Co

The Special Tribunal Debate"An Arrest Warrant against Putin Would Be Immense"

In the debate in Berlin over Ukraine, many are concerned that by supplying weapons, Germany has become party to the war. In an interview, international law expert Claus Kress dispels false arguments and discusses how Russian President Vladimir Putin could be brought to justice.

Spiegel, Interview Conducted by Ralf Neukirch and Rafael Buschmann

About Claus Kress

Claus Kress, 56, is a professor of international law and criminal law and the director of the Institute of International Peace and Security Law at the University of Cologne. He previously served as a member of the German government delegation to the International Criminal Court (ICC) negotiations. He is a judge ad hoc at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the case against the government of Myanmar for alleged genocide against the Rohingya ethnic group.

DER SPIEGEL: Professor Kress, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has justified his long hesitation in supplying Leopard tanks to Ukraine by saying that he wanted to prevent Germany from becoming a party to the war. Under international law, do we become a party to war by sending increasingly powerful weapons?

Kress: For a long time, I had the impression that German policy was hiding behind international law. The legal situation is clear: Germany is allowed to help Ukraine defend itself. Germany would actually be allowed to do even more.

DER SPIEGEL: What do you mean by that?

Kress: On the basis of the right to collective self-defense, Germany could intervene directly in the conflict alongside Ukraine. The question at the center of the German debate, "war party, yes or no," has nothing whatsoever to do with the question regarding the extent to which Germany may support Ukraine. It is a political determination, and one which can be easily politically justified.

DER SPIEGEL: The kinds of weapons that Germany supplies to Ukraine is irrelevant under international law?

Kress: I was disturbed by the fact that German politicians gave currency to the idea that Germany could violate international law by supplying weapons – and that this in turn would entitle Russia to take action against Germany. That is wrong so long as Ukraine is using these weapons for defense, which is allowed.

DER SPIEGEL: At what point would Germany become a party to the war?

Kress: The question should be asked on the basis of the prohibition of violence and the right to self-defense: At what point does supporting Ukraine's individual self-defense become a use of force by Germany requiring the invoking of the collective right of self-defense? This would certainly be the case if Germany deployed its own soldiers – if, for example, the German air force or German tanks manned by German soldiers were deployed in Ukraine. Then Germany would also be a party to the war.

DER SPIEGEL: The U.S. has reportedly transmitted the coordinates of Russian ammunition depots and barracks on Ukrainian soil to Kyiv. Does that cross the line?

Kress: Involvement in the planning of concrete Ukrainian military operations could become a tipping point.

DER SPIEGEL: What consequences might that have?

Kress: The exercise of the right of collective self-defense would have to be reported to the UN Security Council. Such a letter, though, would likely be just as politically undesirable as the status of war party that would also then be implied. But again: There is no doubt about the permissibility of the collective defense of Ukraine under international law. If Russia were to respond to such collective self-defense with military attacks against targets aimed at the defenders, it would again violate the prohibition on the use of force.

"The unleashing of the war of aggression is the original sin that opened the door for all further evils."

DER SPIEGEL: A discussion is currently underway over how to prosecute those responsible for the war of aggression. Why is that so difficult? The International Criminal Court is investigating war crimes and crimes against humanity – and possibly genocide as well.

Kress: These investigations cover a significant part of the injustice; they are very important. But without the crime of aggression, a central dimension is omitted: The decision by the Russian leadership to start this war, thus trampling on the prohibition against the use of force under international law. The unleashing of this war of aggression is the original sin that opened the door for all further evils. This includes the countless killings of Ukrainian soldiers in combat, which cannot be prosecuted as war crimes. Unlike other crimes under international law, the International Criminal Court's own statutes unfortunately prohibit it from investigating the suspected crime of aggression in this case.

DER SPIEGEL: So, it would primarily be about the political dimension?

Kress: For the direct victims of aggression, it is surely of fundamental importance to hold the perpetrators of such a war responsible. But there's more at stake: It is imperative that the prohibition against the use of force under international law be confirmed for the future. After Germany's aggression during World War II, the Americans, and indeed the Soviet Union, pushed to use the Nuremberg trial to set a strong international precedent against wars of aggression in the future.

DER SPIEGEL: Which Russian officials would likely be the focus of a special tribunal focused on crimes of aggression?

Kress: The focus would be Russia's leadership circle. This could also include those who, without a relevant post under the constitution, have a significant influence on the planning, preparation, initiation and/or execution of the war of aggression.

DER SPIEGEL: People like Yevgeny Prigozhin, for example, the head of the private mercenary unit known as the Wagner Group?

Kress: If the investigation were to substantiate the suspicion that he had a say in the aggression, then he would be among those who would have to answer to a special tribunal.

DER SPIEGEL: Still, it seems rather unrealistic that the leadership cadre surrounding Vladimir Putin will ever have to face an international court.

Kress: From today's perspective, it seems rather unlikely. Because for that to happen, Putin and his adherents would have to show up at the trial, and they won't do that. But there could be a change of government in Russia at some point. If the new people in power then wanted to come to terms with the injustice committed, the arrest and deportation of suspects could become a possibility.

DER SPIEGEL: There is nothing to indicate that such a thing might happen.

Kress: This was also said frequently before the trials of Slobodan Milošević, Radovan Karadžić and Ratko Mladić over the Yugoslav war. But things turned out differently. Incidentally, international investigations alone would send an important message to the international community. And what symbolic power would an arrest warrant and a well-substantiated, publicly accessible indictment against Putin and Co. have? It would be immense!

DER SPIEGEL: A few days ago, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock proposed the establishment of a kind of hybrid special tribunal. What do you think of the idea?

Kress: Not much.

DER SPIEGEL: Please explain?

Kress: The "hybrid" court that the minister has in mind would not be an international court. It would be a Ukrainian court located in The Hague, and it would administer Ukrainian law. And there would be a risk that it would end in disappointment.

DER SPIEGEL: Why?

Kress: Under current international law, Putin would enjoy immunity as acting head of state in a tribunal that is essentially Ukrainian. How do you intend to convince the Ukrainian people of the utility of establishing a tribunal at considerable expense that cannot even take action against the primary suspect Moreover, a tribunal must send an effective message reaffirming the universal ban on violence. But such a message can only be sent by an international tribunal that is part of the Nuremberg tradition and applies the international definition of aggression.

DER SPIEGEL: Baerbock has a master's degree in international law. What do you think of the fact that she, of all people, favors the hybrid model?

Kress: I suspect there are political reasons, not least the closing of ranks with France and Britain. Both are in favor of the "hybrid" model.

DER SPIEGEL: Is it possible that Paris and London don't want to see the crime of aggression prosecuted because they themselves have waged wars of aggression?

Kress: I fear it is because the governments of these two countries do not want a strong international precedent against aggression that would put them on the spot themselves in the future. Both governments have so far refused to subject their own use of military force to international scrutiny. These countries do not object to legal action against the crime of aggression, as long as it is directed at the Russians. But the uncomfortable thing about international criminal law is precisely that it must be applied to everyone. That, by the way, is precisely the promise made by the American prosecutor Robert Jackson at the opening of the Nuremberg trials.

"The question of the West's credibility is unfortunately justified, especially when it comes to crimes of aggression."

DER SPIEGEL: You advocate an international tribunal against those responsible in Russia. But the Global South is certain to point out that the West is quick to use international law when it comes to condemning others, but is wary of submitting to international jurisprudence itself.

Kress: The question of the West's credibility is unfortunately justified, especially when it comes to crimes of aggression. That's why a two-pronged strategy should be adopted, one that entails saying: Now we will set up a special court because we need to send the message quickly under international law in this dramatic emergency. At the same time, the loophole in the statute of the International Criminal Court, which is unprincipled, must be closed for the future. This is, to be sure, a process that will take time. But Minister Baerbock already spoke out in The Hague in favor of addressing it.

DER SPIEGEL: How do you propose establishing legitimacy for an international tribunal?

Kress: There is a clear model for this: The United Nations and Ukraine conclude a treaty. That treaty shall be concluded by the secretary-general on behalf of the UN upon request by the UN General Assembly.

DER SPIEGEL: Some claim that only the UN Security Council, in which Russia has a veto, is entitled to do so.

Kress: That's not a convincing argument. Hans Corell, the long-time legal adviser to the United Nations, has strongly affirmed that the General Assembly can participate in the establishment of an international tribunal as described. Here, too, alleged doubts about international law serve to camouflage a lack of political will.

DER SPIEGEL: There is also a political argument against this tribunal: It is unclear whether the support of a majority of countries can be found for it.

Kress: I'm not in favor of setting up a special tribunal at any price. I am only in favor of this if a convincing majority can be won for it in the General Assembly. So far, however, no attempt has been made to try to assemble such a majority. Lacking such an attempt, references to the high majority hurdle seem like a prophecy designed to be self-fulfilling.

DER SPIEGEL: It would help if you had the most important European partners, namely the French and the British, on your side.

Kress: Yes, but Germany is also allowed to take the lead for once in the service of a good cause. That is the position taken by the German government in the last 25 years in negotiations over the crime of aggression, always with a view to Germany's special historical responsibility. Incidentally, Europe would by no means be alone in taking this next step. Among most Europeans who have participated in the discussion intensively so far, there is strong support for an international special tribunal as part of the two-pronged strategy just outlined. Twelve European and non-European states, including Ukraine, recently expressed their support in a paper.

DER SPIEGEL: It has now taken German politicians almost a year to even come up with a position. What is your assessment of that hesitation?

Kress: I didn't understand it. It was basically clear on February 24, 2022, the day of the unleashing of the war of aggression: The crime of aggression must now be placed on the international agenda. Unfortunately, this crime not only played no role in German politics, but also in Western politics as a whole in the long run-up to the war of aggression.

DER SPIEGEL: What would that have changed?

Kress: Even someone like Putin is interested in ensuring that his international reputation doesn't plunge into the deepest abyss. There is a difference between just sending out the message that a war of aggression against Ukraine would be a political mistake and saying that it would be a crime under international law. Generally speaking, if the criminalization of aggression under international law is to gain preventive relevance in the medium and long term, then it must be addressed at the international level just as consistently as genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

DER SPIEGEL: At some point, the end of the war will have to be negotiated. Is it possible to conduct such negotiations with a president that you also want to bring to court?

Kress: International criminal law does not ignore the painful dilemmas of international relations. Humanitarian or political reasons may force one to say that criminal law must now take a back seat.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: An overview of the Bhubaneswari coal mine in Angul district in the Indian state of Odisha 

In India, ‘phase down’ of coal actually means rapid expansion of mining

A tripling of size is planned at the fastest-growing coal mine in India

WP by Karishma Mehrotra

TALCHER, India — Pungent fumes wafted from the deep pit that cuts across the landscape like a small, blackened version of the Grand Canyon. Trucks with sooty cargo rumbled along roads snaking toward the rim, far in the hazy distance.

Dibyajiban Si pointed excitedly at a map. Soon, this vast canyon — the fastest-growing coal mine in India — will stretch even farther into the surrounding plains.

“It will expand beyond this horizon. … This is the fastest excavation of 300 million tons in India,” said Si, the project manager of the Bhubaneswari mine. “Whatever targets they give us, we achieve it ahead of time.”

Here in eastern India, the Bhubaneswari mine is a testament to India’s vast coal reserves, among the largest in the world. The mine’s rapid expansion also is vivid evidence that the world’s second-largest consumer of coal is not ready to give it up, despite urgent concerns about the toll its use is taking on the climate. If anything, India’s coal production is accelerating, according to Coal Ministry data.

At the 2021 global climate forum in Glasgow known as COP26, India publicly promised a “phase down” of coal. But that doesn’t actually mean that India will use less — only that it will gradually generate a smaller proportion of its overall energy with coal. In absolute terms, the country expects its coal production and consumption to expand dramatically as its energy needs skyrocket in the coming decades because of economic growth.

In recent years, the Indian government has reopened old coal mines, carved out new ones, and, perhaps most telling, extended contracts to private mining companies for longer periods, suggesting that the country’s leaders won’t be ready to give up coal for at least 25 years, government officials and coal industry executives say.

“Our energy needs are first and foremost. The share of other sectors like renewable energy is not keeping up with our energy demand. Therefore, our dependence on coal is established,” Indian Coal Secretary Amrit Lal Meena said in an interview. “Whatever we produce is consumed. Every coal mine matters.”

The country committed itself last year at COP27 in Egypt to rely on fossil fuels for no more than half of its power capacity by 2030. But the share of electricity generated using sources other than fossil fuels has not increased for more than a decade and remains below a fifth of total power generation, according to data from the Power Ministry.

“When you take a step back and ask, ‘Is renewable energy [hitting] the targets?’ The answer is, unfortunately, no,” said Rahul Tongia, the author of the book “The Future of Coal in India.” “The backstop remains coal, even more so.”

The Indian government has set a target of producing 1 billion tons of coal in fiscal 2024, which ends in March 2024, up from 700 million tons produced so far in the current fiscal year ending next month. It is urging mining companies to excavate coal as quickly as possible because electricity demand is projected to soar. India is still connecting millions of remote homes to the power grid and, over the next two decades, expects to add as much new power generation as the amount now used by the entire European Union, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency.

“Keep it in the ground is a very Western concept,” said Rohit Chandra, an assistant professor at the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi who studies energy. “New renewable energy can only supply part of this growth for now. … We are decades away from coal playing an insignificant role in India’s power system.”

Pressure to accelerate mining

The Bhubaneswari mining site, near the town of Talcher, is estimated to contain 1 billion tons of relatively shallow coal, beyond the 300 million tons being excavated. The government plans over the next 25 years to triple the size of the mine to 3,700 acres and swallowing up 17 adjacent villages in the process. At the current rate of mining, the coal should last 35 years.

The government in 2011 awarded a 15-year extraction contract to Essel Mining, part of the Aditya Birla conglomerate. This was a new approach in India, and it has since then become much more common, with the government seeking to hasten coal production by turning operations at publicly owned mines over to private companies, mostly under 25-year contracts. Companies also have been given permission to own mines themselves, furthering the privatization of the sector.

After the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, when fuel supplies at Indian power plants ran low, the government gave the coal industry even more incentive to ramp up production by easing regulations.

A worker monitors the loading of coal onto a train near the Bhubaneswari mine on Feb. 1. (Rebecca Conway for The Washington Post)

At the Bhubaneswari mine, public officials and company executives say there is palpable pressure from the government to accelerate extraction operations. “The pressure is coming,” said Si, the project manager, a mustachioed man wearing a white hard-hat. He added, “As long as there is demand, we have to take it out. And that will remain for at least 20, 30 years.”

During colonial times, India’s British rulers ran three mines in the Talcher area. After Indian independence in 1947, there was little coal exploration in the surrounding area, now known as Odisha state, and only in recent years did it become a site of renewed mining activity.

Today, officials in New Delhi, the Indian capital, are enthusiastic about the Bhubaneswari mine because of its immense size and the easy access to its shallow — albeit low-quality — coal. In the surrounding villages, residents boast that they can dig two feet to find coal, which they call “fire stone” in the local language.

Outside the nearby Hingula mine, villagers frequent a temple built around a fire from an underground source, said by believers to be the Hindu goddess Hingula herself. Other locals say the fire is most likely the result of coal being exposed to oxygen and spontaneously igniting.

“It’s the natural gift of this place,” said Rajinder Singh Malhotra, an Essel Mining executive in Odisha.

A villager in an abandoned building in the village of Hensmul, which remains partially inhabited while residents wait to be relocated so the land can be absorbed into the Bhubaneswari coal mine. (Rebecca Conway for The Washington Post)

Lives and livelihoods tied to coal

Indian officials say they have no option but to mine. While energy companies have begun investing in renewable sources, the amount of funding is not nearly enough to make a substantial dent in the use of fossil fuel. And although India is the world’s third-largest emitter of carbon in absolute terms, it is one of the lowest emitters per capita and bears little responsibility for the past century’s emissions, which have been pumped into the atmosphere mostly by industrialized countries, officials note.

Moreover, coal mining is essential to the livelihoods of many thousands of Indians. “Talcher’s mines are now at their heyday of productivity,” said Suravee Nayak, a researcher with the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research who is from the Talcher region and has focused on coal mining there for a decade. “The local communities’ futures for generations are very much entangled with the existence of the coal mines.”

Around Talcher, many of the public buildings were constructed by Mahanadi Coalfields Ltd. (MCL), a state-affiliated company that owns much of the region’s mines. Schools and hospitals often bear its logo. Most of the workers in the area are employed in the mines or in businesses that support the mines and their labor force. Everyone says living standards have risen since mining arrived, driving economic growth evident in plush hotels and glass-walled restaurants.

Of course, there is also the mining dust.

“But no one wants the dust to end. The day the dust settles, that means the mines have died down,” said Soubhagya Pradhan, a Talcher-based retired union official and MCL employee. “The day the mines die down, that’s the day our home stoves will also die down.”

There is no doubt that coal mining over the past decade has taken a toll on many villagers and their surroundings. At the hamlet of Arakhpal, because of the dust, the palm trees have turned black and farming has ceased. Locals complain about new illnesses. And Arakhpal is about to lose 100 acres of land to the mine, adding more families to the 12,000 that Nayak, the think tank researcher, says have lost land to mining in the Talcher area. But mining still has wide support.

“Our national resource is coal. My land is only six feet deep. Whatever is below is the government’s. The quicker you take it, the better,” said Dinabandhu Pradhan, the head of the Arakhpal village government.

Unlike many villagers near mines elsewhere in India, almost all of the residents interviewed in the Talcher area say they actually wish more of their land was taken for the mine. They complain that the land with which they have been left is no longer arable and that they deserve the new employment and compensation that further acquisitions would offer.

In the village of Hensmul, which is perched on a long peninsula jutting into the pit with a panoramic view of the canyon below, residents say they will not move until promises of new homes and compensation are fulfilled. But, even there, villagers say coal is a source of national pride.

Pradhan says it is not up to foreign leaders — which he called “rajahs,” or rulers — to tell India what to do with its resources.

“The rest of the world’s rajahs are saying coal must stop,” said Pradhan. “But we are the rajah of our own country.”

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Image: Fluence

Hoping to make India a supply base for our global energy storage needs: Julian Nebreda CEO of Fluence 

The company's 150 MWh BESS will be commissioned by July-August in Karnataka.

MONEYCONTROL.COM BY SWETA GOSWAMI & RACHITA PRASAD

FEBRUARY 24, 2023 

The joint venture (JV) between ReNew, one of India’s largest renewable energy companies, and Fluence Energy, a US-based energy storage and digital applications company, is going to scale up the manufacture of battery energy storage systems (BESS) in India, said Julian Nebreda, President and CEO, Fluence.

In an interaction with Moneycontrol, Nebreda and Jan Teichmann, Regional President, APAC, at Fluence, said the JV will focus on localising products related to BESS in India as well as in other countries.

Fluence is a global leader in energy storage and digital applications for renewables, and the JV with ReNew was firmed up last December.

Our plan is to localise all our products in India. Probably by the end of 2024, we would have done the majority of product localisation of energy storage systems. The localisation of batteries, however, will be subject to the availability of local supplies. But, hopefully by 2026-2027, depending on how battery manufacturing capabilities get built in India, we will have 100 percent localisation of products,” said Nebreda.

Teichmann explained that Fluence would be responsible for the product and engineering knowhow in the JV, and ReNew will be responsible for the renewable energy projects for which the BESS will be built. “We are also hoping to make India a supply base for our global needs. So, India could export to Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) nations and potentially, Europe. We are already doing projects in India,” he said.

Teichmann also stated that going by the current pace of projects, it might take India 3-4 years to actually start adding 5 GWh of battery storage annually to meet its goal of 50 GWh of domestic capacity by 2030. India plans to generate 50 percent of its electricity from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030. Further, it aims to achieve net zero by 2070.

India’s battery storage schemes will boost EVs

Nebreda said the push for electric vehicles (EV) in India will automatically make the country an attractive manufacturing location for energy storage systems. “That's one element. The second element is that the Indian government’s energy storage programme was also driven by the EV push. This will catalyse the production of batteries in India. Since gas is expensive and renewable energy is intermittent, energy storage systems are the natural solution,” he added.

As part of India’s EV Vision 2030, the government has targeted 30 percent electric vehicle (EV) penetration by 2030.

On May 12, 2021, the union government approved a production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for the manufacture of advanced chemistry cell (ACC) battery storage. The total outlay of the scheme is Rs. 18,100 crore over a period of five years.

Also, in her budget speech on February 1, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that BESS projects will be offered viability gap funding (VGF) for a total capacity of 4,000 MWh.

First 150 MWh BESS of the JV to be ready by July-August

Teichmann informed that a 150 MWh BESS will be commissioned by July-August in Karnataka. “This will be the biggest at present. But bigger BESS’ from others are set to come up very soon. However, this is not our first project in India. Our first project was a 10 MWh system in Delhi in 2019.”

Next, he said, the company will set up a 50 MWh BESS by the end of this year. “But there will be more soon. We also have Fluence’s cloud-based asset performance management software, which we plan to apply on every system globally, including our projects in India,” he added.

Teichmann said the asset performance management software helps monitor the system up to the cell level of the batteries. “What is the temperature, what is the performance, what is the status of the system (in order to predict output)? It tells all that. It also predicts service needs in real time. It is a very detailed monitoring system, which helps improve system performance,” he explained.

He added that the company is also attracted to the commercial and industrial (C&I) market and is exploring corporate power purchase agreements (PPAs). “We are trying to figure out how big that market really is. It is an interesting segment,” Teichmann said.

News round-up, Tuesday, February 28, 2023

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Editor's thoughts…

—-”According to the journal Plos Pathogens from the University of Kent (England), the SARC-COv-2 virus was discovered for the first time on Friday, 17 November 2019, in Wuhan, China. An organism with a simple structure composed of proteins and nucleic acids can reproduce only within specific living cells, using its metabolism.

Our effective behaviours are the cruellest change that humanity has undergone because of the Coronavirus. This little —monster— certainly aroused the paranoia of terror in us in a very evil way... let us know.  It certainly did, that we would die if we were in the company of other individuals of our kind, who were then already submerged by the sophistication of the 2.0 world, where genuine expressions of affection, handshakes, and hugs ... which do so much good for the intangible parts of the so-called soul, have been replaced by intangible faces flowing at an infinite density —billions— per second, without any compassionate human contact whatsoever.

What cruelty have we been subjected to ... How many of our loved ones are not with us today?  Why?  Because —perhaps—, of a human error in a laboratory in the isolated province of Wuhan in millennium China”.

THE DROUGHT BY GERMÁN & CO, SEPTEMBER, 2022

Most read…

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP BY JOBY WARRICK, ELLEN NAKASHIMA AND  SHANE HARRIS

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

REUTERS

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

LNG expansion in Europe opposes climate goals, says research

Researchers warn the doubling down on long-term liquefied natural gas deals in Europe threatens to derail decarbonization efforts.

reuters BY BEATRICE BEDESCHI, WRITING FOR GAS OUTLOOK

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”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says…

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

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Image: Germán & Co

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP BY JOBY WARRICK, ELLEN NAKASHIMA AND  SHANE HARRIS

February 27, 2023

U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said Feb. 27 that China needs to be more honest about “what happened three years ago in Wuhan” with covid-19’s origin.

The theory that covid-19 started with a lab accident in central China received a modest boost in the latest U.S. intelligence assessment after the work of a little-known scientific team that conducts some of the federal government’s most secretive and technically challenging investigations of emerging security threats, current and former U.S. officials said Monday.

An analysis by experts from the U.S. national laboratory complex — including members of a storied team known as Z-Division — prompted the Energy Department to change its view earlier this year about the likely cause of the 2019 coronavirus outbreak, the officials said. Though initially undecided about covid-19’s origins, Energy officials concluded as part of a new government-wide intelligence assessment that a lab accident was most likely the triggering event for the world’s worst pandemic in a century.

But other intelligence agencies involved in the classified update — completed in the past few weeks and kept under wraps — were divided on the question of covid-19’s origins, with most still maintaining that a natural, evolutionary “spillover” from animals was the most likely explanation. Even the Energy Department’s analysis was carefully hedged, as the officials expressed only “low confidence” in their conclusion, according to U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a classified report.

The overall view — that there is as yet no definitive conclusion on the virus’s origin — has not changed since the release of an earlier version of the report by the Biden administration in 2021, according to the officials.

“The bottom line remains the same: Basically no one really knows,” one of the officials said.

Still, the news that Energy had shifted its view reignited what was already an intense debate on social media and in Washington, where members of Congress are preparing for hearings — some as early as Tuesday — exploring the circumstances behind the outbreak.

“To prevent the next pandemic, we need to know how this one began,” Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in response to news of the updated assessment, first reported Sunday by the Wall Street Journal. “The administration must move with a sense of urgency and use every tool at its disposal to ensure that we understand the origins of covid-19.”

U.S. officials confirmed that an updated assessment of covid-19’s origins was completed this year, and said the document was based on fresh data as well as new analysis by experts from eight intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council.

But the agencies are united, the official said, in the view that the virus was not man-made or developed as a bioweapon.

“‘Lab’ does not equal ‘man-made,’ the official said. “Even if it was a leak from a lab, they still think it would be a naturally occurring virus.”

Among the nine intelligence entities involved in the assessment, only the FBI had previously concluded, with “moderate” confidence, that covid-19 started with a lab accident. The Energy Department was the only agency that changed its view, while the CIA and one other agency remained undecided, lacking enough compelling evidence to support one conclusion over the other, officials said.

Even at low confidence, however, the Energy Department’s analysis carries weight. For its assessment, the department drew on the expertise of a team assembled from the U.S. national laboratory complex, which employs tens of thousands of scientists representing many technical specialties, from physics and data analysis to genomics and molecular biology.

The labs were established as part of the U.S. nuclear weapons program and operate largely in the classified realm. The department’s cadre of technical experts includes members of the Energy Department’s Z-Division, which since the 1960s has been involved in secretive investigations of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons threats by U.S. adversaries, including China and Russia.

The Energy Department is “a technical organization with tens of thousands of scientists,” said a former energy official. “It’s more than just physics. It’s chemical and biological expertise. And they have a unique opportunity to look at intelligence from the technical aspect.”

Both the Energy Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on the revised assessment. It was unclear what, precisely, prompted officials at Energy to see a lab leak as the more probable explanation for how covid-19 began.

Neither of the leading theories — a natural spillover or a lab leak — have been conclusively validated, in part because of China’s refusal to allow independent investigators access to environmental samples and other raw data from the earliest weeks of the outbreak.

Many scientists — and, at least for now, the majority of U.S. intelligence agencies — favor the spillover hypothesis, which holds that the virus jumped from bats to humans, perhaps at a Chinese market, and presumably after passing through a third species that had come to harbor what became known as the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Yet, three years after the outbreak began, the search for the elusive “carrier” species has produced no firm leads. The bats that naturally harbor viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 are native to Southeast Asia and southern China, about 1,000 miles from Wuhan, where the first cases of covid-19 were reported.

Likewise, no hard evidence of a lab leak has emerged. Supporters of the leak theory note that the outbreak began in a city that happens to be the world’s leading center for research on coronaviruses. China has had previous lab accidents, including an incident in 2004 in which lab workers were inadvertently exposed to the original SARS virus, and subsequently spread the pathogen outside the lab, resulting in multiple illnesses and at least one death, according to a World Health Organization probe.

China has repeatedly denied that an accident occurred. On Monday, Beijing denounced the new report linking Chinese labs to the pandemic, with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning demanding that the United States “stop defaming China.”

“Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should not be politicized,” she said.

The Biden administration on Monday emphasized the inclusive nature of the evidence so far. National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby, speaking at a White House briefing, said the new intelligence assessment was part of an ongoing “whole of government” effort to investigate how covid-19 began, although he acknowledged that firm conclusions have remained elusive.

“There is not a consensus right now in the U.S. government about exactly how covid started,” Kirby told reporters. “That work is still ongoing, but the president believes it’s really important that we continue that work and that we find out as best we can how it started so that we can better prevent a future pandemic.”

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines is scheduled to testify at a Senate worldwide threats hearing next week and probably will be asked to address the matter. The House select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic was set to hold a roundtable exploring early covid-19 policy decisions on Tuesday.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Germán & Co

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Reuters

LONDON, Feb 28 (Reuters) - Banks gave 81 cents in financing support to low carbon energy supply for every dollar they provided to fossil fuels in 2021, a report showed on Tuesday, but they will need to ramp up their commitments much further for the world to hit its climate goals.

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

Energy analysts BloombergNEF compiled data from 1,142 banks for what it calls an "Energy Supply Banking Ratio" to assess whether banks are aligning their financing to the real economy and the 1.5 degrees target.

In 2021, bank financing for energy supply totalled $1.9 trillion, just over $1 trillion of which went to fossil fuels and $842 billion to low carbon energy projects and companies, according to the report.

The bank financing ratio, of 81 cents to $1, was below the global energy supply investment ratio of 90 cents to $1.

The latter ratio has been climbing in recent years from around 0.45:1 between 2011 and 2015.

"While a bounce in fossil-fuel investment is expected to counter the disruption caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the underlying economics of low-carbon energy supply mean its growth will be sustained," said BloombergNEF CEO Jon Moore, noting 2022's 15% rise in low carbon energy supply investment.

Individual banks' financing ratios varied. The Royal Bank of Canada had a 0.4 ratio and JP Morgan 0.7, against BNP Paribas' 1.7 and Deutsche Bank's 2.2, according to BloombergNEF, which said differences reflect geographic focus, client bases and strategies.

JP Morgan and RBC did not respond to requests for comment.

The report's findings differ from another study published by environmental groups last month which said the share of bank financing going to renewables had stagnated.

BloombergNEF said its research covered financing from far more banks than other studies.

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

…Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

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Image: Germán & Co

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

LONDON — After four months of intense talks (and plenty of squabbling before that), the EU and U.K. have a deal to resolve their long-running post-Brexit trade row over Northern Ireland.

But as U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak works to sell the so-called “Windsor framework” on the Northern Ireland protocol to Brexiteers and unionists, lawmakers on both sides of the English Channel and of the Irish Sea are getting to grips with the details.

From paperwork to plants, let POLITICO walk you through the new agreement, asking: Who has given ground, and how exactly will the deal thrashed out by EU and U.K. negotiators aim to keep the bloc’s prized single market secure?

Customs paperwork and checks

For businesses taking part in an expanded “trusted trader scheme,” the Windsor framework aims to considerably cut customs paperwork and checks on goods moving from Great Britain but destined to stay in Northern Ireland. 

These goods will pass through a “green lane” requiring minimal paperwork and be labeled “Not for EU,” while those heading for the EU single market in the Republic of Ireland will undergo full EU customs checks in Northern Ireland’s ports under a “red lane.”

Traders in the green lane will only need to complete a single, digitized certificate per truck movement, rather than multiple forms per load.

Sunak has already claimed that this means “any sense of a border in the Irish Sea” — deeply controversial among Northern Ireland’s unionist politicians — has now been “removed.”

However, it’s by no means a total end to Irish Sea red tape. An EU official said that although the deal delivers a “dramatic reduction” in the number of physical food safety checks, for example, there will still be some — those seen as “essential” to avoid the risk of goods entering the single market.

These checks will be based on risk assessments and intelligence, and aimed at preventing smuggling and criminality.

U.K. public health and safety standards will meanwhile apply to all retail food and drink within the U.K. internal market. British rules on public health, marketing, organics, labeling, genetic modification, and drinks such as wines, spirits and mineral waters will apply in Northern Ireland. This will remove more than 60 EU food and drink rules in the original protocol, which were detailed in more than 1,000 pages of legislation.

Supermarkets, wholesalers, hospitality and food producers are likely to welcome the new arrangements. Many had stopped supplying to Northern Ireland because the cost of filling out hundreds of certificates for each consignment was deemed too high for a market as small as Northern Ireland. 

Export declarations have been removed for the vast majority of goods moving from Northern Ireland to Great Britain.

The EU’s safeguards: While offering to drastically reduce the volume of checks carried out, the EU has toughened its criteria to become a trusted trader under the expanded scheme. The EU will now have access to databases tracking shipments of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland in real time. The system was tested through the winter, helping build trust in Brussels, and is being fed with data from traders and U.K. authorities. The European Commission will be able to suspend part or all of these trade easements if the U.K. fails to comply with the new rules.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will consult with businesses in the “coming months” before implementing the new rules. The green lane will come into force this fall. Labels for meat, meat products and minimally-processed dairy products such as fresh milk will come into force from October 1, 2024. All relevant products will be marked by July 1, 2025. “Shelf-stable” products like bread and pasta will not be labeled.

Governance

A key plank of the deal is the bid to address complaints by Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) — currently boycotting the power-sharing assembly in the region in opposition to the protocol — that lawmakers there did not have a say in the imposition of new EU rules in the region.

Under the terms of the new agreement, the Commission will have to give the U.K. government notice of future EU regulations intended to apply in Northern Ireland. According to Sunak, Stormont will be given a new power to “pull an emergency brake on changes to EU goods rules” based on “cross-community consent.”

Under this mechanism, the U.K. government will be able to suspend the application in Northern Ireland of an incoming piece of EU law at the request of at least 30 members of the assembly — a third of them. But if unionist parties in Northern Ireland want to trigger the new “Stormont brake,” they must first return to the power-sharing institutions which they abandoned last May. The EU and the U.K. could subsequently agree to apply such a rule in a meeting of the Joint Committee, which oversees the protocol.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said this new tool remains an emergency mechanism that hopefully will not need to be used. A second EU official said it would be triggered “under the most exceptional circumstances and as a matter of last resort in a well-defined process” set out in a unilateral declaration by the U.K. These include that the rules have a “significant and lasting impact on the everyday lives” of people in the region.

If the EU disagrees with the U.K.’s trigger of the Stormont brake, the two would resolve the issue through independent arbitration, instead of involving the Court of Justice of the EU.

Meanwhile, Northern Ireland’s courts will consider disputes over the application of EU rules in the region, and judges could decide whether to consult the CJEU on how to interpret them. In a key concession, the Commission has agreed not to unilaterally refer a case to the CJEU, although it retains the power to do so.

The EU’s safeguards: The CJEU will remain the “sole and ultimate arbiter of EU law” and will have the “final say” on EU single market disputes, von der Leyen stressed. Whether Brexiteers and the DUP are willing to accept that remains the million-dollar question.

Tax, state aid and EU rules

The U.K. government will now be able to set rules in areas such as VAT and state aid that will also apply in Northern Ireland — two major wins for Sunak that were rejected by the Commission in previous rounds of negotiations with other U.K. prime ministers.

It will, Sunak was at pains to point out Monday, allow Westminster to pass on a cut in alcohol duty that previously passed Northern Ireland by.

But London has had to give up on its idea of establishing a dual-regulatory mechanism that would have allowed Northern Ireland businesses to choose whether they would follow EU or British rules when manufacturing goods, depending on whether they intended to sell them in the EU single market or in the U.K. The whole idea was deemed by Brussels as impossible to police.

The EU’s safeguards: Northern Irish businesses producing goods for the U.K. internal market will only have to follow “less than 3 percent” of EU single market rules, a U.K. official said. But the nature of these regulations remains unclear, and there will be increased market surveillance and enforcement by U.K. authorities to try and reassure the EU.

The timeline: The U.K. government will be able to exercise these powers as soon as the Windsor framework comes into force.

Parcels

The EU and the U.K. have agreed to scrap customs processes for parcels being sent between consumers in Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Parcels sent between businesses will now move through the new green lane, as is the case for other goods destined to stay in Northern Ireland. That should allow them to be monitored, but remove the need to undergo international customs procedures. Parcel operators will share commercial data with the U.K.’s tax authority, HMRC, in a bid to reduce risks to the EU single market.

Timeline: These new arrangements will take effect September 2024.

Pets

Residents in Great Britain will be able to take their dogs, cats and ferrets to Northern Ireland without having to fulfill a requirement for a rabies vaccine, tapeworm treatment and other checks.

Pets traveling from Northern Ireland to Great Britain and back will not be required to have any documentation, declarations, checks or health treatments.

The EU’s safeguards: Microchipped pets will be able to travel with a life-long pet travel document issued for free by the U.K.’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Pet owners will tick a box in their travel booking acknowledging they accept the scheme rules and will not move their pet into the EU.

The timeline: The new rules will take effect fall 2023.

Medicines

Drugs approved for use by the U.K.’s medicines regulator, the MHRA, will be automatically available in every pharmacy and hospital in Northern Ireland, “at the same time and under the same conditions” as in the U.K., von der Leyen said. 

Businesses will need to secure approval for a U.K.-wide license from the MHRA to supply medicines to Northern Ireland, rather than having to go through the European Medicines Agency. The agreement removes any EU Falsified Medicines Directive packaging, labeling and barcode requirements for medicines. This means manufacturers will be able to produce a single medicines pack design for the whole of the U.K., including Northern Ireland.

Drugs being shipped into Northern Ireland from Great Britain will be freed of customs paperwork, checks and duties, with traders only being required to provide ordinary commercial information.

The EU’s safeguards: Medicines traveling from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will do so via the new green lane, which will have monitoring to protect the single market built in.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will engage with the medicines industry soon on these changes.

Plants

The deal lifts the protocol’s ban on seed potatoes entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain, and its prohibition on trees and shrubs deemed of “high risk” for the EU single market. This will enable garden centers and other businesses in Northern Ireland to sell 11 native species to Great Britain and some from other regions.

The Windsor framework also removes sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) checks on all these plants, and ditches red tape on their shipment into Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Supplying businesses will have to obtain a Northern Ireland plant health label, which will be the same as the plant passport already required within Great Britain, but with the addition of the words “for use in the U.K. only” and a QR code linking to the rules.

Russia’s strategy of plunging the country into darkness and cold has, if not outright failed, certainly not succeeded, either. Public opinion has not shifted as a result of the blackouts—polls in recent months have shown that more than eighty per cent of respondents in Ukraine want to continue the fight, the same number as before the attacks on the energy grid began. Over time, Ukraine’s air defenses have improved, and its technicians have got faster at repairing the electrical grid. Russia’s stock of long-range missiles, meanwhile, has dwindled, leading to less frequent attacks.

The onset of spring will bring lower electricity consumption, and Kudrytskyi, the head of Ukrenergo, expects that the Ukrainian grid will soon stabilize. “Russia did not achieve its ultimate goal,” he said. “Yes, they managed to create problems for nearly every Ukrainian family.” But that is only half the story: “Instead of making us scared and unhappy, it made us angry, more resolved to win. They did not lower the morale of the nation; they mobilized the nation.”

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Image: Germán & Co

LNG expansion in Europe opposes climate goals, says research

Researchers warn the doubling down on long-term liquefied natural gas deals in Europe threatens to derail decarbonization efforts.

reuters BY BEATRICE BEDESCHI, WRITING FOR GAS OUTLOOK

FEBRUARY 8, 2023 5:00 AM CET

The raft of new liquefied natural gas (LNG) import projects being planned in Europe, as well as the long-term gas deals being signed by buyers in recent months are incompatible with decarbonization targets and risk jeopardizing the continent’s energy transition, a report by nonprofit research organization Global Energy Monitor (GEM) has warned.

The Ukraine war has led to a massive boost in import capacity across Europe, with 195 billion cubic meters/year lined up for commissioning between 2022 and 2026.

Some of this new capacity is already online, including the Krk floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) in Croatia, the Revithoussa LNG Terminal in Greece and the Eemshaven FSRU in the Netherlands, as well as the Wilhelmshaven and Lubmin FRSUs in Germany, which started receiving cargoes between December and January.

In 2021, the EU imported 155 billion cubic meters of gas from Russia, including LNG.

While some short-term supplies have been secured at a high price this winter, the vast majority of the new capacity will become available too late to address security issues for this winter and the next, which is when they’re most needed, the report argued.

The main concern is that all that planned capacity probably won’t be needed in the future.

While “LNG growing capacity could be in contrast with decarbonization targets… The main concern is that all that planned capacity probably won’t be needed in the future as the demand for LNG is not expected to grow at the same pace as the LNG future facilities are expected to be built,” Ana Maria Jaller-Makarewicz, Europe energy analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) told Gas Outlook.

“For the last 10 years or more the gas demand in Europe hasn’t increased and if these new patterns in demand persist, the demand won’t be expected to grow in the future,” she said.

“As a result, it is likely that these new LNG terminals will become stranded assets in the future.”

Germany considers re-export option

At the same time, 15-20 year-long gas deals signed recently run contrary to EU law, which implies a 35 percent decrease in gas demand to 2035, the report said.

“Because it is a sellers’ market, sellers have the upper hand and buyers are being forced to consider longer-term contracts, even if they do not expect strong demand in the future,” Jaller-Makarewicz said.

Long-term agreements signed include Polish PGNiG’s 20-year deal with U.S. major Sempra for four billion cubic meters/year starting in 2027; and French Engie’s 15-year agreement also with Sempra for 1.2 billion cubic meters/year from 2027.

Moreover, Bulgaria’s state-owned Bulgargaz and Turkey’s Botas signed a deal in January granting Bulgaria access to Botas’ LNG and transit pipelines for 13 years.

The vast majority of contracts announced recently were however between U.S. exporters and German buyers.

“Fifteen years is great… I wouldn’t have had anything against 20 [years] or longer contracts,” Germany’s economy minister Robert Habeck was quoted as saying in November, commenting on Conoco Phillips’ deal with Qatar.

Habeck added in the future the need to meet climate targets and therefore to reduce gas volumes would result in German companies having to deliver the volumes to other countries.

Redirecting the volumes in the 2030s is an imperative for EU member states that are serious about hitting climate targets and reducing gas demand.

“Redirecting the volumes in the 2030s is an imperative for EU member states that are serious about hitting climate targets and reducing gas demand,” the GEM report’s author, Greig Aitken, told Gas Outlook. However, he said the “fundamental issue is that by entering long-term contracts at all, EU countries are potentially giving producer countries such as the U.S. the guarantees they need to continue production of fracked gas for export via new export terminals.”  

These need “longer-term contract guarantees to be financially feasible. The rush for new, non-Russian supplies”, he said, is likely to create “unnecessary gas lock-in for too long, however countries try to mitigate against this by rerouting supplies.”

Andy Flower, independent consultant at FlowerLNG, told Gas Outlook: “New U.S. projects typically require a 20-year contract to support the raising of funds to support the investment in liquefaction facilities, but the contracts have destination flexibility so cargoes can be traded to alternative markets if not needed in Europe to offset the cost.

“Non-U.S. project like Qatar are typically looking for a long-term contract with little or no destination flexibility, which makes it a major commitment for a European buyer when the EU is legislating for the reduction and eventual elimination of natural gas use.”

On the other hand, the fact many new terminals are relying on FSRUs means these “can be moved to other locations if no longer needed as has already happened with FSRU-based terminals in, for example, the USA, Brazil, Egypt and Israel, or used to trade as LNG carriers”, Flower said. “So the developers of these terminals are not making a 20-year or longer commitment to use them as FSRUs.”

Stranded asset risk for these is being downplayed by promoters with their claims about future conversion to green hydrogen.

The potential repurposing of these terminals for ammonia or hydrogen imports in later years has also been suggested as a way to address the risk of stranded assets.

However, “the economics and practicalities of these conversions are still very uncertain” and the “stranded asset risk for these is being downplayed by promoters with their claims about future conversion to green hydrogen,” Aitken said.

This article was originally published by Gas Outlook.

News round-up, Tuesday, February 28, 2023. (copia)

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Editor's thoughts…

—-”According to the journal Plos Pathogens from the University of Kent (England), the SARC-COv-2 virus was discovered for the first time on Friday, 17 November 2019, in Wuhan, China. An organism with a simple structure composed of proteins and nucleic acids can reproduce only within specific living cells, using its metabolism.

Our effective behaviours are the cruellest change that humanity has undergone because of the Coronavirus. This little —monster— certainly aroused the paranoia of terror in us in a very evil way... let us know.  It certainly did, that we would die if we were in the company of other individuals of our kind, who were then already submerged by the sophistication of the 2.0 world, where genuine expressions of affection, handshakes, and hugs ... which do so much good for the intangible parts of the so-called soul, have been replaced by intangible faces flowing at an infinite density —billions— per second, without any compassionate human contact whatsoever.

What cruelty have we been subjected to ... How many of our loved ones are not with us today?  Why?  Because —perhaps—, of a human error in a laboratory in the isolated province of Wuhan in millennium China”.

THE drought by germán & co, september, 2022

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Most read…

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP by Joby Warrick, Ellen Nakashima and  Shane Harris

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

Reuters

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

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…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Germán & Co

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP by Joby Warrick, Ellen Nakashima and  Shane Harris

February 27, 2023

U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said Feb. 27 that China needs to be more honest about “what happened three years ago in Wuhan” with covid-19’s origin.

The theory that covid-19 started with a lab accident in central China received a modest boost in the latest U.S. intelligence assessment after the work of a little-known scientific team that conducts some of the federal government’s most secretive and technically challenging investigations of emerging security threats, current and former U.S. officials said Monday.

An analysis by experts from the U.S. national laboratory complex — including members of a storied team known as Z-Division — prompted the Energy Department to change its view earlier this year about the likely cause of the 2019 coronavirus outbreak, the officials said. Though initially undecided about covid-19’s origins, Energy officials concluded as part of a new government-wide intelligence assessment that a lab accident was most likely the triggering event for the world’s worst pandemic in a century.

But other intelligence agencies involved in the classified update — completed in the past few weeks and kept under wraps — were divided on the question of covid-19’s origins, with most still maintaining that a natural, evolutionary “spillover” from animals was the most likely explanation. Even the Energy Department’s analysis was carefully hedged, as the officials expressed only “low confidence” in their conclusion, according to U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a classified report.

The overall view — that there is as yet no definitive conclusion on the virus’s origin — has not changed since the release of an earlier version of the report by the Biden administration in 2021, according to the officials.

“The bottom line remains the same: Basically no one really knows,” one of the officials said.

Still, the news that Energy had shifted its view reignited what was already an intense debate on social media and in Washington, where members of Congress are preparing for hearings — some as early as Tuesday — exploring the circumstances behind the outbreak.

“To prevent the next pandemic, we need to know how this one began,” Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in response to news of the updated assessment, first reported Sunday by the Wall Street Journal. “The administration must move with a sense of urgency and use every tool at its disposal to ensure that we understand the origins of covid-19.”

U.S. officials confirmed that an updated assessment of covid-19’s origins was completed this year, and said the document was based on fresh data as well as new analysis by experts from eight intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council.

But the agencies are united, the official said, in the view that the virus was not man-made or developed as a bioweapon.

“‘Lab’ does not equal ‘man-made,’ the official said. “Even if it was a leak from a lab, they still think it would be a naturally occurring virus.”

Among the nine intelligence entities involved in the assessment, only the FBI had previously concluded, with “moderate” confidence, that covid-19 started with a lab accident. The Energy Department was the only agency that changed its view, while the CIA and one other agency remained undecided, lacking enough compelling evidence to support one conclusion over the other, officials said.

Even at low confidence, however, the Energy Department’s analysis carries weight. For its assessment, the department drew on the expertise of a team assembled from the U.S. national laboratory complex, which employs tens of thousands of scientists representing many technical specialties, from physics and data analysis to genomics and molecular biology.

The labs were established as part of the U.S. nuclear weapons program and operate largely in the classified realm. The department’s cadre of technical experts includes members of the Energy Department’s Z-Division, which since the 1960s has been involved in secretive investigations of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons threats by U.S. adversaries, including China and Russia.

The Energy Department is “a technical organization with tens of thousands of scientists,” said a former energy official. “It’s more than just physics. It’s chemical and biological expertise. And they have a unique opportunity to look at intelligence from the technical aspect.”

Both the Energy Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on the revised assessment. It was unclear what, precisely, prompted officials at Energy to see a lab leak as the more probable explanation for how covid-19 began.

Neither of the leading theories — a natural spillover or a lab leak — have been conclusively validated, in part because of China’s refusal to allow independent investigators access to environmental samples and other raw data from the earliest weeks of the outbreak.

Many scientists — and, at least for now, the majority of U.S. intelligence agencies — favor the spillover hypothesis, which holds that the virus jumped from bats to humans, perhaps at a Chinese market, and presumably after passing through a third species that had come to harbor what became known as the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Yet, three years after the outbreak began, the search for the elusive “carrier” species has produced no firm leads. The bats that naturally harbor viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 are native to Southeast Asia and southern China, about 1,000 miles from Wuhan, where the first cases of covid-19 were reported.

Likewise, no hard evidence of a lab leak has emerged. Supporters of the leak theory note that the outbreak began in a city that happens to be the world’s leading center for research on coronaviruses. China has had previous lab accidents, including an incident in 2004 in which lab workers were inadvertently exposed to the original SARS virus, and subsequently spread the pathogen outside the lab, resulting in multiple illnesses and at least one death, according to a World Health Organization probe.

China has repeatedly denied that an accident occurred. On Monday, Beijing denounced the new report linking Chinese labs to the pandemic, with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning demanding that the United States “stop defaming China.”

“Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should not be politicized,” she said.

The Biden administration on Monday emphasized the inclusive nature of the evidence so far. National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby, speaking at a White House briefing, said the new intelligence assessment was part of an ongoing “whole of government” effort to investigate how covid-19 began, although he acknowledged that firm conclusions have remained elusive.

“There is not a consensus right now in the U.S. government about exactly how covid started,” Kirby told reporters. “That work is still ongoing, but the president believes it’s really important that we continue that work and that we find out as best we can how it started so that we can better prevent a future pandemic.”

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines is scheduled to testify at a Senate worldwide threats hearing next week and probably will be asked to address the matter. The House select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic was set to hold a roundtable exploring early covid-19 policy decisions on Tuesday.

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Image: Germán & Co

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Reuters

LONDON, Feb 28 (Reuters) - Banks gave 81 cents in financing support to low carbon energy supply for every dollar they provided to fossil fuels in 2021, a report showed on Tuesday, but they will need to ramp up their commitments much further for the world to hit its climate goals.

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

Energy analysts BloombergNEF compiled data from 1,142 banks for what it calls an "Energy Supply Banking Ratio" to assess whether banks are aligning their financing to the real economy and the 1.5 degrees target.

In 2021, bank financing for energy supply totalled $1.9 trillion, just over $1 trillion of which went to fossil fuels and $842 billion to low carbon energy projects and companies, according to the report.

The bank financing ratio, of 81 cents to $1, was below the global energy supply investment ratio of 90 cents to $1.

The latter ratio has been climbing in recent years from around 0.45:1 between 2011 and 2015.

"While a bounce in fossil-fuel investment is expected to counter the disruption caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the underlying economics of low-carbon energy supply mean its growth will be sustained," said BloombergNEF CEO Jon Moore, noting 2022's 15% rise in low carbon energy supply investment.

Individual banks' financing ratios varied. The Royal Bank of Canada had a 0.4 ratio and JP Morgan 0.7, against BNP Paribas' 1.7 and Deutsche Bank's 2.2, according to BloombergNEF, which said differences reflect geographic focus, client bases and strategies.

JP Morgan and RBC did not respond to requests for comment.

The report's findings differ from another study published by environmental groups last month which said the share of bank financing going to renewables had stagnated.

BloombergNEF said its research covered financing from far more banks than other studies.

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Source: The New Yorker

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

LONDON — After four months of intense talks (and plenty of squabbling before that), the EU and U.K. have a deal to resolve their long-running post-Brexit trade row over Northern Ireland.

But as U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak works to sell the so-called “Windsor framework” on the Northern Ireland protocol to Brexiteers and unionists, lawmakers on both sides of the English Channel and of the Irish Sea are getting to grips with the details.

From paperwork to plants, let POLITICO walk you through the new agreement, asking: Who has given ground, and how exactly will the deal thrashed out by EU and U.K. negotiators aim to keep the bloc’s prized single market secure?

Customs paperwork and checks

For businesses taking part in an expanded “trusted trader scheme,” the Windsor framework aims to considerably cut customs paperwork and checks on goods moving from Great Britain but destined to stay in Northern Ireland. 

These goods will pass through a “green lane” requiring minimal paperwork and be labeled “Not for EU,” while those heading for the EU single market in the Republic of Ireland will undergo full EU customs checks in Northern Ireland’s ports under a “red lane.”

Traders in the green lane will only need to complete a single, digitized certificate per truck movement, rather than multiple forms per load.

Sunak has already claimed that this means “any sense of a border in the Irish Sea” — deeply controversial among Northern Ireland’s unionist politicians — has now been “removed.”

However, it’s by no means a total end to Irish Sea red tape. An EU official said that although the deal delivers a “dramatic reduction” in the number of physical food safety checks, for example, there will still be some — those seen as “essential” to avoid the risk of goods entering the single market.

These checks will be based on risk assessments and intelligence, and aimed at preventing smuggling and criminality.

U.K. public health and safety standards will meanwhile apply to all retail food and drink within the U.K. internal market. British rules on public health, marketing, organics, labeling, genetic modification, and drinks such as wines, spirits and mineral waters will apply in Northern Ireland. This will remove more than 60 EU food and drink rules in the original protocol, which were detailed in more than 1,000 pages of legislation.

Supermarkets, wholesalers, hospitality and food producers are likely to welcome the new arrangements. Many had stopped supplying to Northern Ireland because the cost of filling out hundreds of certificates for each consignment was deemed too high for a market as small as Northern Ireland. 

Export declarations have been removed for the vast majority of goods moving from Northern Ireland to Great Britain.

The EU’s safeguards: While offering to drastically reduce the volume of checks carried out, the EU has toughened its criteria to become a trusted trader under the expanded scheme. The EU will now have access to databases tracking shipments of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland in real time. The system was tested through the winter, helping build trust in Brussels, and is being fed with data from traders and U.K. authorities. The European Commission will be able to suspend part or all of these trade easements if the U.K. fails to comply with the new rules.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will consult with businesses in the “coming months” before implementing the new rules. The green lane will come into force this fall. Labels for meat, meat products and minimally-processed dairy products such as fresh milk will come into force from October 1, 2024. All relevant products will be marked by July 1, 2025. “Shelf-stable” products like bread and pasta will not be labeled.

Governance

A key plank of the deal is the bid to address complaints by Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) — currently boycotting the power-sharing assembly in the region in opposition to the protocol — that lawmakers there did not have a say in the imposition of new EU rules in the region.

Under the terms of the new agreement, the Commission will have to give the U.K. government notice of future EU regulations intended to apply in Northern Ireland. According to Sunak, Stormont will be given a new power to “pull an emergency brake on changes to EU goods rules” based on “cross-community consent.”

Under this mechanism, the U.K. government will be able to suspend the application in Northern Ireland of an incoming piece of EU law at the request of at least 30 members of the assembly — a third of them. But if unionist parties in Northern Ireland want to trigger the new “Stormont brake,” they must first return to the power-sharing institutions which they abandoned last May. The EU and the U.K. could subsequently agree to apply such a rule in a meeting of the Joint Committee, which oversees the protocol.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said this new tool remains an emergency mechanism that hopefully will not need to be used. A second EU official said it would be triggered “under the most exceptional circumstances and as a matter of last resort in a well-defined process” set out in a unilateral declaration by the U.K. These include that the rules have a “significant and lasting impact on the everyday lives” of people in the region.

If the EU disagrees with the U.K.’s trigger of the Stormont brake, the two would resolve the issue through independent arbitration, instead of involving the Court of Justice of the EU.

Meanwhile, Northern Ireland’s courts will consider disputes over the application of EU rules in the region, and judges could decide whether to consult the CJEU on how to interpret them. In a key concession, the Commission has agreed not to unilaterally refer a case to the CJEU, although it retains the power to do so.

The EU’s safeguards: The CJEU will remain the “sole and ultimate arbiter of EU law” and will have the “final say” on EU single market disputes, von der Leyen stressed. Whether Brexiteers and the DUP are willing to accept that remains the million-dollar question.

Tax, state aid and EU rules

The U.K. government will now be able to set rules in areas such as VAT and state aid that will also apply in Northern Ireland — two major wins for Sunak that were rejected by the Commission in previous rounds of negotiations with other U.K. prime ministers.

It will, Sunak was at pains to point out Monday, allow Westminster to pass on a cut in alcohol duty that previously passed Northern Ireland by.

But London has had to give up on its idea of establishing a dual-regulatory mechanism that would have allowed Northern Ireland businesses to choose whether they would follow EU or British rules when manufacturing goods, depending on whether they intended to sell them in the EU single market or in the U.K. The whole idea was deemed by Brussels as impossible to police.

The EU’s safeguards: Northern Irish businesses producing goods for the U.K. internal market will only have to follow “less than 3 percent” of EU single market rules, a U.K. official said. But the nature of these regulations remains unclear, and there will be increased market surveillance and enforcement by U.K. authorities to try and reassure the EU.

The timeline: The U.K. government will be able to exercise these powers as soon as the Windsor framework comes into force.

Parcels

The EU and the U.K. have agreed to scrap customs processes for parcels being sent between consumers in Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Parcels sent between businesses will now move through the new green lane, as is the case for other goods destined to stay in Northern Ireland. That should allow them to be monitored, but remove the need to undergo international customs procedures. Parcel operators will share commercial data with the U.K.’s tax authority, HMRC, in a bid to reduce risks to the EU single market.

Timeline: These new arrangements will take effect September 2024.

Pets

Residents in Great Britain will be able to take their dogs, cats and ferrets to Northern Ireland without having to fulfill a requirement for a rabies vaccine, tapeworm treatment and other checks.

Pets traveling from Northern Ireland to Great Britain and back will not be required to have any documentation, declarations, checks or health treatments.

The EU’s safeguards: Microchipped pets will be able to travel with a life-long pet travel document issued for free by the U.K.’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Pet owners will tick a box in their travel booking acknowledging they accept the scheme rules and will not move their pet into the EU.

The timeline: The new rules will take effect fall 2023.

Medicines

Drugs approved for use by the U.K.’s medicines regulator, the MHRA, will be automatically available in every pharmacy and hospital in Northern Ireland, “at the same time and under the same conditions” as in the U.K., von der Leyen said. 

Businesses will need to secure approval for a U.K.-wide license from the MHRA to supply medicines to Northern Ireland, rather than having to go through the European Medicines Agency. The agreement removes any EU Falsified Medicines Directive packaging, labeling and barcode requirements for medicines. This means manufacturers will be able to produce a single medicines pack design for the whole of the U.K., including Northern Ireland.

Drugs being shipped into Northern Ireland from Great Britain will be freed of customs paperwork, checks and duties, with traders only being required to provide ordinary commercial information.

The EU’s safeguards: Medicines traveling from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will do so via the new green lane, which will have monitoring to protect the single market built in.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will engage with the medicines industry soon on these changes.

Plants

The deal lifts the protocol’s ban on seed potatoes entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain, and its prohibition on trees and shrubs deemed of “high risk” for the EU single market. This will enable garden centers and other businesses in Northern Ireland to sell 11 native species to Great Britain and some from other regions.

The Windsor framework also removes sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) checks on all these plants, and ditches red tape on their shipment into Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Supplying businesses will have to obtain a Northern Ireland plant health label, which will be the same as the plant passport already required within Great Britain, but with the addition of the words “for use in the U.K. only” and a QR code linking to the rules.

Russia’s strategy of plunging the country into darkness and cold has, if not outright failed, certainly not succeeded, either. Public opinion has not shifted as a result of the blackouts—polls in recent months have shown that more than eighty per cent of respondents in Ukraine want to continue the fight, the same number as before the attacks on the energy grid began. Over time, Ukraine’s air defenses have improved, and its technicians have got faster at repairing the electrical grid. Russia’s stock of long-range missiles, meanwhile, has dwindled, leading to less frequent attacks.

The onset of spring will bring lower electricity consumption, and Kudrytskyi, the head of Ukrenergo, expects that the Ukrainian grid will soon stabilize. “Russia did not achieve its ultimate goal,” he said. “Yes, they managed to create problems for nearly every Ukrainian family.” But that is only half the story: “Instead of making us scared and unhappy, it made us angry, more resolved to win. They did not lower the morale of the nation; they mobilized the nation.”

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News round-up, Tuesday, February 28, 2023.

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Editor's thoughts…

—-”According to the journal Plos Pathogens from the University of Kent (England), the SARC-COv-2 virus was discovered for the first time on Friday, 17 November 2019, in Wuhan, China. An organism with a simple structure composed of proteins and nucleic acids can reproduce only within specific living cells, using its metabolism.

Our effective behaviours are the cruellest change that humanity has undergone because of the Coronavirus. This little —monster— certainly aroused the paranoia of terror in us in a very evil way... let us know.  It certainly did, that we would die if we were in the company of other individuals of our kind, who were then already submerged by the sophistication of the 2.0 world, where genuine expressions of affection, handshakes, and hugs ... which do so much good for the intangible parts of the so-called soul, have been replaced by intangible faces flowing at an infinite density —billions— per second, without any compassionate human contact whatsoever.

What cruelty have we been subjected to ... How many of our loved ones are not with us today?  Why?  Because —perhaps—, of a human error in a laboratory in the isolated province of Wuhan in millennium China”.

THE drought by germán & co, september, 2022

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Most read…

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP by Joby Warrick, Ellen Nakashima and  Shane Harris

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

Reuters

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

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…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Germán & Co

Little-known scientific team behind new assessment on covid-19 origins

Small shift in favor of ‘lab leak’ theory was prompted by new data and group of weapons-lab scientists

WP by Joby Warrick, Ellen Nakashima and  Shane Harris

February 27, 2023

U.S. Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said Feb. 27 that China needs to be more honest about “what happened three years ago in Wuhan” with covid-19’s origin.

The theory that covid-19 started with a lab accident in central China received a modest boost in the latest U.S. intelligence assessment after the work of a little-known scientific team that conducts some of the federal government’s most secretive and technically challenging investigations of emerging security threats, current and former U.S. officials said Monday.

An analysis by experts from the U.S. national laboratory complex — including members of a storied team known as Z-Division — prompted the Energy Department to change its view earlier this year about the likely cause of the 2019 coronavirus outbreak, the officials said. Though initially undecided about covid-19’s origins, Energy officials concluded as part of a new government-wide intelligence assessment that a lab accident was most likely the triggering event for the world’s worst pandemic in a century.

But other intelligence agencies involved in the classified update — completed in the past few weeks and kept under wraps — were divided on the question of covid-19’s origins, with most still maintaining that a natural, evolutionary “spillover” from animals was the most likely explanation. Even the Energy Department’s analysis was carefully hedged, as the officials expressed only “low confidence” in their conclusion, according to U.S. officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a classified report.

The overall view — that there is as yet no definitive conclusion on the virus’s origin — has not changed since the release of an earlier version of the report by the Biden administration in 2021, according to the officials.

“The bottom line remains the same: Basically no one really knows,” one of the officials said.

Still, the news that Energy had shifted its view reignited what was already an intense debate on social media and in Washington, where members of Congress are preparing for hearings — some as early as Tuesday — exploring the circumstances behind the outbreak.

“To prevent the next pandemic, we need to know how this one began,” Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.), a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in response to news of the updated assessment, first reported Sunday by the Wall Street Journal. “The administration must move with a sense of urgency and use every tool at its disposal to ensure that we understand the origins of covid-19.”

U.S. officials confirmed that an updated assessment of covid-19’s origins was completed this year, and said the document was based on fresh data as well as new analysis by experts from eight intelligence agencies and the National Intelligence Council.

But the agencies are united, the official said, in the view that the virus was not man-made or developed as a bioweapon.

“‘Lab’ does not equal ‘man-made,’ the official said. “Even if it was a leak from a lab, they still think it would be a naturally occurring virus.”

Among the nine intelligence entities involved in the assessment, only the FBI had previously concluded, with “moderate” confidence, that covid-19 started with a lab accident. The Energy Department was the only agency that changed its view, while the CIA and one other agency remained undecided, lacking enough compelling evidence to support one conclusion over the other, officials said.

Even at low confidence, however, the Energy Department’s analysis carries weight. For its assessment, the department drew on the expertise of a team assembled from the U.S. national laboratory complex, which employs tens of thousands of scientists representing many technical specialties, from physics and data analysis to genomics and molecular biology.

The labs were established as part of the U.S. nuclear weapons program and operate largely in the classified realm. The department’s cadre of technical experts includes members of the Energy Department’s Z-Division, which since the 1960s has been involved in secretive investigations of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons threats by U.S. adversaries, including China and Russia.

The Energy Department is “a technical organization with tens of thousands of scientists,” said a former energy official. “It’s more than just physics. It’s chemical and biological expertise. And they have a unique opportunity to look at intelligence from the technical aspect.”

Both the Energy Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on the revised assessment. It was unclear what, precisely, prompted officials at Energy to see a lab leak as the more probable explanation for how covid-19 began.

Neither of the leading theories — a natural spillover or a lab leak — have been conclusively validated, in part because of China’s refusal to allow independent investigators access to environmental samples and other raw data from the earliest weeks of the outbreak.

Many scientists — and, at least for now, the majority of U.S. intelligence agencies — favor the spillover hypothesis, which holds that the virus jumped from bats to humans, perhaps at a Chinese market, and presumably after passing through a third species that had come to harbor what became known as the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Yet, three years after the outbreak began, the search for the elusive “carrier” species has produced no firm leads. The bats that naturally harbor viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 are native to Southeast Asia and southern China, about 1,000 miles from Wuhan, where the first cases of covid-19 were reported.

Likewise, no hard evidence of a lab leak has emerged. Supporters of the leak theory note that the outbreak began in a city that happens to be the world’s leading center for research on coronaviruses. China has had previous lab accidents, including an incident in 2004 in which lab workers were inadvertently exposed to the original SARS virus, and subsequently spread the pathogen outside the lab, resulting in multiple illnesses and at least one death, according to a World Health Organization probe.

China has repeatedly denied that an accident occurred. On Monday, Beijing denounced the new report linking Chinese labs to the pandemic, with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning demanding that the United States “stop defaming China.”

“Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should not be politicized,” she said.

The Biden administration on Monday emphasized the inclusive nature of the evidence so far. National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby, speaking at a White House briefing, said the new intelligence assessment was part of an ongoing “whole of government” effort to investigate how covid-19 began, although he acknowledged that firm conclusions have remained elusive.

“There is not a consensus right now in the U.S. government about exactly how covid started,” Kirby told reporters. “That work is still ongoing, but the president believes it’s really important that we continue that work and that we find out as best we can how it started so that we can better prevent a future pandemic.”

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines is scheduled to testify at a Senate worldwide threats hearing next week and probably will be asked to address the matter. The House select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic was set to hold a roundtable exploring early covid-19 policy decisions on Tuesday.

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Image: Germán & Co

Bank finance for cleaner energy grows, but still lags fossil fuels - report

Reuters

LONDON, Feb 28 (Reuters) - Banks gave 81 cents in financing support to low carbon energy supply for every dollar they provided to fossil fuels in 2021, a report showed on Tuesday, but they will need to ramp up their commitments much further for the world to hit its climate goals.

Several climate scenarios suggest that to limit global temperature rises to 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial average, the world needs to be investing $4 in renewable energy for every $1 invested in fossil fuels by 2030.

Energy analysts BloombergNEF compiled data from 1,142 banks for what it calls an "Energy Supply Banking Ratio" to assess whether banks are aligning their financing to the real economy and the 1.5 degrees target.

In 2021, bank financing for energy supply totalled $1.9 trillion, just over $1 trillion of which went to fossil fuels and $842 billion to low carbon energy projects and companies, according to the report.

The bank financing ratio, of 81 cents to $1, was below the global energy supply investment ratio of 90 cents to $1.

The latter ratio has been climbing in recent years from around 0.45:1 between 2011 and 2015.

"While a bounce in fossil-fuel investment is expected to counter the disruption caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the underlying economics of low-carbon energy supply mean its growth will be sustained," said BloombergNEF CEO Jon Moore, noting 2022's 15% rise in low carbon energy supply investment.

Individual banks' financing ratios varied. The Royal Bank of Canada had a 0.4 ratio and JP Morgan 0.7, against BNP Paribas' 1.7 and Deutsche Bank's 2.2, according to BloombergNEF, which said differences reflect geographic focus, client bases and strategies.

JP Morgan and RBC did not respond to requests for comment.

The report's findings differ from another study published by environmental groups last month which said the share of bank financing going to renewables had stagnated.

BloombergNEF said its research covered financing from far more banks than other studies.

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Source: The New Yorker

The EU and UK have a Northern Ireland deal — so what’s in it?

The key concessions and single market safeguards in the newly-unveiled Windsor framework.

POLITICO EU BY CRISTINA GALLARDO, FEBRUARY 27, 2023

LONDON — After four months of intense talks (and plenty of squabbling before that), the EU and U.K. have a deal to resolve their long-running post-Brexit trade row over Northern Ireland.

But as U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak works to sell the so-called “Windsor framework” on the Northern Ireland protocol to Brexiteers and unionists, lawmakers on both sides of the English Channel and of the Irish Sea are getting to grips with the details.

From paperwork to plants, let POLITICO walk you through the new agreement, asking: Who has given ground, and how exactly will the deal thrashed out by EU and U.K. negotiators aim to keep the bloc’s prized single market secure?

Customs paperwork and checks

For businesses taking part in an expanded “trusted trader scheme,” the Windsor framework aims to considerably cut customs paperwork and checks on goods moving from Great Britain but destined to stay in Northern Ireland. 

These goods will pass through a “green lane” requiring minimal paperwork and be labeled “Not for EU,” while those heading for the EU single market in the Republic of Ireland will undergo full EU customs checks in Northern Ireland’s ports under a “red lane.”

Traders in the green lane will only need to complete a single, digitized certificate per truck movement, rather than multiple forms per load.

Sunak has already claimed that this means “any sense of a border in the Irish Sea” — deeply controversial among Northern Ireland’s unionist politicians — has now been “removed.”

However, it’s by no means a total end to Irish Sea red tape. An EU official said that although the deal delivers a “dramatic reduction” in the number of physical food safety checks, for example, there will still be some — those seen as “essential” to avoid the risk of goods entering the single market.

These checks will be based on risk assessments and intelligence, and aimed at preventing smuggling and criminality.

U.K. public health and safety standards will meanwhile apply to all retail food and drink within the U.K. internal market. British rules on public health, marketing, organics, labeling, genetic modification, and drinks such as wines, spirits and mineral waters will apply in Northern Ireland. This will remove more than 60 EU food and drink rules in the original protocol, which were detailed in more than 1,000 pages of legislation.

Supermarkets, wholesalers, hospitality and food producers are likely to welcome the new arrangements. Many had stopped supplying to Northern Ireland because the cost of filling out hundreds of certificates for each consignment was deemed too high for a market as small as Northern Ireland. 

Export declarations have been removed for the vast majority of goods moving from Northern Ireland to Great Britain.

The EU’s safeguards: While offering to drastically reduce the volume of checks carried out, the EU has toughened its criteria to become a trusted trader under the expanded scheme. The EU will now have access to databases tracking shipments of goods between Great Britain and Northern Ireland in real time. The system was tested through the winter, helping build trust in Brussels, and is being fed with data from traders and U.K. authorities. The European Commission will be able to suspend part or all of these trade easements if the U.K. fails to comply with the new rules.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will consult with businesses in the “coming months” before implementing the new rules. The green lane will come into force this fall. Labels for meat, meat products and minimally-processed dairy products such as fresh milk will come into force from October 1, 2024. All relevant products will be marked by July 1, 2025. “Shelf-stable” products like bread and pasta will not be labeled.

Governance

A key plank of the deal is the bid to address complaints by Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) — currently boycotting the power-sharing assembly in the region in opposition to the protocol — that lawmakers there did not have a say in the imposition of new EU rules in the region.

Under the terms of the new agreement, the Commission will have to give the U.K. government notice of future EU regulations intended to apply in Northern Ireland. According to Sunak, Stormont will be given a new power to “pull an emergency brake on changes to EU goods rules” based on “cross-community consent.”

Under this mechanism, the U.K. government will be able to suspend the application in Northern Ireland of an incoming piece of EU law at the request of at least 30 members of the assembly — a third of them. But if unionist parties in Northern Ireland want to trigger the new “Stormont brake,” they must first return to the power-sharing institutions which they abandoned last May. The EU and the U.K. could subsequently agree to apply such a rule in a meeting of the Joint Committee, which oversees the protocol.

Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said this new tool remains an emergency mechanism that hopefully will not need to be used. A second EU official said it would be triggered “under the most exceptional circumstances and as a matter of last resort in a well-defined process” set out in a unilateral declaration by the U.K. These include that the rules have a “significant and lasting impact on the everyday lives” of people in the region.

If the EU disagrees with the U.K.’s trigger of the Stormont brake, the two would resolve the issue through independent arbitration, instead of involving the Court of Justice of the EU.

Meanwhile, Northern Ireland’s courts will consider disputes over the application of EU rules in the region, and judges could decide whether to consult the CJEU on how to interpret them. In a key concession, the Commission has agreed not to unilaterally refer a case to the CJEU, although it retains the power to do so.

The EU’s safeguards: The CJEU will remain the “sole and ultimate arbiter of EU law” and will have the “final say” on EU single market disputes, von der Leyen stressed. Whether Brexiteers and the DUP are willing to accept that remains the million-dollar question.

Tax, state aid and EU rules

The U.K. government will now be able to set rules in areas such as VAT and state aid that will also apply in Northern Ireland — two major wins for Sunak that were rejected by the Commission in previous rounds of negotiations with other U.K. prime ministers.

It will, Sunak was at pains to point out Monday, allow Westminster to pass on a cut in alcohol duty that previously passed Northern Ireland by.

But London has had to give up on its idea of establishing a dual-regulatory mechanism that would have allowed Northern Ireland businesses to choose whether they would follow EU or British rules when manufacturing goods, depending on whether they intended to sell them in the EU single market or in the U.K. The whole idea was deemed by Brussels as impossible to police.

The EU’s safeguards: Northern Irish businesses producing goods for the U.K. internal market will only have to follow “less than 3 percent” of EU single market rules, a U.K. official said. But the nature of these regulations remains unclear, and there will be increased market surveillance and enforcement by U.K. authorities to try and reassure the EU.

The timeline: The U.K. government will be able to exercise these powers as soon as the Windsor framework comes into force.

Parcels

The EU and the U.K. have agreed to scrap customs processes for parcels being sent between consumers in Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Parcels sent between businesses will now move through the new green lane, as is the case for other goods destined to stay in Northern Ireland. That should allow them to be monitored, but remove the need to undergo international customs procedures. Parcel operators will share commercial data with the U.K.’s tax authority, HMRC, in a bid to reduce risks to the EU single market.

Timeline: These new arrangements will take effect September 2024.

Pets

Residents in Great Britain will be able to take their dogs, cats and ferrets to Northern Ireland without having to fulfill a requirement for a rabies vaccine, tapeworm treatment and other checks.

Pets traveling from Northern Ireland to Great Britain and back will not be required to have any documentation, declarations, checks or health treatments.

The EU’s safeguards: Microchipped pets will be able to travel with a life-long pet travel document issued for free by the U.K.’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Pet owners will tick a box in their travel booking acknowledging they accept the scheme rules and will not move their pet into the EU.

The timeline: The new rules will take effect fall 2023.

Medicines

Drugs approved for use by the U.K.’s medicines regulator, the MHRA, will be automatically available in every pharmacy and hospital in Northern Ireland, “at the same time and under the same conditions” as in the U.K., von der Leyen said. 

Businesses will need to secure approval for a U.K.-wide license from the MHRA to supply medicines to Northern Ireland, rather than having to go through the European Medicines Agency. The agreement removes any EU Falsified Medicines Directive packaging, labeling and barcode requirements for medicines. This means manufacturers will be able to produce a single medicines pack design for the whole of the U.K., including Northern Ireland.

Drugs being shipped into Northern Ireland from Great Britain will be freed of customs paperwork, checks and duties, with traders only being required to provide ordinary commercial information.

The EU’s safeguards: Medicines traveling from Great Britain to Northern Ireland will do so via the new green lane, which will have monitoring to protect the single market built in.

The timeline: The U.K. government said it will engage with the medicines industry soon on these changes.

Plants

The deal lifts the protocol’s ban on seed potatoes entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain, and its prohibition on trees and shrubs deemed of “high risk” for the EU single market. This will enable garden centers and other businesses in Northern Ireland to sell 11 native species to Great Britain and some from other regions.

The Windsor framework also removes sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) checks on all these plants, and ditches red tape on their shipment into Northern Ireland.

The EU’s safeguards: Supplying businesses will have to obtain a Northern Ireland plant health label, which will be the same as the plant passport already required within Great Britain, but with the addition of the words “for use in the U.K. only” and a QR code linking to the rules.

Russia’s strategy of plunging the country into darkness and cold has, if not outright failed, certainly not succeeded, either. Public opinion has not shifted as a result of the blackouts—polls in recent months have shown that more than eighty per cent of respondents in Ukraine want to continue the fight, the same number as before the attacks on the energy grid began. Over time, Ukraine’s air defenses have improved, and its technicians have got faster at repairing the electrical grid. Russia’s stock of long-range missiles, meanwhile, has dwindled, leading to less frequent attacks.

The onset of spring will bring lower electricity consumption, and Kudrytskyi, the head of Ukrenergo, expects that the Ukrainian grid will soon stabilize. “Russia did not achieve its ultimate goal,” he said. “Yes, they managed to create problems for nearly every Ukrainian family.” But that is only half the story: “Instead of making us scared and unhappy, it made us angry, more resolved to win. They did not lower the morale of the nation; they mobilized the nation.”

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Who is China's new foreign minister in charge of finding —a glimmer of hope— for Russia-Ukraine peace talks?

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"You can't hide an elephant," Martin said, referring to a refrain he heard several times in Beijing. In other words, China's international standing has now reached a point where a low-key approach to diplomacy is inappropriate, if not impossible."

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Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday acknowledged for the first time China's "concerns" about the war in Ukraine.

"We understand your questions and concerns," he told his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, during their first face-to-face meeting in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, since Moscow decided to invade Ukraine in late February, turning the global geopolitical scene upside down.

El País by Guillermo Abril, Beijing, 15 September 2022

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What is worse, negotiation or war?

Significant dispute causes opposing interests (or what we think are opposing interests) to be at the core of the most conflict. Three visions on the War:

Sun Tzu (China 544 BC) the premise of The Art of War is that diplomacy should be used to avoid war. If it cannot be avoided, it should be fought strategically and psychologically in order to minimise damage and resource waste.

Hugo Grotius (10 April 1583, Delft, Holland - 28 August 1645,  Rostock, Swedish Pomerania) published his seminal work De Jure Belli ac Pacis (On the Law of War and Peace) in 1629 during the Thirty Years' War, which described the political order as a loose international society and explored the idea of self-defence. His recommendations showed tolerance and changed the nature of wars in Europe, leading to the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.

As the United States Ambassador to Germany during the rise of Hitler's dominance in 1933, history professor William E. Dodd (Clayton, North Carolina, 28 February of 1869, Virginia, USA, 9 February 1940) would step outside his comfort zone, with sometimes complicated thoughts for a diplomat in times of crisis... One of the most well-known is: Why is it so difficult for world leaders to learn, adjust policies, and avoid the disasters that have occurred so frequently in the past?

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The images are self-explanatory

The Kremlin, Moscow, February 22, 2023

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Illustration by Eleanor Shakespeare

The proposal from China…

China calls for a cease-fire in Ukraine while warning Moscow against using nuclear weapons, and insists that "dialogue and negotiations are the only viable way out in Ukraine," according to the Asian superpower's government.

The Chinese bid on Russia's invasion of Ukraine has sparked much debate and suspicion... However, China, the East's forgotten ally during WWII, has taken a cautious stance toward the Kremlin... Mr. Quin Gang, the newly appointed Foreign Minister of the People's Republic of China, has been tasked with driving the challenger..

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China’s new foreign minister and the taming of “wolf warrior” diplomacy

newstatesman By Katie Stallard

Qin Gang's rise from trusted aide to China's leader to ambassador to the US and then foreign minister reflects the country's increasingly assertive foreign policy, known as "wolf warrior" diplomacy.

“For a long time among the Chinese public, there was a perception that Chinese diplomats were too passive, that they didn’t defend China rigorously enough,” said Peter Martin, author of China’s Civilian Army: The Making of Wolf Warrior Diplomacy. Some citizens sent calcium tablets to the foreign ministry, urging diplomats to strengthen their spines. “That started to shift under Hu Jintao [general secretary from 2002 to 2012],” Martin explained. After Xi came to power in 2012, he demanded that China be treated with respect as the world’s second-largest economy and told his diplomats to show “fighting spirit”.

Born in Tianjin, near Beijing, in 1966 – the same year Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution began – Qin seems to have aspired to a career in diplomacy at an early stage. He studied international politics at the foreign ministry’s Institute of International Relations, and got his first job, at 22, in the bureau for diplomatic missions in Beijing, clipping news articles. He joined the foreign ministry in 1992, in the department of west European affairs, and completed three postings to the UK embassy, an experience he likened to winning the lottery.

While little is known about his personal life beyond that he is married with a son (such a dearth of facts is not unusual in China’s opaque political system), Qin’s professional career tracks the country’s re-emergence as a major power. Aged ten when Chairman Mao died in 1976, he joined the foreign ministry as the height of China’s “reform and opening up” period, as the country was pursuing closer relations with the West and membership of the World Trade Organisation (granted in 2001). He was a spokesman in Beijing during the global financial crisis in 2008, which saw China recover faster than the US and question the future of the Western-dominated financial system.

But it was under Xi that Qin rose to higher office. He became head of Xi’s protocol department in 2014, where he accompanied the leader on trips overseas and is said to have paid great attention to ensuring Xi was afforded sufficient respect. As relations with the US deteriorated in subsequent years, Qin’s rise continued. He became vice-minister of foreign affairs in 2018 and ambassador to Washington in 2021, where he served for 17 months before being named foreign minister on 30 December 2022. At 56, he is one of the youngest people ever to hold the post.

While Qin’s reputation as a wolf warrior preceded his arrival in Washington, his approach as ambassador was more restrained. With Joe Biden in the White House, both countries hoped to stabilise relations and slow an apparent spiral towards open confrontation. “He was here to make nice and mend ties, not to do more damage,” said Yun Sun.

Yet there was a limit to how much of a difference he could make, given the parlous state of relations. Qin’s access to senior US officials was reportedly limited, with few authorised to meet him (the White House has denied this). So Qin focused on public diplomacy instead, posting photos on Twitter of meetings with Elon Musk, driving a tractor on a visit to farms in Iowa, and throwing the first pitch at a St Louis Cardinals baseball game. Still, American views of China darkened during his posting. According to the Pew Research Center, 82 per cent of Americans surveyed said they had an unfavourable opinion of China in 2022. This trend was repeated across the democratic world, fuelled by China’s heavy-handed approach to territorial and trade disputes. The demand that diplomats show “fighting spirit” has done little to win China friends abroad.

There are signs that the worst excesses of wolf warrior diplomacy are being tamed. During a politburo study session in May 2021, Xi called for efforts to promote a “trustworthy, lovable and respectable” image of China. In early January, Zhao Lijian, a foreign ministry spokesman and another notorious wolf warrior, was sidelined – transferred to a department that handles land and maritime borders.

“I think there is a recognition, from the top leadership down, that some of the more extreme examples of wolf warrior diplomacy were damaging China’s international reputation and there was a need for some kind of tactical recalibration,” Martin said. We should not expect its diplomats to adopt a conciliatory tone, but China seems to be trying to balance a robust defence of national interests with outreach to trading partners, as it seeks to rebuild economic growth after the self-imposed isolation of its “zero Covid” policy.

Despite his “Warrior Gang” notoriety, Qin’s appointment fits this new approach. In previous roles, he had “a reputation among European diplomats as someone who was very capable of acting like a wolf warrior in private, dressing down officials and using very assertive language about China’s place in the world,” Martin said. But “he is capable of doing the charm-offensive thing too – addressing think tank audiences, working diplomatic receptions… Xi needs someone like that in charge of China’s diplomatic apparatus”.

Yun Sun said that Qin’s recent experience in the US could also help to steady relations between the two powers. “Qin’s tenure as the ambassador in Washington was clearly aimed at familiarising him with the key issues and personnel in the bilateral relationship,” Sun said. “It also shows Xi wants someone he knows and trusts to handle foreign relations.”

This won’t mean the end of Chinese diplomats berating their foreign counterparts in public, however. As China’s economic prospects look less assured, Xi won’t hesitate to stoke nationalism to redirect domestic discontent towards external enemies. He will not waver in his conviction that the days of hiding and biding are over; that China is a great power once again and must be treated as such.

“There is a refrain that I heard several times in Beijing,” Martin said: “You can’t hide an elephant. In other words, China’s international status has now reached a point where it’s inappropriate, and maybe impossible, for it to have a low-key approach to diplomacy.”

Qin has put this more colourfully, answering a question about increasing defence budgets in 2014 by scoffing that China was “not just a boy scout with a red-tasselled gun”. Besides, he continued, “even a boy scout grows bigger and bigger every year”. Both Beijing’s sense of its status in the world and Qin’s seniority have only increased since. If there is any change to China’s foreign policy in the months ahead, it will be more in style than in substance. An early test will come when the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, meets Qin in Beijing in early February. China’s diplomats may try to avoid picking fights, but that doesn’t mean they have any intention of backing down.

Russian nuclear fuel: The habit Europe just can’t break

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Quote of the day…

Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to turn off the gas taps while the EU turned increasingly to liquefied natural gas deliveries from elsewhere caused the reliance on Moscow to tumble from 40 percent of the bloc's gas supply before the war to less than 10 percent now.

POLITICO EU

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Image: Russias Novovoronezh plant in central Russia which is a sister project to Turkey’s first nuclear power plant, the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant.

The EU managed to quickly cut down on Russian coal, gas and oil supplies, but can’t seem to do the same for nuclear.

POLITICO EU BY VICTOR JACK AND CHARLIE COOPER, FEBRUARY 23

Europe is on track to kick its addiction to Russian fossil fuels, but can't seem to replicate that success with nuclear energy a year into the Ukraine war.

The EU's economic sanctions on Russian coal and oil permanently reshaped trade and left Moscow in a “much diminished position,” according to the International Energy Agency. Coal imports have dropped to zero, and it is illegal for Russian crude to be imported by ship; only four countries still receive it by pipeline.

That's compared to the bloc getting 54 percent of its hard coal imports and one-quarter of its oil from Russia in 2020.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to turn off the gas taps while the EU turned increasingly to liquefied natural gas deliveries from elsewhere caused the reliance on Moscow to tumble from 40 percent of the bloc's gas supply before the war to less than 10 percent now.

Source: IEAE

But nuclear energy has proved a trickier knot for EU countries to untie — for both historical and practical reasons.

As competition in the global nuclear sector atrophied following the Cold War, Soviet-built reactors in the EU remained locked into tailor-made fuel from Russia, leaving Moscow to play an outsized role.

In 2021, Russia's state-owned atomic giant Rosatom supplied the bloc’s reactors with 20 percent of their natural uranium, handled a quarter of their conversion services and provided a third of their enrichment services, according to the EU’s Euratom Supply Agency (ESA).

That same year, EU countries paid Russia €210 million for raw uranium exports, compared to the €88 billion the bloc paid Moscow for oil.

The value of imports of Russia-related nuclear technology and fuel worldwide rose to more than $1 billion (€940 billion) last year, according to research from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). In the EU, the value of Russia's nuclear exports fell in some countries like Bulgaria and the Czech Republic but rose in others, including Slovakia, Hungary and Finland, RUSI data shared with POLITICO showed.

“While it is difficult to draw definitive conclusions from what is ultimately a time-limited and incomplete dataset, it does clearly show that there are still dependencies on, and a market for, Russian nuclear fuel,” said Darya Dolzikova, a research fellow at RUSI.

Although uranium from Russia could be replaced by imports from elsewhere within a year — and most nuclear plants have at least one-year extra reserves, according to ESA head Agnieszka Kaźmierczak — countries with Russian-built VVER reactors rely on fuel made by Moscow.

“There are 18 Russian-designed nuclear power plants in [the EU] and all of them would be affected by sanctions,” said Mark Hibbs, a senior fellow at Carnegie's Nuclear Policy Program. “This remains a deeply divided issue in the European Union.”

That's why the bloc has struggled over the past year to target Russia's nuclear industry — despite repeated calls from Ukraine and some EU countries to hit Rosatom for its role in overseeing the occupied Ukrainian Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, and possibly supplying equipment to the Russian arms industry.

“The whole question of sanctioning the nuclear sector … was basically killed before there was ever a meaningful discussion,” said a diplomat from one EU country who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The most vocal opponent has been Hungary, one of five countries — along with Slovakia, Bulgaria, Finland and the Czech Republic — to have Russian-built reactors for which there is no alternative fuel so far.

Bulgaria and the Czech Republic have signed contracts with U.S. firm Westinghouse to replace the Russian fuel, according to ESA chief Kaźmierczak, but the process could take “three years” as national regulators also need to analyze and license the new fuel.

The “bigger problem” across the board is enrichment and conversion, she added, due to chronic under-capacity worldwide. It could take “seven to 10 years” to replace Rosatom — and that timeline is conditional on significant investments in the sector.

While Finland last year scrapped a deal to build a Russian-made nuclear plant on the country’s west coast — prompting a lawsuit from Rosatom — others aren't changing tack.

Slovakia’s new Mochovce-3 Soviet VVER-design reactor came online earlier this month, which Russia will supply with fuel until at least 2026. 

Russia's nuclear energy was not initially included in EU sanctions over Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine | Eric Piermont/AFP via Getty Images

Hungary, meanwhile, deepened ties with Moscow by giving the go-ahead to the construction of two more reactors at its Paks plant last summer, underwritten by a €10 billion Russian loan.

“Even if [they] were to come into existence, nuclear sanctions would be filled with exemptions because we are dependent on Russian nuclear fuel,” said a diplomat from a second EU country.

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A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine

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Quote of the day…

Despite scattered calls in the US for the creation of a ‘no-fly zone' over some or all of Ukraine, the Biden administration has widely resisted. In practice, this could mean shooting down Russian planes. It could lead to World War III

NINA TANNENWALD

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Germán & Co

‘If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’

A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine

The first nuclear age was marked by deterrence, the second by hopes that nuclear weapons might be eliminated. The war in Ukraine may herald a third nuclear age, much more dangerous and uncertain than what came before.

LE MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE BY OLIVIER ZAJEC

…A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine?

On 11 March, President Joe Biden sharply rejected politicians’ and experts’ calls for the United States to get more directly involved in the Ukraine war, ruling out direct conflict with Russia: ‘The idea that we’re going to send in offensive equipment and have planes and tanks and trains going in with American pilots and American crews — just understand ... that’s called World War III’ (1). He nonetheless accepted war was possible if the Russian offensive spread to the territory of a NATO member state.

Thus a distinction was established between NATO’s territory (inviolable) and the territory of Ukraine, which falls into a unique geostrategic category: according to the US, maintaining this distinction will require an accurate understanding of the balance of power between the belligerents on the ground, strict control of the degree of operational involvement of Ukraine’s declared supporters (especially concerning the nature of arms transfers to Ukraine) and, above all, continual reassessment of the limits of Russia’s determination — all with a view to leaving room for a negotiated way out acceptable to both Russia and Ukraine. Some trace the US’s caution back to a statement by Russia’s president Vladimir Putin on 24 February: ‘No matter who tries to stand in our way or ... create threats for our country and our people, they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.’ These words, and his order that Russia’s nuclear forces be placed on high alert (‘a special regime of combat duty’), amounted to attempted coercion, and could suggest that Biden’s reaction constituted backing down. In January, neoconservative New York Times columnist Bret Stephens had called for the revival of the concept of the ‘free world’, and warned, ‘The bully’s success ultimately depends on his victim’s psychological surrender’ (2).

One might argue that it is not for the bully to say how much aggression is ‘acceptable’ from countries that, with help from allies, seek to defend their own borders and their right to exist. Stephens’s warning could equally apply to past international crises, such as Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. But the territory being invaded today is Ukraine, which is far bigger. And the aggressor — Russia — has strategic arguments entirely different from those of Saddam Hussein.

‘Scenarios for use of nuclear arms’

To help understand the issues at stake in US-Russian relations today, and Joe Biden’s irritation with the extreme positions of some of his fellow Americans and some allies, it’s worth recalling Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov’s 2018 statement that Russia’s nuclear doctrine ‘has unambiguously limited the threshold of use of nuclear weapons to two ... hypothetical, entirely defensive scenarios. They are as follows: [first,] in response to an act of aggression against Russia and/or against our allies if nuclear or other types of mass destruction weapons are used and [second,] with use of conventional arms but only in case our state’s very existence would be in danger’ (3).

Nuclear doctrines are made to be interpreted, and Russia experts have long debated exactly how (4). In Foreign Affairs, Olga Oliker, director of International Crisis Group’s Europe and Central Asia programme, writes that ‘although it has not been used before, Putin’s phrase “a special regime of combat duty” does not appear to signal a serious change in Russia’s nuclear posture’ (5).

But, at least in terms of how the present crisis is perceived, we cannot ignore the implications of the second scenario in Lavrov’s 2018 statement — an existential threat to Russia. Do Russia’s leaders really see Ukraine’s strategic status, and therefore its potential NATO accession, as critical? If they do, that would explain why, contrary to all normal logic and political good sense, they have given NATO a reason to make a stand and irretrievably damaged Russia’s international standing by deciding it is rational to attack Ukraine unilaterally — and then opting for a blunt ‘nuclearisation’ of their crisis diplomacy, so as to keep other potential belligerents out of the conflict.

Is this just a cynical manoeuvre, banking on Western weakness and hesitation, to give Russia the greatest possible freedom to act? Former British prime minister Tony Blair asks on his thinktank’s website: ‘Is it sensible to tell [Putin] in advance that whatever he does militarily, we will rule out any form of military response? Maybe that is our position and maybe that is the right position, but continually signalling it, and removing doubt in his mind, is a strange tactic’ (6).

Who would take responsibility?

Yet although diplomatic manoeuvring is clearly going on, who — with responsibility for what comes next — would be able to say today precisely to what extent this Russian cynicism, which seeks to achieve its objectives through aggressive drawing of red lines, also stems from strategic conviction fuelled by frustrations that have come to a head? We should not underestimate the dangers of this mixture if the West were to test Russia’s siege mentality head on in Ukraine.

Others asked these questions, well before Biden. In the first days of the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis, when the US joint chiefs of staff were taking a hard line, President John F Kennedy expressed the key issues not in military terms, but in terms of perception. He told a meeting of ExComm (the Executive Committee of the National Security Council), ‘Let me just say a little, first, about what the problem is, from my point of view ... we ought to think of why the Russians did this.’

The declassified archives on this key moment in history reveal that Kennedy talked of a blockade, of the importance of giving Khrushchev a way out, and of avoiding escalation to nuclear weapons, all while preserving the US’s international credibility. General Curtis E LeMay, US Air Force chief of staff, replied, ‘This blockade and political action, I see leading into war ... This is almost as bad as the appeasement at Munich.’ The joint chiefs were unanimous in recommending immediate military action. Kennedy thanked them, dryly, and, in the days that followed, did the exact opposite.

‘And [the joint chiefs] were wrong,’ historian Martin J Sherwin concludes in a recent book on decision-making processes in nuclear crises. ‘Had the president not insisted on a blockade, had he accepted the chiefs’ recommendations (also favoured by the majority of his ExComm advisers), he unwittingly would have precipitated a nuclear war’ (7).

The central issue is indeed the significance of the nuclear signalling in which Russia has wrapped its premeditated conventional attack. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky doubts Putin will really use nuclear weapons: ‘I think that the threat of nuclear war is a bluff. It’s one thing to be a murderer. It’s another to commit suicide. Every use of nuclear weapons means the end for all sides, not just for the person using them’ (8).

At the risk of appearing spineless, Biden seems to have reserved judgment. For the moment he is restraining his most aggressive allies, such as Poland, and focusing on the coercive force of the economic sanctions, rather than any initiative that might give Putin an excuse for escalation — starting with the use of tactical nuclear weapons, of which Russia is thought to have around 2,000.

‘Putin is bluffing on nuclear’

Is Biden wrong? On 14 March General Rick J Hillier, former chief of Canada’s defence staff, told CBS that NATO should impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine because Putin was bluffing. John Feehery, former communications director to House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, thought so too: ‘Biden’s weakness on Ukraine invited [the] Russian invasion ... When Putin hinted that he was willing to use nuclear weapons to achieve his goals, Biden said that we weren’t going to use ours, which seems to me to defeat the purpose of having those weapons in the first place. If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’ (9). Stanford historian Niall Ferguson agrees: ‘Putin is bluffing on nuclear, we shouldn’t have backed down.’ And is dismayed that ‘media coverage has become so sentimental and ignorant of military realities’ (10).

But what are these military ‘realities’? What is the nature of the problem? It’s the possibility that Russia will resort to first use of nuclear weapons in an armed conflict that is already under way. Nina Tannenwald, whose book The Nuclear Taboo (Cambridge, 2007) has become a key text in international relations, believes the risk is too great, and supports the US’s wait-and-see strategy: ‘Despite scattered calls in the US for the creation of a “no-fly zone” over some or all of Ukraine, the Biden administration has widely resisted. In practice, this could mean shooting down Russian planes. It could lead to World War III’ (11).

The most striking characteristic of the war in Ukraine is its nuclear backdrop. Events are unfolding as if the world was hurriedly relearning the vocabulary and fundamentals of nuclear strategy, forgotten since the cold war. This is certainly true of Western media and governments, as they become conscious of the potentially destructive sequences of events that link the operational-tactical and politico-strategic dimensions of the present tragedy. The bellicose declarations of some experts in the early days of the war have given way to calmer analysis. In many ways, it’s high time; Kharkiv is not Kabul. Especially given the recent worrying developments in the nuclear debate.

Until relatively recently, the nuclear orthodoxy established after the cold war, as the two superpowers reduced their strategic arsenals, had placed some nuclear weapons in a kind of peripheral area of the doctrine: those known as ‘tactical’ because of their lesser power and range. From 1945 to the 1960s, they had been a key part of US war plans, especially for the European theatre. At the time, the aim was to counter the Soviet Union’s conventional superiority with overwhelming nuclear superiority, to deny the battlefield to the enemy. US secretary of state John Foster Dulles, author of the ‘massive retaliation’ doctrine, stated in 1955, ‘The United States in particular has sea and air forces now equipped with new and powerful weapons of precision which can utterly destroy military targets without endangering unrelated civilian centers’ (12). President Dwight D Eisenhower declared, ‘I see no reason why they shouldn’t be used just exactly as you would use a bullet or anything else.’

However, from the 1960s, the prospect of ‘mutual assured destruction’ reduced the likelihood that tactical nuclear weapons would be used, because of the risk of escalation. The concept of a ‘limited nuclear strike’ gradually came to be seen as dangerous sophistry. Regardless of experts who were certain that a nuclear war could be ‘won’ by ‘graduating’ one’s nuclear response, and controlling the ‘ladders of escalation’ (the best known being Herman Kahn of the Hudson Institute), even a nuclear weapon (arbitrarily) labelled as ‘tactical’ still had the potential to lead to total destruction. The works of Thomas Schelling, especially The Strategy of Conflict (1960) and Strategy and Arms Control (1961) contributed to this new awareness.

Options for US decision makers

The rejection of graduation became a distinguishing characteristic of France’s nuclear doctrine. While reserving the option of a ‘unique and non-renewable’ warning shot, President Emmanuel Macron said in February 2020 that France had always ‘refused to consider nuclear weapons as a weapon of battle.’ He also insisted that France would ‘never engage in a nuclear battle or any form of graduated response’ (13).

Prior to the 2010s, it seemed possible that other nuclear-weapon states could adopt such a doctrinal stance, coupled with the ‘minimum necessary’ nuclear arsenal (France had fewer than 300 warheads). And it was possible to believe that, with a few exceptions (such as Pakistan), tactical nuclear weapons had ‘faded into the background of military and political planning and rhetoric’ (14).

Despite scattered calls in the US for the creation of a ‘no-fly zone' over some or all of Ukraine, the Biden administration has widely resisted. In practice, this could mean shooting down Russian planes. It could lead to World War III

NINA TANNENWALD

But over the last decade, the trend has reversed. In the world of strategic studies, there has been a return to ‘theories of [nuclear] victory’. Their proponents draw on the work of past scholars such as Henry Kissinger, who wondered in his 1957 book Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy if extending the American deterrent to all of Europe at a time when the threat of total destruction hung over the US itself would actually work: ‘A reliance on all-out war as the chief deterrent saps our system of alliances in two ways: either our allies feel that any military effort on their part is unnecessary or they may be led to the conviction that peace is preferable to war even on terms almost akin to surrender ... As the implication of all-out war with modern weapons become better understood ... it is not reasonable to assume that the United Kingdom, and even more the United States, would be prepared to commit suicide in order to defend a particular area ... whatever its importance, to an enemy’ (15).

One of the recommended solutions was to bring tactical nuclear weapons back into the dialectic of deterrence extended to allied territories, so as to give US decision makers a range of options between Armageddon and defeat without a war. Global deterrence was ‘restored’ by creating additional rungs on the ladder of escalation, which were supposed to enable a sub-apocalyptic deterrence dialogue — before one major adversary or the other felt its key interests were threatened and resorted to extreme measures. Many theorists in the 1970s took this logic further, in particular Colin Gray in a 1979 article, now back in fashion, titled ‘Nuclear Strategy: the case for a theory of victory’ (16).

Theoreticians of nuclear victory today reject the ‘paralysis’ that comes with an excessively rigid vision of deterrence. Their strategic beliefs were semi-officialised in the Trump administration’s 2018 Nuclear Posture Review (17). What influence have these theories had on Russia? Has the Kremlin chosen to combine nuclear and conventional deterrents in an operational continuum? Whatever the case, authors who defend the idea of using tactical (‘low-yield’ or ‘ultra-low yield’) nuclear weapons emphasise the importance of countering adversaries who adopt hybrid strategies. Rogue states without a nuclear deterrent will increasingly be tempted to present a fait accompli, banking on nuclear-weapon states’ risk aversion, at least when the latter face a crisis that does not affect their own national territory.

Uncertainties of deterrence dialogue

This shows how Kissinger’s 1957 discussion of the intrinsic weaknesses of wider nuclear deterrence remains pertinent today. The benefits would be even greater for a state with a nuclear deterrent — a nuclear-weapon state behaving like a rogue state. This is exactly what Russia is doing in Ukraine. The West’s hesitation to adopt an over-vigorous response that could lead to nuclear escalation is amplified by its realisation of how history would view whichever party — aggressor or victim — became the first to break the nuclear taboo since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. International Crisis Group’s Olga Oliker admits that ‘such caution and concessions may not bring emotional satisfaction; there is certainly a visceral appeal to proposals that would have NATO forces directly help Ukraine. But these would dramatically heighten the risk that the war becomes a wider, potentially nuclear conflict. Western leaders should therefore reject them out of hand. Literally nothing else could be more dangerous.’

The ‘Third Nuclear Age’, heralded by various crises over the last decade, has dawned in Ukraine. In 2018 Admiral Pierre Vandier, now chief of staff of the French navy, offered a precise definition of this shift to the new strategic era, which has begun with Russia’s invasion: ‘A number of indicators suggest that we are entering a new era, a Third Nuclear Age, following the first, defined by mutual deterrence between the two superpowers, and the second, which raised hopes of a total and definitive elimination of nuclear weapons after the cold war’ (18).

This third age will bring new questions on the reliability — and relevance — of ‘logical rules ... painfully learned, as during the Cuban [missile] crisis’ (19). There will be questions about the rationality of new actors using their nuclear deterrents. The worth of the nuclear taboo, which some today treat as absolute, will be reappraised.

‘Unleashed power of the atom’

Questions like ‘If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’ suggest Albert Einstein’s warning from 1946 may still be pertinent: ‘The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking.’ Yet Einstein was already wrong. Huge numbers of papers were hurriedly written to explain the balances and imbalances of the deterrence dialogue. The current usefulness of these historical, theoretical documents is highly variable, as their logic often reaches absurd conclusions. Yet they include some intelligent analyses that shed light on the Ukrainian nuclear crisis.

Columbia professor Robert Jervis (20), a pioneer of political psychology in international relations, sought to demonstrate that it was possible to overcome the security anxieties that cause each actor to see his own actions as defensive, and those of his competitor as ‘naturally’ offensive. Jervis maintained that breaking the insecurity cycle caused by this distortion meant developing exchanges of signals that would make it possible to differentiate between offensive and defensive weapons in the arsenals of one’s adversaries. And his adaptation of prospect theory to nuclear crises opens up possibilities of interpreting Russia’s behaviour differently, suggesting for example that the adoption of aggressive tactics is more often motivated by aversion to loss than by hopes of gain.

In a nuclear crisis, all strategies are sub-optimal. One, however, is worse than all the rest: claiming that the adversary’s leader is insane, while simultaneously treating the standoff as a game of chicken. This will lead either to mutual destruction or to defeat without a war. Over the past few weeks, some seem to have accepted that this worst of all possible choices is worthy of being called a strategy.

*OLIVIER ZAJEC IS A LECTURER IN POLITICAL SCIENCE AT JEAN MOULIN LYON III UNIVERSITY’S LAW FACULTY.

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News round-up, Friday, February 24, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

…Undoubtedly, to China, the forgotten ally of the West during World War II, also, this undesirable situation is squeezing his shoes leaving them serious wounds in their public treasury, hopefully, and so, by necessity or common sense, the economic giant of the East will awaken to the damage that this context is causing in its own economy and will use the magic key.

NATURAL GAS IS THE NEW “RUSSIAN WINTER” AS A WAR ELEMENT…

GERMAN & CO, SEPTEMBER 9, 2022

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Most read…

China calls for peace talks between Russia and Ukraine

China made the comments in a 12-point paper on the 'political settlement' of the crisis, timed to coincide with the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

LE MONDE WITH AP AND AFP

‘If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’

A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine

The first nuclear age was marked by deterrence, the second by hopes that nuclear weapons might be eliminated. The war in Ukraine may herald a third nuclear age, much more dangerous and uncertain than what came before.

Le Monde Diplomatique by Olivier Zajec

The U.S. Has Billions for Wind and Solar Projects. Good Luck Plugging Them In

An explosion in proposed clean energy ventures has overwhelmed the system for connecting new power sources to homes and businesses.

NYT BY BRAD PLUMER

New French fund with 87.5 mln euros targets African solar development

The AFRIGREEEN Debt Impact Fund's first closing will finance on- and off-grid solar power plants for small- and medium-sized commercial and industrial consumers across the continent, the statement said.

REUTERS

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…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Image: Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang speaks during the Lanting Forum on the Global Security Initiative Tuesday. The foreign ministry issued a 12-point plan to end the Russia-Ukraine war Friday. (Andy Wong/The Associated Press )

China calls for peace talks between Russia and Ukraine

China made the comments in a 12-point paper on the 'political settlement' of the crisis, timed to coincide with the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Le Monde with AP and AFP, Published on February 24, 2023 at 04h06

China, a firm Russian ally, has called for a cease-fire between Ukraine and Moscow and the opening of peace talks as part of a 12-point proposal to end the conflict.

The plan issued on Friday, February 24, by the Foreign Ministry also urges the end of Western sanctions imposed on Russia, measures to ensure the safety of nuclear facilities, the establishment of humanitarian corridors for the evacuation of civilians, and steps to ensure the export of grain after disruptions caused global food prices to spike.

China has claimed to be neutral in the conflict, but it has a "no limits" relationship with Russia and has refused to criticize its invasion of Ukraine over even refer to it as such, while accusing the West of provoking the conflict and "fanning the flames" by providing Ukraine with defensive arms.

China and Russia have increasingly aligned their foreign policies to oppose the US-led liberal international order. Foreign Minister Wang Yi reaffirmed the strength of those ties when he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a visit to Moscow this week.

China has also been accused by the US of possibly preparing to provide Russia with military aid, something Beijing says lacks evidence. Given China's positions, that throws doubt on whether its 12-point proposal has any hope of going ahead – or whether China is seen as an honest broker.

US reserving judgment

Before the proposal was released, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called it an important first step. "I think that, in general, the fact that China started talking about peace in Ukraine, I think that it is not bad. It is important for us that all states are on our side, on the side of justice," he said at a news conference Friday with Spain's prime minister.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price said earlier Thursday that the US would reserve judgment but that China’s allegiance with Russia meant it was not a neutral mediator. "We would like to see nothing more than a just and durable peace ... but we are skeptical that reports of a proposal like this will be a constructive path forward," he said.

Price added that the US hopes "all countries that have a relationship with Russia unlike the one that we have will use that leverage, will use that influence to push Russia meaningfully and usefully to end this brutal war of aggression. (China) is in a position to do that in ways that we just aren’t."

The peace proposal mainly elaborated on long-held Chinese positions, including referring to the need that all countries' "sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity be effectively guaranteed." It also called an end to the "Cold War mentality" – it's a standard term for what it regards as US hegemony and interference in other countries.

"A country’s security cannot be at the expense of other countries’ security, and regional security cannot be guaranteed by strengthening or even expanding military blocs," the proposal said. "The legitimate security interests and concerns of all countries should be taken seriously and properly addressed."

'Resume direct dialogue asap'

China abstained Thursday when the UN General Assembly approved a nonbinding resolution that calls for Russia to end hostilities in Ukraine and withdraw its forces. It is one of 16 countries that either voted against or abstained on almost all of five previous resolutions on Ukraine.

The resolution, drafted by Ukraine in consultation with its allies, passed 141-7 with 32 abstentions, sending a strong message on the eve of the first anniversary of the invasion that appears to leave Russia more isolated than ever.

While China has not been openly critical of Moscow, it has said that the present conflict is "not something it wishes to see," and has repeatedly said any use of nuclear weapons would be completely unacceptable, in an implied repudiation of Putin’s statement that Russia would use "all available means" to protect its territory.

"There are no winners in conflict wars," the proposal said. "All parties should maintain rationality and restraint ... support Russia and Ukraine to meet each other, resume direct dialogue as soon as possible, gradually promote the de-escalation and relaxation of the situation, and finally reach a comprehensive ceasefire," it said.

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Image: Germán & Co

‘If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’

A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine

The first nuclear age was marked by deterrence, the second by hopes that nuclear weapons might be eliminated. The war in Ukraine may herald a third nuclear age, much more dangerous and uncertain than what came before.

Le Monde Diplomatique by Olivier Zajec

…A third nuclear age may be dawning in Ukraine?

On 11 March, President Joe Biden sharply rejected politicians’ and experts’ calls for the United States to get more directly involved in the Ukraine war, ruling out direct conflict with Russia: ‘The idea that we’re going to send in offensive equipment and have planes and tanks and trains going in with American pilots and American crews — just understand ... that’s called World War III’ (1). He nonetheless accepted war was possible if the Russian offensive spread to the territory of a NATO member state.

Thus a distinction was established between NATO’s territory (inviolable) and the territory of Ukraine, which falls into a unique geostrategic category: according to the US, maintaining this distinction will require an accurate understanding of the balance of power between the belligerents on the ground, strict control of the degree of operational involvement of Ukraine’s declared supporters (especially concerning the nature of arms transfers to Ukraine) and, above all, continual reassessment of the limits of Russia’s determination — all with a view to leaving room for a negotiated way out acceptable to both Russia and Ukraine. Some trace the US’s caution back to a statement by Russia’s president Vladimir Putin on 24 February: ‘No matter who tries to stand in our way or ... create threats for our country and our people, they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history.’ These words, and his order that Russia’s nuclear forces be placed on high alert (‘a special regime of combat duty’), amounted to attempted coercion, and could suggest that Biden’s reaction constituted backing down. In January, neoconservative New York Times columnist Bret Stephens had called for the revival of the concept of the ‘free world’, and warned, ‘The bully’s success ultimately depends on his victim’s psychological surrender’ (2).

One might argue that it is not for the bully to say how much aggression is ‘acceptable’ from countries that, with help from allies, seek to defend their own borders and their right to exist. Stephens’s warning could equally apply to past international crises, such as Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. But the territory being invaded today is Ukraine, which is far bigger. And the aggressor — Russia — has strategic arguments entirely different from those of Saddam Hussein.

‘Scenarios for use of nuclear arms’

To help understand the issues at stake in US-Russian relations today, and Joe Biden’s irritation with the extreme positions of some of his fellow Americans and some allies, it’s worth recalling Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov’s 2018 statement that Russia’s nuclear doctrine ‘has unambiguously limited the threshold of use of nuclear weapons to two ... hypothetical, entirely defensive scenarios. They are as follows: [first,] in response to an act of aggression against Russia and/or against our allies if nuclear or other types of mass destruction weapons are used and [second,] with use of conventional arms but only in case our state’s very existence would be in danger’ (3).

Nuclear doctrines are made to be interpreted, and Russia experts have long debated exactly how (4). In Foreign Affairs, Olga Oliker, director of International Crisis Group’s Europe and Central Asia programme, writes that ‘although it has not been used before, Putin’s phrase “a special regime of combat duty” does not appear to signal a serious change in Russia’s nuclear posture’ (5).

But, at least in terms of how the present crisis is perceived, we cannot ignore the implications of the second scenario in Lavrov’s 2018 statement — an existential threat to Russia. Do Russia’s leaders really see Ukraine’s strategic status, and therefore its potential NATO accession, as critical? If they do, that would explain why, contrary to all normal logic and political good sense, they have given NATO a reason to make a stand and irretrievably damaged Russia’s international standing by deciding it is rational to attack Ukraine unilaterally — and then opting for a blunt ‘nuclearisation’ of their crisis diplomacy, so as to keep other potential belligerents out of the conflict.

Is this just a cynical manoeuvre, banking on Western weakness and hesitation, to give Russia the greatest possible freedom to act? Former British prime minister Tony Blair asks on his thinktank’s website: ‘Is it sensible to tell [Putin] in advance that whatever he does militarily, we will rule out any form of military response? Maybe that is our position and maybe that is the right position, but continually signalling it, and removing doubt in his mind, is a strange tactic’ (6).

Who would take responsibility?

Yet although diplomatic manoeuvring is clearly going on, who — with responsibility for what comes next — would be able to say today precisely to what extent this Russian cynicism, which seeks to achieve its objectives through aggressive drawing of red lines, also stems from strategic conviction fuelled by frustrations that have come to a head? We should not underestimate the dangers of this mixture if the West were to test Russia’s siege mentality head on in Ukraine.

Others asked these questions, well before Biden. In the first days of the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis, when the US joint chiefs of staff were taking a hard line, President John F Kennedy expressed the key issues not in military terms, but in terms of perception. He told a meeting of ExComm (the Executive Committee of the National Security Council), ‘Let me just say a little, first, about what the problem is, from my point of view ... we ought to think of why the Russians did this.’

The declassified archives on this key moment in history reveal that Kennedy talked of a blockade, of the importance of giving Khrushchev a way out, and of avoiding escalation to nuclear weapons, all while preserving the US’s international credibility. General Curtis E LeMay, US Air Force chief of staff, replied, ‘This blockade and political action, I see leading into war ... This is almost as bad as the appeasement at Munich.’ The joint chiefs were unanimous in recommending immediate military action. Kennedy thanked them, dryly, and, in the days that followed, did the exact opposite.

‘And [the joint chiefs] were wrong,’ historian Martin J Sherwin concludes in a recent book on decision-making processes in nuclear crises. ‘Had the president not insisted on a blockade, had he accepted the chiefs’ recommendations (also favoured by the majority of his ExComm advisers), he unwittingly would have precipitated a nuclear war’ (7).

The central issue is indeed the significance of the nuclear signalling in which Russia has wrapped its premeditated conventional attack. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky doubts Putin will really use nuclear weapons: ‘I think that the threat of nuclear war is a bluff. It’s one thing to be a murderer. It’s another to commit suicide. Every use of nuclear weapons means the end for all sides, not just for the person using them’ (8).

At the risk of appearing spineless, Biden seems to have reserved judgment. For the moment he is restraining his most aggressive allies, such as Poland, and focusing on the coercive force of the economic sanctions, rather than any initiative that might give Putin an excuse for escalation — starting with the use of tactical nuclear weapons, of which Russia is thought to have around 2,000.

‘Putin is bluffing on nuclear’

Is Biden wrong? On 14 March General Rick J Hillier, former chief of Canada’s defence staff, told CBS that NATO should impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine because Putin was bluffing. John Feehery, former communications director to House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, thought so too: ‘Biden’s weakness on Ukraine invited [the] Russian invasion ... When Putin hinted that he was willing to use nuclear weapons to achieve his goals, Biden said that we weren’t going to use ours, which seems to me to defeat the purpose of having those weapons in the first place. If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’ (9). Stanford historian Niall Ferguson agrees: ‘Putin is bluffing on nuclear, we shouldn’t have backed down.’ And is dismayed that ‘media coverage has become so sentimental and ignorant of military realities’ (10).

But what are these military ‘realities’? What is the nature of the problem? It’s the possibility that Russia will resort to first use of nuclear weapons in an armed conflict that is already under way. Nina Tannenwald, whose book The Nuclear Taboo (Cambridge, 2007) has become a key text in international relations, believes the risk is too great, and supports the US’s wait-and-see strategy: ‘Despite scattered calls in the US for the creation of a “no-fly zone” over some or all of Ukraine, the Biden administration has widely resisted. In practice, this could mean shooting down Russian planes. It could lead to World War III’ (11).

The most striking characteristic of the war in Ukraine is its nuclear backdrop. Events are unfolding as if the world was hurriedly relearning the vocabulary and fundamentals of nuclear strategy, forgotten since the cold war. This is certainly true of Western media and governments, as they become conscious of the potentially destructive sequences of events that link the operational-tactical and politico-strategic dimensions of the present tragedy. The bellicose declarations of some experts in the early days of the war have given way to calmer analysis. In many ways, it’s high time; Kharkiv is not Kabul. Especially given the recent worrying developments in the nuclear debate.

Until relatively recently, the nuclear orthodoxy established after the cold war, as the two superpowers reduced their strategic arsenals, had placed some nuclear weapons in a kind of peripheral area of the doctrine: those known as ‘tactical’ because of their lesser power and range. From 1945 to the 1960s, they had been a key part of US war plans, especially for the European theatre. At the time, the aim was to counter the Soviet Union’s conventional superiority with overwhelming nuclear superiority, to deny the battlefield to the enemy. US secretary of state John Foster Dulles, author of the ‘massive retaliation’ doctrine, stated in 1955, ‘The United States in particular has sea and air forces now equipped with new and powerful weapons of precision which can utterly destroy military targets without endangering unrelated civilian centers’ (12). President Dwight D Eisenhower declared, ‘I see no reason why they shouldn’t be used just exactly as you would use a bullet or anything else.’

However, from the 1960s, the prospect of ‘mutual assured destruction’ reduced the likelihood that tactical nuclear weapons would be used, because of the risk of escalation. The concept of a ‘limited nuclear strike’ gradually came to be seen as dangerous sophistry. Regardless of experts who were certain that a nuclear war could be ‘won’ by ‘graduating’ one’s nuclear response, and controlling the ‘ladders of escalation’ (the best known being Herman Kahn of the Hudson Institute), even a nuclear weapon (arbitrarily) labelled as ‘tactical’ still had the potential to lead to total destruction. The works of Thomas Schelling, especially The Strategy of Conflict (1960) and Strategy and Arms Control (1961) contributed to this new awareness.

Options for US decision makers

The rejection of graduation became a distinguishing characteristic of France’s nuclear doctrine. While reserving the option of a ‘unique and non-renewable’ warning shot, President Emmanuel Macron said in February 2020 that France had always ‘refused to consider nuclear weapons as a weapon of battle.’ He also insisted that France would ‘never engage in a nuclear battle or any form of graduated response’ (13).

Prior to the 2010s, it seemed possible that other nuclear-weapon states could adopt such a doctrinal stance, coupled with the ‘minimum necessary’ nuclear arsenal (France had fewer than 300 warheads). And it was possible to believe that, with a few exceptions (such as Pakistan), tactical nuclear weapons had ‘faded into the background of military and political planning and rhetoric’ (14).

Despite scattered calls in the US for the creation of a ‘no-fly zone' over some or all of Ukraine, the Biden administration has widely resisted. In practice, this could mean shooting down Russian planes. It could lead to World War III

Nina Tannenwald

But over the last decade, the trend has reversed. In the world of strategic studies, there has been a return to ‘theories of [nuclear] victory’. Their proponents draw on the work of past scholars such as Henry Kissinger, who wondered in his 1957 book Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy if extending the American deterrent to all of Europe at a time when the threat of total destruction hung over the US itself would actually work: ‘A reliance on all-out war as the chief deterrent saps our system of alliances in two ways: either our allies feel that any military effort on their part is unnecessary or they may be led to the conviction that peace is preferable to war even on terms almost akin to surrender ... As the implication of all-out war with modern weapons become better understood ... it is not reasonable to assume that the United Kingdom, and even more the United States, would be prepared to commit suicide in order to defend a particular area ... whatever its importance, to an enemy’ (15).

One of the recommended solutions was to bring tactical nuclear weapons back into the dialectic of deterrence extended to allied territories, so as to give US decision makers a range of options between Armageddon and defeat without a war. Global deterrence was ‘restored’ by creating additional rungs on the ladder of escalation, which were supposed to enable a sub-apocalyptic deterrence dialogue — before one major adversary or the other felt its key interests were threatened and resorted to extreme measures. Many theorists in the 1970s took this logic further, in particular Colin Gray in a 1979 article, now back in fashion, titled ‘Nuclear Strategy: the case for a theory of victory’ (16).

Theoreticians of nuclear victory today reject the ‘paralysis’ that comes with an excessively rigid vision of deterrence. Their strategic beliefs were semi-officialised in the Trump administration’s 2018 Nuclear Posture Review (17). What influence have these theories had on Russia? Has the Kremlin chosen to combine nuclear and conventional deterrents in an operational continuum? Whatever the case, authors who defend the idea of using tactical (‘low-yield’ or ‘ultra-low yield’) nuclear weapons emphasise the importance of countering adversaries who adopt hybrid strategies. Rogue states without a nuclear deterrent will increasingly be tempted to present a fait accompli, banking on nuclear-weapon states’ risk aversion, at least when the latter face a crisis that does not affect their own national territory.

Uncertainties of deterrence dialogue

This shows how Kissinger’s 1957 discussion of the intrinsic weaknesses of wider nuclear deterrence remains pertinent today. The benefits would be even greater for a state with a nuclear deterrent — a nuclear-weapon state behaving like a rogue state. This is exactly what Russia is doing in Ukraine. The West’s hesitation to adopt an over-vigorous response that could lead to nuclear escalation is amplified by its realisation of how history would view whichever party — aggressor or victim — became the first to break the nuclear taboo since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. International Crisis Group’s Olga Oliker admits that ‘such caution and concessions may not bring emotional satisfaction; there is certainly a visceral appeal to proposals that would have NATO forces directly help Ukraine. But these would dramatically heighten the risk that the war becomes a wider, potentially nuclear conflict. Western leaders should therefore reject them out of hand. Literally nothing else could be more dangerous.’

The ‘Third Nuclear Age’, heralded by various crises over the last decade, has dawned in Ukraine. In 2018 Admiral Pierre Vandier, now chief of staff of the French navy, offered a precise definition of this shift to the new strategic era, which has begun with Russia’s invasion: ‘A number of indicators suggest that we are entering a new era, a Third Nuclear Age, following the first, defined by mutual deterrence between the two superpowers, and the second, which raised hopes of a total and definitive elimination of nuclear weapons after the cold war’ (18).

This third age will bring new questions on the reliability — and relevance — of ‘logical rules ... painfully learned, as during the Cuban [missile] crisis’ (19). There will be questions about the rationality of new actors using their nuclear deterrents. The worth of the nuclear taboo, which some today treat as absolute, will be reappraised.

‘Unleashed power of the atom’

Questions like ‘If we refuse to use them, why do we have them?’ suggest Albert Einstein’s warning from 1946 may still be pertinent: ‘The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking.’ Yet Einstein was already wrong. Huge numbers of papers were hurriedly written to explain the balances and imbalances of the deterrence dialogue. The current usefulness of these historical, theoretical documents is highly variable, as their logic often reaches absurd conclusions. Yet they include some intelligent analyses that shed light on the Ukrainian nuclear crisis.

Columbia professor Robert Jervis (20), a pioneer of political psychology in international relations, sought to demonstrate that it was possible to overcome the security anxieties that cause each actor to see his own actions as defensive, and those of his competitor as ‘naturally’ offensive. Jervis maintained that breaking the insecurity cycle caused by this distortion meant developing exchanges of signals that would make it possible to differentiate between offensive and defensive weapons in the arsenals of one’s adversaries. And his adaptation of prospect theory to nuclear crises opens up possibilities of interpreting Russia’s behaviour differently, suggesting for example that the adoption of aggressive tactics is more often motivated by aversion to loss than by hopes of gain.

In a nuclear crisis, all strategies are sub-optimal. One, however, is worse than all the rest: claiming that the adversary’s leader is insane, while simultaneously treating the standoff as a game of chicken. This will lead either to mutual destruction or to defeat without a war. Over the past few weeks, some seem to have accepted that this worst of all possible choices is worthy of being called a strategy.

*Olivier Zajec is a lecturer in political science at Jean Moulin Lyon III University’s law faculty.

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Image: The climate bill President Biden signed last year provides $370 billion in subsidies for low-carbon technologies like wind, solar, nuclear and batteries. Credit...Kenny Holston for The New York Times

The U.S. Has Billions for Wind and Solar Projects. Good Luck Plugging Them In

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New French fund with 87.5 mln euros targets African solar development

Reuters

Dr Stanford Chidziva, acting director of Green Hydrogen, looks at the solar panels at the site where Keren Energy constructed the first proof of concept of green hydrogen production facility in Africa at Namaqua Engineering in Vredendal, in collaboration with The Green Hydrogen Institute for Advanced Materials Chemistry (SAIAMC) at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa, November 15, 2022. REUTERS/Esa Alexande

PARIS, Feb 24 (Reuters) - A new investment fund with 87.5 million euros ($92.63 million) will finance solar power production across Africa, with a focus on West and Central Africa, French fund manager RGREEN INVEST and investment adviser ECHOSYS INVEST said on Friday.

The AFRIGREEEN Debt Impact Fund's first closing will finance on- and off-grid solar power plants for small- and medium-sized commercial and industrial consumers across the continent, the statement said.

The project aims to provide direct lending and asset-based debt facilities for regional and international developers and African commercial and industrial companies to develop solar infrastructure.

The groups are looking to have a portfolio of twenty to thirty investments, with aim of meeting long-term debt financing needs of between 10 and 15 million euros, with an average of around 5 million euros over eight to ten years, the statement said.

The fund also includes and offer of long-term local currency financing in Ghana and Nigeria with support from the International Development Association's Private Sector Window Local Currency Facility.

The Fund's will measure impact targets in terms of megawatts (MW) installed, megawtt-hours (MWh) produced, tonnes of CO2 emissions and litres of fuel avoided, and number of companies directly or indirectly accessing new financing channel, it said.

The impact will also be measured by the number of commercial and industrial companies able to upgrade their power generation facilities and enhance their efficiency.

RGREEN INVEST and ECHOSYS INVEST said that the first closing included commitments from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC).

French banks Societe Generale (SOGN.PA) and BNP Paribas (BNPP.PA) completed the first round of funding, the statement said.

The group is aiming to raise a total of 100 million euros from development finance institutions and private investors.

($1 = 0.9446 euros)

Reporting by Forrest Crellin and Sudip Kar-Gupta. Editing by Jane Merriman

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China calls for peace talks between Russia and Ukraine (Le Monde)

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Quote of the day…

Undoubtedly, to China, the forgotten ally of the West during World War II, also, this undesirable situation is squeezing his shoes leaving them serious wounds in their public treasury, hopefully, and so, by necessity or common sense, the economic giant of the East will awaken to the damage that this context is causing in its own economy and will use the magic key.

Natural gas is the new “Russian winter” as a war element…

German & Co, september 9, 2022

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang speaks during the Lanting Forum on the Global Security Initiative Tuesday. The foreign ministry issued a 12-point plan to end the Russia-Ukraine war Friday. (Andy Wong/The Associated Press )

China made the comments in a 12-point paper on the 'political settlement' of the crisis, timed to coincide with the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Le Monde with AP and AFP

Published on February 24, 2023 at 04h06, updated at 07h14 on February 24, 2023

China, a firm Russian ally, has called for a cease-fire between Ukraine and Moscow and the opening of peace talks as part of a 12-point proposal to end the conflict.

The plan issued on Friday, February 24, by the Foreign Ministry also urges the end of Western sanctions imposed on Russia, measures to ensure the safety of nuclear facilities, the establishment of humanitarian corridors for the evacuation of civilians, and steps to ensure the export of grain after disruptions caused global food prices to spike.

China has claimed to be neutral in the conflict, but it has a "no limits" relationship with Russia and has refused to criticize its invasion of Ukraine over even refer to it as such, while accusing the West of provoking the conflict and "fanning the flames" by providing Ukraine with defensive arms.

China and Russia have increasingly aligned their foreign policies to oppose the US-led liberal international order. Foreign Minister Wang Yi reaffirmed the strength of those ties when he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a visit to Moscow this week.

China has also been accused by the US of possibly preparing to provide Russia with military aid, something Beijing says lacks evidence. Given China's positions, that throws doubt on whether its 12-point proposal has any hope of going ahead – or whether China is seen as an honest broker.

US reserving judgment

Before the proposal was released, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called it an important first step. "I think that, in general, the fact that China started talking about peace in Ukraine, I think that it is not bad. It is important for us that all states are on our side, on the side of justice," he said at a news conference Friday with Spain's prime minister.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price said earlier Thursday that the US would reserve judgment but that China’s allegiance with Russia meant it was not a neutral mediator. "We would like to see nothing more than a just and durable peace ... but we are skeptical that reports of a proposal like this will be a constructive path forward," he said.

Price added that the US hopes "all countries that have a relationship with Russia unlike the one that we have will use that leverage, will use that influence to push Russia meaningfully and usefully to end this brutal war of aggression. (China) is in a position to do that in ways that we just aren’t."

The peace proposal mainly elaborated on long-held Chinese positions, including referring to the need that all countries' "sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity be effectively guaranteed." It also called an end to the "Cold War mentality" – it's a standard term for what it regards as US hegemony and interference in other countries.

"A country’s security cannot be at the expense of other countries’ security, and regional security cannot be guaranteed by strengthening or even expanding military blocs," the proposal said. "The legitimate security interests and concerns of all countries should be taken seriously and properly addressed."

'Resume direct dialogue asap'

China abstained Thursday when the UN General Assembly approved a nonbinding resolution that calls for Russia to end hostilities in Ukraine and withdraw its forces. It is one of 16 countries that either voted against or abstained on almost all of five previous resolutions on Ukraine.

The resolution, drafted by Ukraine in consultation with its allies, passed 141-7 with 32 abstentions, sending a strong message on the eve of the first anniversary of the invasion that appears to leave Russia more isolated than ever.

While China has not been openly critical of Moscow, it has said that the present conflict is "not something it wishes to see," and has repeatedly said any use of nuclear weapons would be completely unacceptable, in an implied repudiation of Putin’s statement that Russia would use "all available means" to protect its territory.

"There are no winners in conflict wars," the proposal said. "All parties should maintain rationality and restraint ... support Russia and Ukraine to meet each other, resume direct dialogue as soon as possible, gradually promote the de-escalation and relaxation of the situation, and finally reach a comprehensive ceasefire," it said.

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The U.S. Has Billions for Wind and Solar Projects. Good Luck Plugging Them In. (NYT)

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Quote of the day…

“There’s a lesson there,” Mr. Gahl said. “You can pass big, ambitious climate laws, but if you don’t pay attention to details like interconnection rules, you can quickly run into trouble.”

NYT

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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The climate bill President Biden signed last year provides $370 billion in subsidies for low-carbon technologies like wind, solar, nuclear and batteries. Credit...Kenny Holston for The New York Times

An explosion in proposed clean energy ventures has overwhelmed the system for connecting new power sources to homes and businesses.

NYT By Brad Plumer

Feb. 23, 2023

Plans to install 3,000 acres of solar panels in Kentucky and Virginia are delayed for years. Wind farms in Minnesota and North Dakota have been abruptly canceled. And programs to encourage Massachusetts and Maine residents to adopt solar power are faltering.

The energy transition poised for takeoff in the United States amid record investment in wind, solar and other low-carbon technologies is facing a serious obstacle: The volume of projects has overwhelmed the nation’s antiquated systems to connect new sources of electricity to homes and businesses.

So many projects are trying to squeeze through the approval process that delays can drag on for years, leaving some developers to throw up their hands and walk away.

More than 8,100 energy projects — the vast majority of them wind, solar and batteries — were waiting for permission to connect to electric grids at the end of 2021, up from 5,600 the year before, jamming the system known as interconnection.

That’s the process by which electricity generated by wind turbines or solar arrays is added to the grid — the network of power lines and transformers that moves electricity from the spot where it is created to cities and factories. There is no single grid; the United States has dozens of electric networks, each overseen by a different authority.

PJM Interconnection, which operates the nation’s largest regional grid, stretching from Illinois to New Jersey, has been so inundated by connection requests that last year it announced a freeze on new applications until 2026, so that it can work through a backlog of thousands of proposals, mostly for renewable energy.

It now takes roughly four years, on average, for developers to get approval, double the time it took a decade ago.

And when companies finally get their projects reviewed, they often face another hurdle: the local grid is at capacity, and they are required to spend much more than they planned for new transmission lines and other upgrades.

“From our perspective, the interconnection process has become the No. 1 project killer,” said Piper Miller, vice president of market development at Pine Gate Renewables, a major solar power and battery developer.

A building that formerly housed transformers at the Brayton Point Power Station, a decommissioned coal plant that is being repurposed to link a wind farm to the Massachusetts power grid.Credit...Simon Simard for The New York Times

After years of breakneck growth, large-scale solar, wind and battery installations in the United States fell 16 percent in 2022, according to the American Clean Power Association, a trade group. It blamed supply chain problems but also lengthy delays connecting projects to the grid.

Electricity production generates roughly one-quarter of the greenhouse gases produced by the United States; cleaning it up is key to President Biden’s plan to fight global warming. The landmark climate bill he signed last year provides $370 billion in subsidies to help make low-carbon energy technologies — like wind, solar, nuclear or batteries — cheaper than fossil fuels.

But the law does little to address many practical barriers to building clean energy projects, such as permitting holdups, local opposition or transmission constraints. Unless those obstacles get resolved, experts say, there’s a risk that billions in federal subsidies won’t translate into the deep emissions cuts envisioned by lawmakers.

“It doesn’t matter how cheap the clean energy is,” said Spencer Nelson, managing director of research at ClearPath Foundation, an energy-focused nonprofit. “If developers can’t get through the interconnection process quickly enough and get enough steel in the ground, we won’t hit our climate change goals.”

Waiting in line for years

In the largest grids, such as those in the Midwest or Mid-Atlantic, a regional operator manages the byzantine flow of electricity from hundreds of different power plants through thousands of miles of transmission lines and into millions of homes.

Before a developer can build a power plant, the local grid operator must make sure the project won’t cause disruptions — if, for instance, existing power lines get more electricity than they can handle, they could overheat and fail. After conducting a detailed study, the grid operator might require upgrades, such as a line connecting the new plant to a nearby substation. The developer usually bears this cost. Then the operator moves on to study the next project in the queue.

This process was fairly routine when energy companies were building a few large coal or gas plants each year. But it has broken down as the number of wind, solar and battery projects has risen sharply over the past decade, driven by falling costs, state clean-energy mandates and, now, hefty federal subsidies.

“The biggest challenge is just the sheer volume of projects,” said Ken Seiler, who leads system planning at PJM Interconnection. “There are only so many power engineers out there who can do the sophisticated studies we need to do to ensure the system stays reliable, and everyone else is trying to hire them, too.”

PJM, the grid operator, now has 2,700 energy projects under study — mostly wind, solar and batteries — a number that has tripled in just three years. Wait times can now reach four years or more, which prompted PJM last year to pause new reviews and overhaul its processes.

Delays can upend the business models of renewable energy developers. As time ticks by, rising materials costs can erode a project’s viability. Options to buy land expire. Potential customers lose interest.

Two years ago, Silicon Ranch, a solar power developer, applied to PJM for permission to connect three 100-megawatt solar projects in Kentucky and Virginia, enough to power tens of thousands of homes. The company, which often pairs its solar arrays with sheep grazing, had negotiated purchase options with local landowners for thousands of acres of farmland.

Today, that land is sitting empty. Silicon Ranch hasn’t received feedback from PJM and now estimates it may not be able to bring those solar farms online until 2028 or 2029. That creates headaches: The company may have to decide whether to buy the land before it even knows whether its solar arrays will be approved.

“It’s frustrating,” said Reagan Farr, the chief executive of Silicon Ranch. “We always talk about how important it is for our industry to establish trust and credibility with local communities. But if you come in and say you’re going to invest, and then nothing happens for years, it’s not an optimal situation.”

PJM soon plans to speed up its queues — for instance, by studying projects in clusters rather than one at a time — but needs to clear its backlog first.

‘Imagine if we paid for highways this way’

A potentially bigger problem for solar and wind is that, in many places around the country, the local grid is clogged, unable to absorb more power.

That means if a developer wants to build a new wind farm, it might have to pay not just for a simple connecting line, but also for deeper grid upgrades elsewhere. One planned wind farm in North Dakota, for example, was asked to pay for multimillion-dollar upgrades to transmission lines hundreds of miles away in Nebraska and Missouri.

These costs can be unpredictable. In 2018, EDP North America, a renewable energy developer, proposed a 100-megawatt wind farm in southwestern Minnesota, estimating it would have to spend $10 million connecting to the grid. But after the grid operator completed its analysis, EDP learned the upgrades would cost $80 million. It canceled the project.

That creates a new problem: When a proposed energy project drops out of the queue, the grid operator often has to redo studies for other pending projects and shift costs to other developers, which can trigger more cancellations and delays.

It also creates perverse incentives, experts said. Some developers will submit multiple proposals for wind and solar farms at different locations without intending to build them all. Instead, they hope that one of their proposals will come after another developer who has to pay for major network upgrades. The rise of this sort of speculative bidding has further jammed up the queue.

“Imagine if we paid for highways this way,” said Rob Gramlich, president of the consulting group Grid Strategies. “If a highway is fully congested, the next car that gets on has to pay for a whole lane expansion. When that driver sees the bill, they drop off. Or, if they do pay for it themselves, everyone else gets to use that infrastructure. It doesn’t make any sense.”

A better approach, Mr. Gramlich said, would be for grid operators to plan transmission upgrades that are broadly beneficial and spread the costs among a wider set of energy providers and users, rather than having individual developers fix the grid bit by bit, through a chaotic process.

There is precedent for that idea. In the 2000s, Texas officials saw that existing power lines wouldn’t be able to handle the growing number of wind turbines being built in the blustery plains of West Texas and planned billions of dollars in upgrades. Texas now leads the nation in wind power. Similarly, MISO, a grid spanning 15 states in the Midwest, recently approved $10.3 billion in new power lines, partly because officials could see that many of its states had set ambitious renewable energy goals and would need more transmission.

But this sort of proactive planning is rare, since utilities, state officials and businesses often argue fiercely over whether new lines are necessary — and who should bear the cost.

“The hardest part isn’t the engineering, it’s figuring out who’s going to pay for it,” said Aubrey Johnson, vice president of system planning at MISO.

Climate goals at risk

As grid delays pile up, regulators have taken notice. Last year, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission proposed two major reforms to streamline interconnection queues and encourage grid operators to do more long-term planning.

The fate of these rules is unclear, however. In December, Richard Glick, the former regulatory commission chairman who spearheaded both reforms, stepped down after clashing with Senator Joe Manchin III, Democrat of West Virginia, over unrelated policies around natural gas pipelines. The commission is now split between two Democrats and two Republicans; any new reforms need majority approval.

If the United States can’t fix its grid problems, it could struggle to tackle climate change. Researchers at the Princeton-led REPEAT project recently estimated that new federal subsidies for clean energy could cut electricity emissions in half by 2030. But that assumes transmission capacity expands twice as fast over the next decade. If that doesn’t happen, the researchers found, emissions could actually increase as solar and wind get stymied and existing gas and coal plants run more often to power electric cars.

Massachusetts and Maine offer a warning, said David Gahl, executive director of the Solar and Storage Industries Institute. In both states, lawmakers offered hefty incentives for small-scale solar installations. Investors poured money in, but within months, grid managers were overwhelmed, delaying hundreds of projects.

“There’s a lesson there,” Mr. Gahl said. “You can pass big, ambitious climate laws, but if you don’t pay attention to details like interconnection rules, you can quickly run into trouble.”

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News round-up, Thursday, February 23, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

International relations are complicated at present, and the situation hardly improved after the collapse of the bipolar system; quite on the contrary, tensions spiralled. In this regard, Russian-Chinese cooperation in the international arena, as we have repeatedly stressed, is very important for stabilising the international situation.

THE KREMLIN, MOSCOW, FEBRUARY 22, 2023

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Most read…

Meeting with Member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Wang Yi

We are delighted to see you in Russia, in Moscow.

THE KREMLIN, MOSCOW, FEBRUARY 22, 2023

From George to Barack: A Look at Secret Bush Memos to the Obama Team

Newly declassified memos offer a window into how the world appeared as the Bush administration was winding down.

The transition between Barack Obama and George W. Bush came at a fragile moment for the country…

NYT By Peter Baker

The Impact of Russian Missile Strikes on Ukraine’s Power Grid

The Kremlin wagered that by depriving Ukrainians of electricity—and heat and water—during wintertime, they would sap the country’s resolve.

The New Yorker By Joshua Yaffa

Analysis: Healthy gas storage warms Europe, but not enough

European gas prices rallied in the run-up to Moscow's invasion of Ukraine begun almost exactly a year ago and they leapt to record highs when Russia subsequently cut supplies of relatively cheap pipeline gas.

Reuters by Nora Buli and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin

Mexico passes electoral overhaul that critics warn weakens democracy

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador argues the reorganization will save $150 million a year and reduce the influence of economic interests in politics.

Reuters

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…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Meeting with Member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Wang Yi. Photo by Anton Novoderezhkin, TASS

Meeting with Member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Wang Yi

The Kremlin, Moscow, February 22, 2023

On the Russian side, taking part in the talks were Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev; the Chinese side was represented by Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the People's Republic of China to the Russian Federation Zhang Hanhui and Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Deng Li.

* * *

Beginning of conversation with Member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Wang Yi

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Wang Yi, friends, colleagues,

We are delighted to see you in Russia, in Moscow.

First of all, I would like to take this opportunity of having you here and to begin our meeting by conveying my best wishes to our friend, President of the People's Republic of China, Comrade Xi Jinping.

We know that China has implemented very important domestic political steps, which will certainly contribute to the strengthening of the country and will create the right conditions for its ongoing development in accordance with the plans of the Chinese Communist Party.

In this regard, I would like to note that Russian-Chinese relations are progressing as we planned in previous years: they are progressing and growing steadily, and we are reaching new milestones.

I am primarily referring to economic projects, of course. It is our ambition to reach the level of US$200 billion in 2024. Last year, we reached US$185 billion. There is every reason to believe that we will achieve our goals in terms of trade, perhaps even earlier than we planned, because bilateral trade is growing.

Trade is important for both sides, but we also cooperate in international affairs. As the long-term Foreign Minister of China, you are well aware of this, as you have been a part of this and continue to be directly involved as a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. We are grateful to you and to all your colleagues, to the entire staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs – we are expressing the warmest words of gratitude for this joint work.

International relations are complicated at present, and the situation hardly improved after the collapse of the bipolar system; quite on the contrary, tensions spiralled. In this regard, Russian-Chinese cooperation in the international arena, as we have repeatedly stressed, is very important for stabilising the international situation.

We also cooperate in every other area – in humanitarian projects and international organisations, including, of course, the United Nations, the UN Security Council, of which we are permanent members, BRICS, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. We have a lot of joint work to do together.

And of course, we are expecting the President of the People's Republic of China in Russia – we have agreed on his visit earlier. We know he has a domestic political agenda to attend to, but we assume that once the issues on that agenda are dealt with (the National People's Congress, which is planned by the relevant congress of Chinese deputies, where major personnel issues are to be resolved), we will proceed with our plans for personal meetings, which will give an additional impetus to our relations.

Thank you.

Member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and Director of the Office of the Foreign Affairs Commission of the CPC Central Committee Wang Yi (retranslated):

Mr President,

Thank you very much for finding the time in your schedule to meet with our delegation.

First, let me convey to you sincere greetings and best wishes from President Xi Jinping.

At the end of 2022, President Xi Jinping met with you via videoconference to comprehensively sum up the achievements in our relations, which outlined a wide-scale plan for the continued development of our relations.

I attended that meeting as well. You said that the Russian side invited Mr Wang Yi to visit Russia as soon as possible, so I visited Russia as scheduled in order to comprehensively implement the agreements of our leaders so as to achieve great results in our cooperation across various fields.

Amid an extremely complex and volatile international situation, China-Russia relations have withstood the pressure exerted by the international community and are developing quite sustainably. Although the crisis constantly makes itself felt, crises offer opportunities, and opportunities may turn into crises, which we know from history. So, we need to redouble our efforts to respond to the crisis and the opportunities, and to deepen our cooperation.

We are also here to emphasise that our relations are never directed against third countries and, of course, are not subject to pressure from third parties, since we have a very strong economic, political and cultural foundation. We have gained quite an extensive experience precisely because we are supportive of multipolarity and democratisation of international relations, which is fully in line with the spirit of the times and history and meets the interests of most countries as well.

In conjunction with the Russian side, we are looking forward to maintaining political determination, deepening political mutual trust and strategic cooperation, comprehensively expanding practical cooperation in order to play a major, constructive role in ensuring the interests of our countries, and promoting progress around the world.

That concludes my opening remarks. I am now ready to listen to your very important opinion, and I am also prepared to have a detailed discussion with you.

Thank you.

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Source: Time

From George to Barack: A Look at Secret Bush Memos to the Obama Team

Newly declassified memos offer a window into how the world appeared as the Bush administration was winding down.

The transition between Barack Obama and George W. Bush came at a fragile moment for the country…

NYT By Peter Baker

Feb. 14, 2023

WASHINGTON — The world was a volatile place when President George W. Bush was leaving office. So on the way out the door, he and his national security team left a little advice for their successors:

India is a friend. Pakistan is not. Don’t trust North Korea or Iran, but talking is still better than not. Watch out for Russia; it covets the territory of its neighbor Ukraine. Beware becoming ensnared by intractable land wars in the Middle East and Central Asia. And oh yes, nation-building is definitely harder than it looks.

Fourteen years ago, Mr. Bush’s team recorded its counsel for the incoming administration of President Barack Obama in 40 classified memos by the National Security Council, part of what has widely been hailed by both sides as a model transition between presidents of different parties. For the first time, those memos have now been declassified, offering a window into how the world appeared to a departing administration after eight years marked by war, terrorism and upheaval.

Thirty of the memos are reproduced in “Hand-Off: The Foreign Policy George W. Bush Passed to Barack Obama,” a new book edited by Stephen J. Hadley, Mr. Bush’s last national security adviser, along with three members of his staff, and set to be published by the Brookings Institution on Wednesday. The memos add up to a tour d’horizon of the international challenges that awaited Mr. Obama and his team in January 2009 with U.S. troops still in combat in two wars and various other threats to American security looming.

“They were designed to provide the incoming administration with what they needed to know about the most critical foreign policy and national security issues they would face,” Mr. Bush wrote in a foreword to the book. “The memoranda told them candidly what we thought we had accomplished — where we had succeeded and where we had fallen short — and what work remained to be done.”

The transition between Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama came at a fragile moment for the country, which was in the throes of a global financial crisis even as it was grappling with other foreign challenges. But even though Mr. Obama had assailed Mr. Bush’s policies during his campaign, particularly the war in Iraq, their teams worked together with unusual collegiality during the turnover.

Each of the memos focuses on a different country or a different area of foreign policy, reviewing for the new team what the Bush administration had done and how it saw the road ahead.

In the book, Mr. Hadley and his team, led by Peter D. Feaver, William C. Inboden and Meghan L. O’Sullivan, add postscripts written in the current day to reflect on where the transition memos got it right or wrong and what has happened in the three presidencies since then.

Iraq was central to the Bush administration’s foreign policy and still a festering problem as he was leaving office, but his surge of additional troops and a change in strategy in 2006 had helped bring down civilian deaths by nearly 90 percent. Those moves also paved the way for agreements that Mr. Bush sealed with Iraq to withdraw all American troops by the end of 2011, a time frame that Mr. Obama essentially adopted.

The Iraq memo, written by Brett McGurk, who went on to work for Mr. Obama, President Donald J. Trump and President Biden, offered no recapitulation of how the war was initiated on false intelligence about weapons of mass destruction, but it did acknowledge how badly the war had gone until the surge.

“The surge strategy reset negative trends and set the conditions for longer-term stability,” the memo said. “The coming 18 months, however, may be the most strategically significant in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein,” it added, putting that in boldface. Referring to Al Qaeda of Iraq, it said, “AQI is down but not out and a series of elections will define Iraq’s future.”

The memo warned the Obama team that the situation could still unravel again: “There is no magic formula in Iraq. While our policy is now on a more stable and sustainable course, we should expect shocks to the system that will require a flexible and pragmatic approach at least through government formation in the first quarter of 2010.”

The memo included a warning that would figure in a later debate. While Mr. Bush’s agreement called for a 2011 withdrawal, the memo reported that Iraqi leaders “have told us that they will seek a follow-on arrangement for training and logistical (and probably some special operations) forces beyond 2011.” Mr. Obama tried to negotiate such a follow-on agreement, but talks collapsed and his allies later played down the notion that anyone had ever expected such an extension.

In her postscript to the Iraq memo, Ms. O’Sullivan skated lightly over the false predicate for the war (“intelligence that was tragically later proven wrong”) and the mistaken assumptions (“an unanticipated collapse of order and Iraqi institutions”). But she was more expansive about the “shortcomings of the 2003-2006 strategy,” which she defined as the “mistaken belief” that political reconciliation would lead to improved security, inadequate troop levels, “too aggressive a timeline to transition” to Iraqi control and “a failure to take on Iranian influence more directly.”

“America’s experience in Iraq demonstrates that it is neither all-powerful nor powerless,” she wrote. “It has the ability to help countries make dramatic changes. But it should not underestimate the significant time, resources and energy that doing so requires — and the overwhelming importance of a committed, capable local partner.” Moreover, she added, “significant efforts to rebuild countries should only be undertaken when truly vital U.S. interests are at stake.”

The Bush team drew similar conclusions about Afghanistan. “Rarely, if ever, were the resources accorded to Afghanistan commensurate with the goals espoused,” Ms. O’Sullivan and two colleagues wrote in a postscript for that memo. “Policymakers overestimated the ability of the United States to produce an outcome” and “underestimated the impact of variables beyond U.S. control.”

Some of the memos underscored how much has changed in the last 14 years — and how much has not. Paving the way for administrations that followed, the Bush team saw India as a country ripe for alliance — and in fact its improved ties with India were seen as one of its foreign policy successes — even as it saw Pakistan as duplicitous and untrustworthy.

The Bush administration spent enormous energy trying to negotiate agreements to eliminate North Korea’s nuclear weapons program and, to a lesser extent, Iran’s, to no avail, much like its successors. But Mr. Bush’s aides concluded that diplomatic engagement restrained North Korea from provocative acts and came to believe that their mistake may have been expecting too much from the talks.

“An argument could be made that the United States had too intense a focus on the North Korean nuclear problem,” the postscript to the North Korea memo said. “Rather than seeking to contain or ‘quarantine’ the program, the Bush administration set a very high bar of eliminating the program.”

The memos indicate how much American policymakers in both parties at the time still held out hope for constructive relations with Russia and China. The memo on China urged extensive personal engagement between leaders, crediting Mr. Bush’s interactions with his Chinese counterparts with creating “a reserve of good will” between the two powers.

The memo on Russia concludes that Mr. Bush’s “strategy of personal diplomacy met with early success” but acknowledged that ties had soured, especially after Russia’s invasion of the former Soviet republic of Georgia in 2008. The memo presciently warned about Russia’s future ambitions.

“Russia attempts to challenge the territorial integrity of Ukraine, particularly in Crimea, which is 59 percent ethnically Russian and is home to the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet, must be prevented,” the memo warned five years before Russian forces would seize Crimea and 13 years before they would invade the rest of the country. The memo added that “Russia will exploit Europe’s dependence on Russian energy” and use political means “to drive wedges between the United States and Europe.”

As enlightening as the memos are, however, they also underscore that major challenges on the international stage are rarely solved for good, but instead are bequeathed from one administration to another, even in evolved form. So too are the successes and failures.

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Source: The New Yorker

The Impact of Russian Missile Strikes on Ukraine’s Power Grid

The Kremlin wagered that by depriving Ukrainians of electricity—and heat and water—during wintertime, they would sap the country’s resolve.

The New Yorker By Joshua Yaffa

Photography by Sasha Maslov

February 20, 2023

One day last fall, a Kh-101 cruise missile, launched from a Russian strategic-bomber plane, slammed into an electrical substation on the outskirts of Kharkiv, a Ukrainian city of more than a million people twenty-five miles from the Russian border. The strike blew apart the station’s control room, sending bricks and steel flying. The roof collapsed; equipment was incinerated in a wall of fire. Two workers for Ukrenergo, the state electricity company, were on duty in the control room and were killed instantly. Kharkiv was plunged into darkness. “They know where they are aiming,” a repairman named Vadim said. (Like a number of power-grid employees I spoke with, he asked not to use his full name.) “They hit the most critical places.”

Serhii, an electrician at a substation in the Kharkiv region.

Ukrenergo workers at a substation in eastern Ukraine are salvaging pieces of equipment that still can be used for repairs.

Since the beginning of Russia’s invasion, its attacks had periodically damaged energy infrastructure near the front lines. “That we were used to,” Dmytro Sakharuk, the executive director of DTEK, Ukraine’s largest private energy company, said. “But then they changed strategy.” Starting last fall, the Russian military began targeting coal-fuelled power plants, substations, and transformers across the whole of Ukraine. Russian officials wagered that by depriving Ukrainians of electricity—and, as a result, heat and water—during wintertime, they would sap the country’s resolve. “They wanted to initiate a long-term blackout and to freeze our big cities,” Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, the C.E.O. of Ukrenergo, told me. “The idea was to force us to negotiate not through emerging victorious on the battlefield but by terrorizing the population.”

Dmytro Sakharuk, the executive director of DTEK, photographed at a former underground parking area that has been repurposed as a shelter where corporate workers descend every time there is an air-raid alarm.

A damaged high-voltage transformer at a substation in western Ukraine.

After successive waves of Russian strikes, Ukraine has faced a stark electricity deficit and rolling blackouts. At any given moment, millions of Ukrainian households are without power, as part of a centrally managed schedule that splits each day into three color-coded periods: green (guaranteed electricity), orange (no electricity), and white (cuts are possible). The guttural purr of diesel generators has become the background noise to life in just about every major Ukrainian city, as shops and restaurants have struggled to keep their lights on.

“We want to at least make these cuts predictable,” Kudrytskyi said. “It’s not just about making sure people survive the winter but also making sure they can work, and that businesses can operate, so that there is a domestic economy that, in turn, can fund the army.”

Not long ago, Ukraine and Russia, along with Belarus, shared the same electricity grid, an arrangement that independent Ukraine inherited from the Soviet period. Last year, on the eve of the war, Ukraine finalized a long-awaited plan to disconnect from the Russian grid and reorient its electrical network toward Europe. But the physical legacy of its shared past with Russia remains: much of the crucial equipment in the energy sector, from power-generating turbines to transformers and control-panel switches, are of Soviet vintage. The layouts of Ukraine’s plants and substations hardly vary from those in Russia; many were constructed from blueprints still readily available in Moscow.

“Our station was built from a Mosenergo project that dates to the nineteen-sixties,” Roman, the head of a substation in the Lviv region, said, referring to the Russian state power company that serves Moscow. “I imagine them sitting holding these plans in their hands, pointing out exactly what should be hit.”

The main switchboard at a power plant in western Ukraine.

The Russian campaign has a certain logic. Initial strikes focussed largely on transformers and substations—the pumps and arteries of an electrical grid, which convert electricity from one voltage to another and move it across the system, eventually delivering it to a person’s home. That equipment tends to be exposed, placed in the open, whereas the vast turbine halls of power plants, sheathed by a casing of concrete and steel, present a harder target.

A damaged high-voltage transformer at a substation in western Ukraine.

A substation in central Ukraine hosts a number of seven-hundred-and-fifty-kilowatt transformers, each one the size of a moving van and capable of transporting large quantities of electricity over long distances. Not only are these transformers crucial for Ukraine’s energy grid—they are the only model of transformer capable of accepting high-voltage electricity produced by a nuclear power plant, for example—but they are also relatively rare. Similar models are found in the United States and China, but nowhere else in Europe; ordering and producing a new one can take up to a year. Ukraine has one factory that makes seven-hundred-and-fifty-kilowatt transformers, but it is situated in Zaporizhzhia, a city in the south that has come under regular bombardment.

The remains of a Russian long-range missile at a power plant in western Ukraine.

The first strikes at the substation damaged a number of transformers. Repair crews managed to receive spare parts from across Ukraine, and spent weeks trying to bring whatever they could back online. The hope was that the station could function with limited capacity. But then, on New Year’s Eve, the station was hit again, this time by a number of Iranian-made kamikaze drones. The repaired transformers were destroyed completely.

“That’s when, you might say, we ran out of hardware and patience all at once,” Taras, the head of the facility, told me. “At the current moment, the station doesn’t carry out its function whatsoever.” Workers found a wing of one of the drones in the snow. “Happy New Year” was written on the underside, in Russian. “They must have been proud, and thought this was funny,” Taras said.

Sandbag barriers were erected to protect the equipment at a power plant in western Ukraine.

Later waves of Russian strikes targeted power generation itself. At one power plant in western Ukraine, a missile hit the turbine hall, destroying one power unit and damaging others. One of the units is still smoldering, weeks after it was hit, letting out a hiss of dark smoke. According to Maksym, the facility’s chief engineer, the plant is functioning at only a third of its previous capacity. Even that output makes it a target.

“You go to work every day with a certain fear,” Makysm said. Although most personnel head to the bomb shelter during air-raid alerts, Maksym remains at his post in the central control room. He pointed to a rack of helmets and flak jackets. “We tell our guys we are also at war,” he said. “This is our front—to keep the electricity flowing.”

A destroyed power unit at one of the plants in western Ukraine.

Russia’s strategy of plunging the country into darkness and cold has, if not outright failed, certainly not succeeded, either. Public opinion has not shifted as a result of the blackouts—polls in recent months have shown that more than eighty per cent of respondents in Ukraine want to continue the fight, the same number as before the attacks on the energy grid began. Over time, Ukraine’s air defenses have improved, and its technicians have got faster at repairing the electrical grid. Russia’s stock of long-range missiles, meanwhile, has dwindled, leading to less frequent attacks.

The onset of spring will bring lower electricity consumption, and Kudrytskyi, the head of Ukrenergo, expects that the Ukrainian grid will soon stabilize. “Russia did not achieve its ultimate goal,” he said. “Yes, they managed to create problems for nearly every Ukrainian family.” But that is only half the story: “Instead of making us scared and unhappy, it made us angry, more resolved to win. They did not lower the morale of the nation; they mobilized the nation.”

Damaged freight cars at a power plant in western Ukraine.

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Image: The Astora natural gas depot, which is the largest natural gas storage in Western Europe, is pictured in Rehden, Germany, March 16, 2022. REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer

Analysis: Healthy gas storage warms Europe, but not enough

European gas prices rallied in the run-up to Moscow's invasion of Ukraine begun almost exactly a year ago and they leapt to record highs when Russia subsequently cut supplies of relatively cheap pipeline gas.

Reuters by Nora Buli and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin

OSLO, Feb 23 (Reuters) - As Europe emerges from a mild winter with gas storage close to record levels, it must brace for another costly race to replenish its reserves on the international market.

European gas prices rallied in the run-up to Moscow's invasion of Ukraine begun almost exactly a year ago and they leapt to record highs when Russia subsequently cut supplies of relatively cheap pipeline gas.

Although European prices have eased to around 50 euros ($53) per megawatt hour (MWh) from last August's peak of more than 340 euros, they remain above historic averages.

That means European governments face another huge bill to refill storages before peak winter demand.

To ward off market volatility and protect against shortage, they will have to repeat the exercise annually until the continent has developed a more permanent alternative to the Russian pipeline gas on which it depended for decades.

Analysts and executives say the amounts already in storage will help, as will an increase in French nuclear generation following unusually extensive maintenance.

"The situation on the gas market is currently no longer so tense," Markus Krebber, CEO of RWE (RWEG.DE), Germany's biggest utility, told Reuters.

He did not expect any repeat of last year's record price spike, but also said "one must not lull oneself into a false sense of security".

Similarly, analysts cautioned against leaving it too late to buy for future delivery.

"We do not expect filling storage to be as costly next summer as it was this past year," Jacob Mandel, senior analyst at Aurora Energy Research, said.

"That said, firms that rely on spot supply to fill storage, rather than hedge against future price jumps, will risk paying similar costs to last summer."

He estimated buying gas over the summer months would cost "2-2.5 times more on a per unit basis than it had been pre-crisis" and that European governments last year spent tens of billions of euros on supplies.

That was even when they had received significant levels of Russian gas on long-term contracts prior to the shut down of the Nord Stream pipeline to Germany in August.

Nord Stream's closure drove up European gas prices, as well as liquefied natural gas (LNG) prices, which also hit record levels of around 70 million British thermal units (mmBtu), compared with around $16 now .

CONTRACTS IN TATTERS

Russia's long-term contract prices, based on complex calculations, are not public but are much cheaper than the spot market rate, industry sources say.

In all, last year's European imports of Russian pipeline gas were 62 billion cubic metres (bcm), 60% below the average of the previous five years, European Commission data showed.

This year, Russian deliveries to the EU are expected to fall to 25 bcm, assuming flows via the TurkStream pipeline and through Ukraine are in line with December 2022 volumes, the International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts.

Reuters Graphics

LNG FOR NOW, RENEWABLES FOR THE FUTURE

Even when filled to the brim, Europe's storage caverns, capable of holding some 100 bcm, can only meet around a quarter of European demand.

Think-tank Bruegel, which provides analysis to EU policymakers, has called for a 13% demand curb this summer, compared with the EU agreement last year for a voluntary reduction of 15%.

That could be tricky as the fall in gas prices this year has reduced the incentive to avoid the fuel.

Reuters Graphics

One of the reasons for less gas use last year was increased use of coal, which was cheaper, although bad for carbon emissions.

James Waddell, head of European Gas and global LNG at Energy Aspects, said gas was becoming competitive against coal in the power sector and other industry, which switched to alternative fuels to gas, may also switch back.

"If you're pricing somewhere below 60 euros/MWh and you move down to 40 euros/MWh, you get quite a lot of that gas coming back into the industrial sector," he said.

More French nuclear production will help Europe's overall situation as output rises to about 310 Terwatt-hours (TWh) from 280 TWh last year, Waddell said.

But he said it was still lower than the five-year average and the gain would be eroded by losses elsewhere, notably in Germany.

Industry analysts say eventually the solution to the gas shortfall needs to be more renewable energy as the EU seeks to achieve its goal of zero net greenhouse emissions by 2050 and that the energy crisis will accelerate progress.

Until then, even full storages are no guarantee, Helge Haugane, head of gas and power trading at Equinor (EQNR.OL), Europe's biggest gas supplier, said.

As long as global supplies remain tight, he said, the market would be very vulnerable to any disruptions or "weather events".

UNUSUAL LEVEL OF UNCERTAINTY

After a Herculean EU effort, gas storages were 96% full at last year's November peak.

They have dropped to 64%, according to Gas Infrastructure Europe (GIE) data. Analysts forecast a further fall to around 55% by the end of the official heating season, on March 31.

Levels have held up following a mild winter that, combined with reduced demand, led the IEA to lower its forecast for the EU gas shortfall.

Reuters Graphics

Earlier this month, it put the supply-demand gap at 40 bcm this year, down from its previous estimate of 57 bcm.

It said energy efficiency and speedy deployment of renewable energy and heat pumps could help plug 37 bcm of that gap in 2023, while warning of an "unusually wide range of uncertainties and exogenous risk factors".

These include the possible complete halt of Russian gas through the pipelines still supplying Europe and a post-lockdown demand recovery in China that could increase competition on the international LNG market, making it harder for Europe to buy there.

The IEA said European LNG imports could provide an extra 11 bcm to 140 bcm this year, in addition to an additional 55 bcm in 2022.

As one of Russia's most loyal gas customers until last year's invasion of Ukraine, Germany previously had no import capacity for LNG. Now at a record pace, it is bringing online six floating storage and regasification units (FSRUs) by the end of this year.

The industry says this needs to be matched with more terminals to liquefy and ship LNG, but strong global demand means that will be difficult to achieve over the next 24 months, Luke Cottell, senior analyst at Timera Energy consultancy, said.

Other European countries are also increasing their LNG capacity, while environmental campaigners and green politicians question the amounts being invested in the infrastructure that should become irrelevant in a low-carbon economy.

Germany has also been at the forefront of demand for heat pumps, which do not rely on fossil fuel to heat buildings, although their installation last year was still outpaced by gas-based systems.

($1 = 0.9395 euros)

Reporting by Nora Buli in Oslo and Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in London; additional reporting by Kate Abnett in Brussels and Vera Eckert in Frankfurt; editing by Barbara Lewis

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Image: A view shows senators during a session at Mexico's senate as they discusses an initiative by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to give the Army control over the civilian-led National Guard, at Mexico's Senate building, in Mexico City, Mexico September 8, 2022. REUTERS/Henry Romero

Mexico passes electoral overhaul that critics warn weakens democracy

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador argues the reorganization will save $150 million a year and reduce the influence of economic interests in politics.

Reuters

A view shows senators during a session at Mexico's senate as they discusses an initiative by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to give the Army control over the civilian-led National Guard, at Mexico's Senate building, in Mexico City, Mexico September 8, 2022. REUTERS/Henry Romero

MEXICO CITY, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Mexican lawmakers on Wednesday approved a controversial overhaul of the body overseeing the country's elections, a move critics warn will weaken democracy ahead of a presidential vote next year.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador argues the reorganization will save $150 million a year and reduce the influence of economic interests in politics.

But opposition lawmakers and civil society groups have said they will challenge the changes at the Supreme Court, arguing they are unconstitutional. Protests are planned in multiple cities on Sunday.

The Senate approved the reform, which still needs to be signed into law by Lopez Obrador, 72 to 50.

The changes will cut the budget of the National Electoral Institute (INE), cull staff and close offices.

The INE has played an important role in the shift to multi-party democracy since Mexico left federal one-party rule in 2000. Critics fear some of that progress is being lost, in a pattern of eroding electoral confidence also seen in the United States and Brazil.

Lopez Obrador has repeatedly attacked the electoral agency, saying voter fraud robbed him of victory in the 2006 presidential election.

The head of the INE, Lorenzo Cordova, has called the changes a "democratic setback" that put at risk "certain, trustworthy and transparent" elections. Proposed "brutal cuts" in personnel would hinder the installation of polling stations and vote counting, Cordova said.

The changes, dubbed "Plan B," follow a more ambitious constitutional overhaul last year that fell short of the needed two-thirds majority. That bill had sought to convert the INE into a smaller body of elected officials.

Mexico will hold two state elections in June and general elections next year, including votes for president and elected officials in 30 states.

• Reporting by Adriana Barrera and Diego Ore; Writing by Carolina Pulice; Editing by Stephen Eisenhammer, Sandra Maler and William Mallard

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News round-up, Wednesday, February 22, 2023.

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Editor's thoughts…

From Yalta to Yalta... Crimea, the peninsula of desires...

”Homer described it as "symbolic, a place of beautiful, sheltered bays"; Chekhov described it as a paradise far above the French Côte d'Azur; and, not for nothing, the Crimea figured in the plans of Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Hitlerite Gestapo and no poet, as one of his favourite places to turn into the Garden of Eden—a sort of Emerita Augusta for future SS retirees."

PEDRO GRIFOL

Quote of the day…

"Diamonds and nuclear fuels would be very easy to sanction."

Spiegel

---

Most read…

Morgan Stanley ups 2023 oil demand growth estimate by 36%, flags Russia risk

"Mobility indicators for China, such as congestion, have been rising steadily," while "flight schedules have firmed-up the outlook for jet fuel demand," the bank said.

Reuters

"Russia Is Good at Cheating"

In an interview, Vladyslav Vlasyuk, sanctions adviser to the Ukrainian government, accuses Russia of fudging economic statistics and calls on the West to drastically lower the oil price cap.

DER SPIEGEL: INTERVIEW CONDUCTED BY MARKUS BECKER

Analysis: Pain and gain for industry as EU carbon hits 100 euros

"If you think we're permanently going above 100 [euro carbon prices], then that's a very constructive environment for green hydrogen," Lewis said, though he added that CO2 prices could fall back below that level because of bearish factors.

REUTERS By Kate Abnett and Susanna Twidale

---

…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

---

Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

---

Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

---

---

Image: Germán & Co

Editor's thoughts…

From Yalta to Yalta... Crimea, the peninsula of desires...

” Homer described it as "symbolic, a place of beautiful, sheltered bays"; Chekhov described it as a paradise far above the French Côte d'Azur; and, not for nothing, the Crimea figured in the plans of Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Hitlerite Gestapo and no poet, as one of his favourite places to turn into the Garden of Eden—a sort of Emerita Augusta for future SS retirees."

"The Lady with the Dog..." was written by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (Yalta, 29 January 1861–15 July 1904) and published for the first time in December 1899.

…”Every evening, the couple observes the sunset from the vantage point over Yalta at Oreanda and was charmed again by the "beautiful and majestic" sight....”

A forty-year-old male named Dmitri Gurov is charmed by a young woman walking along the seafront of Yalta with her small Pomeranian dog. Dmitri dislikes his shrewish and educated wife and, as a result, has various love connections. Although the protagonist disparages women and calls them "the lesser race," he secretly reveals that he is more comfortable in their company than in men's.

One day, "the lady with the dog" sits beside Dmitri to dine in the public gardens. The man pets her dog while trying to strike up a conversation. He learns that she is called Anna Sergeyevna.

The Lady with the Dog is one of Anton Chekhov's best-known and most beloved stories. This extraordinary tale, too, was made into a film in 1960 by the film director Iosif Yefimovich Kheifits (Belarusian, 17 December 1905–24 April 1995).

Anton Chekhov was born in Yalta, Crimea, in Taganrog, far south of Moscow, on the Sea of Azov. More Levantine than European (Turkey was 300 miles away), Taganrog was a hot, fly-infested port with a varied population: Russians, Greeks, Armenians, and Italians.

Crimea’s contentious and multi-ethnic history is a source of conflict.

Occupied, conquered, invaded, colonized... a thousand and one times over the centuries, Crimea, this small piece of luminous land, which seems to detach itself from the great continent to sail its way through the sea, is like an island cut out with coquettish coves enclosed in pine forests, which have been (or would like to be again) the favorite mooring places for oligarch yachts. Moreover, because of its privileged strategic position, it is a territory that has always been involved in wars, as if its karma had unique designs.

With World War II over, the rulers of the three Allied powers that formed the winning coalition, Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin, determined in 1945 to share the spoils and transform post-war Europe. They chose the fair city of Yalta, a place on the Crimean Peninsula on the benign Black Sea coast, and gathered in the Livadia Palace, the residence of Russia's last Tsar, Nicholas II. The exquisite Italian Renaissance-style home was rapidly completed in just 16 months. The Tsar was in a hurry to enjoy champagne and caviar by the sea as if he sensed that the ancient dominion of the Tsars would be destroyed by the Bolshevik arms just four summers later. Roosevelt and Stalin stayed there, while Churchill stayed in another palace, the no less pompous Voronstsov, as the chronicles say that the Americans and the Russians wanted to keep the Englishman away from their quarrels; Churchill complained in a London newspaper:

"I am caught between two monstrous animals: the American bison and the Russian bear."

After the so-called Yalta Conference, the Livadia Palace, throughout the Soviet period, became the resort for the ruling class of the communist party, and the whole area was filled with dachas (Russian for "pleasure villas"). Many years later, we may tour the beautiful mansion and learn about the life and sweat that went on the sunny walls, including a table with the invoices for the overheads of the Yalta Conference.

Crimea is an exceptional witness to international warfare

Undoubtedly, the most famous occurrence is the Battle of Balaklava, which took place during the Crimean War (1853–1856), when the famed Light Brigade of the British army, in its "riding to its death," succumbed to the intense fire of the Russian artillery. Similarly worthy of attention is the 349-day siege of Sevastopol by the Franco-British alliance on Sapun Hill in 1855, which concluded in a Russian victory. Sevastopol, a city of solid resonance, "the City of Glory" (from the Greek words sebas, glory, and polis), besides experiencing the war between the Franco-British coalition and the Romanov army in its stony flesh, was also bombed by the Germans in 1914 during World War I and came under siege again during the Second World War.

Crimea does not seem to want to be left in peace.

Contrary to Dostoyevsky's words: "There are corners in the world that are so beautiful that visiting them gives us a feeling of joy and we feel life in its fullness," this peninsula steeped in history may trigger or has already sparked a new Cold War, at least, not to call the nightmares of the visionary and acclaimed film director Andrei Arsenievich Tarkovsky (Ivanovo Oblast, April 4, 1932 - Paris, December 29, 1986 about a nuclear tragedy.

Source: some ideas from: www.revistagq.com

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Source: Reuters

Morgan Stanley ups 2023 oil demand growth estimate by 36%, flags Russia risk

"Mobility indicators for China, such as congestion, have been rising steadily," while "flight schedules have firmed-up the outlook for jet fuel demand," the bank said.

Feb 22, Reuters

Morgan Stanley has raised its global oil demand growth estimate for this year by about 36%, citing growing momentum in China's reopening and a recovery in aviation, but flagged higher supply from Russia as an offseting factor.

Global oil consumption is now expected to increase by about 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd), versus its previous 1.4 million bpd forecast, the bank said in a note dated Tuesday.

"Mobility indicators for China, such as congestion, have been rising steadily," while "flight schedules have firmed-up the outlook for jet fuel demand," the bank said.

But supply from Russia has been stronger than expected, leading to a slightly smaller than previously assumed deficit in the second half of the year, analysts at the bank wrote, trimming their Brent oil price forecast for that period to $90-100 a barrel from $100-110 previously.

"We previously estimated a ~1 mb/d year-on-year decline in 2023, which we moderate to 0.4 mb/d," the bank said, referring to its Russian output outlook in million barrels per day.

Earlier this month, Goldman Sachs cut its 2023 Brent price forecast and raised its global supply forecasts for 2023 and 2024, with Russia, Kazakhstan and the United States the most notable upward adjustments.

But Goldman also noted that a 1.1 million bpd rise in Chinese demand this year should push oil markets back into a deficit in June.

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Image: Germán & Co

"Russia Is Good at Cheating"

In an interview, Vladyslav Vlasyuk, sanctions adviser to the Ukrainian government, accuses Russia of fudging economic statistics and calls on the West to drastically lower the oil price cap.

Der spiegel: interview Conducted By Markus Becker

DER SPIEGEL: Mr. Vlasiuk, are the West’s sanctions against Russia having a significant impact at all?

Vlasiuk: Of course they do.

DER SPIEGEL: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) seems to differ: According to a recent report, Russia’s economy will grow by 0.3 percent this year and by 2.1 percent in 2024. And on Monday, Russia’s statistics authority said that in 2022, the country’s economy has contracted by only 2.1 percent, far less than experts had expected.

Vladyslav Vlasiuk, born in February 1989, is an expert on international sanctions. In April 2022, he became an adviser to Andriy Yermak, head of the Office of the President of Ukraine. A lawyer by training, Vlasiuk is also a secretary of the Yermak-McFaul Group of international experts working on sanctions against Russia and Belarus.

Vlasiuk: Never believe a word of what Russian authorities are saying. They stopped publishing many statistics that were published before – for good reasons. Russia is struggling to get hold of fresh money and is running a record-high deficit. Lots of Russia’s assets are frozen, less and less technology is available. The European Union's ban on Russian oil products alone has cost the Russian economy a market of 30 to 40 billion euros. At the end of 2022, Russia was forced to impose an additional 600 billion rubles in new taxes on the biggest companies, including Gazprom. Russia now spends 20 percent less on drugs for hospitals. Expenditures for road construction were cut in half. They are losing whole industries – their car industry, for example. So, it would be absurd to assume that the sanctions don't have a significant impact. They do, only Russia is trying to hide it, by lying with their statistics.

DER SPIEGEL: Do you have an example of that?

Vlasiuk: Only this week, Russia introduced a bill which basically prescribes that they count taxes collected on oil exports based not on the real price, but on some theoretical price. It consists of the price for a barrel of Brent (crude), which is much more expensive than Urals, the Russian reference oil brand, minus some discount. This shows one thing: Russia is good at cheating.

DER SPIEGEL: Still, Russia is firing thousands of artillery shells per day and seems to be able to keep up production, whereas the West is struggling to resupply Ukraine with ammunition.

Vlasiuk: The sanctions’ direct impact on Russia’s military production is hard to gauge. We have some reports that there is such an impact. In the coming weeks, we will have a report ready with more definitive numbers.

DER SPIEGEL: The IMF also suggests that the price cap the G-7 and the EU have placed on Russian oil – $60 a barrel – is not enough to significantly curtail Russian revenues. How low would the cap have to be for that?

Vlasiuk: According to the International Working Group on Russia Sanctions, the price ceiling should be $30 to $35. From our point of view, this makes sense. At present, the potential of this instrument is not yet fully exploited.

"Now is the moment to discuss a lowering of the oil price cap."

DER SPIEGEL: The EU and the G-7 only managed to agree on a threshold of $60 after much wrangling, for fear of turbulence on the global markets. How realistic is it that they would lower the threshold to $30?

Vlasiuk: Of course, we understand why the West is wary of any risky moves. But now is the moment to discuss a lowering of the oil price cap. Perhaps not immediately to $30, but over time, that level should be reached. After all, the production cost for Russian oil is only $20 or even less.

DER SPIEGEL: A major part of the 10th sanctions package being discussed by the EU is to close loopholes in ways that make it more difficult to circumvent sanctions. Has the EU been too lax in this respect?

Vlasiuk: You cannot block any kind of exports to a country like Russia, especially exports by non-EU countries. But there are tools the EU has to stop goods from reaching Russia if it can be proven that sanctions are being violated. The EU could make more consistent use of these tools.

DER SPIEGEL: Secondary sanctions against countries who help Russia circumvent sanctions could be among those tools. Should they be used?

Vlasiuk: Ukraine is interested in effective sanctions. To ensure that, secondary sanctions are certainly an option.

DER SPIEGEL: Which countries would be likely targets?

Vlasiuk: Georgia is helping Russia to circumvent some sanctions; the same is true of Kazakhstan, Turkey and, of course, of China. Hitting them with sanctions would be very difficult for legal reasons and reasons of trade policy. But it is true that these countries could do more themselves in curtailing their help to Russia

"Diamonds and nuclear fuels would be very easy to sanction."

DER SPIEGEL: There is also disagreement among EU countries about whether to sanction certain products – like diamonds imported by Belgium or nuclear fuels, which are especially important for France's nuclear power plants. Is the EU still too soft on Russia?

Vlasiuk: From a Ukrainian viewpoint, diamonds and nuclear fuels would be very easy to sanction. Of course, some issues are difficult for some countries. But we hope that in the next packages, the European Council will agree on sanctions against companies like Russia’s nuclear agency Rosatom and diamond producer Alrosa.

DER SPIEGEL: So far, France has been strictly against curtailing civil nuclear imports. It is hard to imagine why Paris would just give in.

Vlasiuk: Perhaps. But one year ago, nobody could imagine that the EU would ban Russian energy imports almost completely, either. Now, it is doing exactly that.

---

Image: Germán & Co

Analysis: Pain and gain for industry as EU carbon hits 100 euros

"If you think we're permanently going above 100 [euro carbon prices], then that's a very constructive environment for green hydrogen," Lewis said, though he added that CO2 prices could fall back below that level because of bearish factors.

By Kate Abnett and Susanna Twidale

BRUSSELS/LONDON Feb 21 (Reuters) - Europe's carbon price hit a record 100 euros ($106) per tonne on Tuesday, a long-awaited milestone that boosts the economic case for some green technologies and hits industry with its largest bill yet for carbon dioxide emissions.

The European Union has pledged to cut its emissions by 55% by 2030 versus 1990 levels. One of its main tools to make that happen is its carbon market, which requires European industry and power plants to buy permits to cover their CO2 emissions.

Benchmark EU carbon permit prices hit 100 euros per tonne of CO2 on Tuesday, the highest since the scheme launched in 2005.

Incentivising green investments is the scheme's aim. If the carbon permit price is higher than the investment cost of a green technology, then companies will be motivated to choose the investment.

At current levels, CO2 prices provide a strong incentive to invest in green technologies to cut the use of fossil fuels, the price of which surged last year and remains relatively high, Mark Lewis, head of climate research at Andurand Capital, said.

Green hydrogen, produced using renewable energy is seen as important for decarbonising industries including steelmaking. Most hydrogen is currently produced using gas, which emits CO2 but is cheaper than the electricity-based method.

"If you think we're permanently going above 100 [euro carbon prices], then that's a very constructive environment for green hydrogen," Lewis said, though he added that CO2 prices could fall back below that level because of bearish factors.

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News round-up, Tuesday, February 21, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

Britain has made moral and military support for Ukraine a fundamental plank of its post-Brexit foreign policy, winning support in Eastern Europe and aligning itself with the US.

LE MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE BY ALEXANDER ZEVIN

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Most read…

Putin suspends Russia's participation in New START nuclear treaty

This 2010 treaty caps the number of strategic nuclear warheads that the United States and Russia can deploy.

Le Monde with AP   

EU outsources military and diplomatic initiative to Washington…

UK and EU look for new roles after Brexit

Le Monde Diplomatique by Alexander Zevin

Brent oil falls on fears of global economic slowdown

"Brent is at the middle of the trading range since late December of between $78 and $88 a barrel, with some investors taking profits on concerns over more U.S. interest rate hikes while others kept bullish sentiment on hopes for a demand recovery in China," said Satoru Yoshida, a commodity analyst with Rakuten Securities.

Reuters by Sudarshan Varadhan and Yuka Obayashi

Russia urges Sweden again to share Nord Stream probe findings

"Your Silence Gives Consent"

(Plato)

Sweden and Denmark, in whose exclusive economic zones the explosions occurred, have concluded the pipelines were blown up deliberately, but have not said who might be responsible.

Reuters by Lidia Kelly

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…”We’ll need natural gas for years…

— but can start blending it with green hydrogen today, AES CEO, Andrés Gluski says

cnbc.com, Anmar Frangoul

PUBLISHED MON, JAN 23 

AES chief says we’ll need natural gas for next 20 years

From the United States to the European Union, major economies around the world are laying out plans to move away from fossil fuels in favor of low and zero-carbon technologies.

It’s a colossal task that will require massive sums of money, huge political will and technological innovation. As the planned transition takes shape, there’s been a lot of talk about the relationship between hydrogen and natural gas.

During a panel discussion moderated by CNBC’s Joumanna Bercetche at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the CEO of energy firm AES offered up his take on how the two could potentially dovetail with one another going forward.   

“I feel very confident in saying that, for the next 20 years, we need natural gas,” Andrés Gluski, who was speaking Wednesday, said. “Now, what we can start to do today is … start to blend it with green hydrogen,” he added.

“So we’re running tests that you can blend it up to, say 20%, in existing turbines, and new turbines are coming out that can burn … much higher percentages,” Gluski said.

“But it’s just difficult to see that you’re going to have enough green hydrogen to substitute it like, in the next 10 years.”

Change on the way, but scale is key

The planet’s green hydrogen sector may still be in a relatively early stage of development, but a number of major deals related to the technology have been struck in recent years.

In December 2022, for example, AES and Air Products said they planned to invest roughly $4 billion to develop a “mega-scale green hydrogen production facility” located in Texas.

According to the announcement, the project will incorporate around 1.4 gigawatts of wind and solar and be able to produce more than 200 metric tons of hydrogen every day.

Despite the significant amount of money and renewables involved in the project, AES chief Gluski was at pains to highlight how much work lay ahead when it came to scaling up the sector as a whole.

The facility being planned with Air Products, he explained, could only “supply point one percent of the U.S. long haul trucking fleet.” Work to be done, then.

---

Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

---

Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

---

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Source: Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers his annual state of the nation address at the Gostiny Dvor conference centre in central Moscow on February 21, 2023. SERGEI SAVOSTYANOV / AFP

Putin suspends Russia's participation in New START nuclear treaty

This 2010 treaty caps the number of strategic nuclear warheads that the United States and Russia can deploy.

Le Monde with AP   

Published on February 21, 2023 at 12h51

Russian President Vladimir Putin declared on Tuesday, February 21, that Moscow was suspending its participation in the New START treaty – the last remaining nuclear arms control pact with the United States – sharply upping the ante amid tensions with Washington over the fighting in Ukraine.

Speaking in his state-of-the-nation address, Putin also said that Russia should stand ready to resume nuclear weapons tests if the US does so, a move that would end a global ban on nuclear weapons tests in place since Cold War times.

Explaining his decision to suspend Russia's obligations under New START, Putin accused the US and its NATO allies of openly declaring the goal of Russia's defeat in Ukraine. "They want to inflict a ‘strategic defeat’ on us and try to get to our nuclear facilities at the same time," he said.

Putin argued that while the US has pushed for the resumption of inspections of Russian nuclear facilities under the treaty, NATO allies had helped Ukraine mount drone attacks on Russian air bases hosting nuclear-capable strategic bombers.

"The drones used for it were equipped and modernized with NATO's expert assistance," Putin said. "And now they want to inspect our defense facilities? In the conditions of today's confrontation, it sounds like sheer nonsense." Putin emphasized that Russia is suspending its involvement in New START and not entirely withdrawing from the pact yet.

The New START treaty, signed in 2010 by US President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, limits each country to no more than 1,550 deployed nuclear warheads and 700 deployed missiles and bombers. The agreement envisages sweeping on-site inspections to verify compliance.

Just days before the treaty was due to expire in February 2021, Russia and the United States agreed to extend it for another five years. Russia and the US have suspended mutual inspections under New START since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, but Moscow last fall refused to allow their resumption, raising uncertainty about the pact’s future. Russia also indefinitely postponed a planned round of consultations under the treaty.

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View fullsize

Image: Germán & Co

EU outsources military and diplomatic initiative to Washington…

UK and EU look for new roles after Brexit

Britain has made moral and military support for Ukraine a fundamental plank of its post-Brexit foreign policy, winning support in Eastern Europe and aligning itself with the US.

Le Monde Diplomatique by Alexander Zevin

UK and EU look for new roles after Brexit

Charles de Gaulle, explaining his veto of Britain’s application to join the EEC for a second time in 1967, pointed above all to ‘the special relations between Britain and America with their advantages and also limitations’; earlier, he had dismissed the idea of British membership more brusquely, as a Trojan horse for the economic and military domination of Europe by America.

That impression was not unfounded, as first Dwight D Eisenhower and then John F Kennedy pressed their counterparts in London to take the lead in further European integration. Yet it was not until 1973 that Britain managed to join the Common Market, and by then France had a new president, Georges Pompidou, with fewer misgivings about the UK’s privileged ties to Washington.

The ensuing union turned out to be fragile. Less than 50 years later, the UK became the only country ever to leave the EU, with the referendum of 2016. If Brexit has caused endless recriminations within Britain focused mainly on the economic costs, the questions raised outside it have been of the sort posed by De Gaulle, albeit turned on their head. Once the UK’s Trojan horse was wheeled away, what might Europe become – and could it be expected to act with more independence, less like the ‘colossal Atlantic community’ De Gaulle had warned against than the ‘European Europe’ he advocated (1)?

Predictions that post-Brexit Britain would find itself isolated in Europe, adrift at its edge or caught between the tug of Washington and Beijing – or that Europe might regain some of the initiative it had lost due to British intransigence on political federation or common defence – have not survived contact with the geopolitical shock that arrived 14 months after the end of its ‘transition period’ out of the EU. The war in Ukraine that began in February 2022 has acted like a chemical bath in a dark room, revealing an image of power hidden under the surface of words and events – both in the relationship of Britain to the EU, and of each of them to the US.

‘Britain is on our side’

Far from sitting on the sidelines, the UK has forced the pace of the European response to Russia’s invasion. From the start, it advocated sanctions to ‘squeeze Russia from the global economy, piece by piece’ – including a ban on global payments via SWIFT, tech exports, travel, a freeze on Russian assets, and an end to Russian oil and gas imports. The UK has also supplied £2.3bn of military hardware to Ukraine, from anti-tank and ship missiles to artillery and drones, along with a just-announced squadron of 12 tanks, a total level of aid second only to the US.

Ukrainians are trained to use these weapons not only at bases in Kent and the Salisbury plain, but by British special forces in and around Kyiv, alongside an unspecified number of British intelligence personnel (2). According to a senior general, Royal Marines are also there, engaged since April in ‘discreet operations’ in a ‘hugely sensitive environment and with a high level of political and military risk’ (3). By the spring, Volodymyr Zelensky declared British prime minister Boris Johnson his favourite European leader, telling The Economist (22 March 2022) that, in implied contrast to France or Germany, ‘Britain is definitely on our side. It is not performing a balancing act.’

That popularity extended to the Baltic states, where Johnson dispatched 8,000 soldiers to conduct military drills. They joined 1,700 already in Estonia, as part of a Joint Expeditionary Force to the Baltic, set up in 2012 and led by the Royal Navy (4).

When Russia and Ukraine seemed on the verge of agreeing to an interim peace deal in late March, it was the British prime minister who arrived in Kyiv as messenger of the ‘collective West’ to press Zelensky to break off negotiations, on the grounds that ‘Putin was not really as powerful as they had previously imagined’ and that here was a chance to ‘press him’ (5). Britain now plays the same basic role it once did as an EU member, partnering with actors that share its scepticism of EU budgetary largesse, federalism or independent military action – Poland and the other Visegrád states, as well as Romania, Bulgaria, the Netherlands – if now on bilateral, trilateral or ad hoc bases.

In contrast, the core EU member states that stood to gain in stature from Brexit have faced just the opposite outcomes. Germany is threatened with an economic wipeout – squeezed between the explosion in energy prices stemming from sanctions it has adopted against Russia, and the falloff in oil and gas supplies since; and a slowdown in China, its largest trading partner, exacerbated by a campaign devised in Washington to isolate Beijing. The problem goes beyond that of a recession to the demise of an entire growth model and the ‘threat of deindustrialisation’ (6).

France’s goals frustrated

France, meanwhile, is now the only nuclear power and permanent member of the UN Security Council in the EU, and has its strongest military. But Paris has been unable to deploy these elements of power in or outside the bloc. Globally, its position was brought home after the humiliation of the AUKUS affair in 2021 – which saw Australia renege on a deal to buy 12 diesel submarines from it, in favour of a wide-ranging security pact with the US and UK to build a nuclear flotilla to patrol the Pacific against China.

In the EU, Macron’s stated goal of strengthening European ‘strategic sovereignty’ in cooperation with Germany has also withered. Under the coalition headed by Olaf Scholz, and as a condition for the Greens’ participation, Berlin agreed to buy American F-18s – putting the future of the Franco-German-Spanish fighter bomber project FCAS in doubt – while influential figures openly moot the possibility of transcending the old idea of a Kerneuropa with France, in favour of the inclusion of new partners driving EU expansion to the East. Of the momentum that Brexit was expected to give EU security and defence policy, not a peep can be heard.

The autonomy of the EU with respect to the Atlantic alliance has since the 1990s been more self-conceit than reality. President Clinton pressed for EU enlargement to the east as the complement to NATO membership, which in all cases preceded it – in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic in 1999, before NATO launched its offensive in the Balkans; and then in Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia, as well as Slovenia and the Baltics in 2004, soon after the alliance began its first ‘out-of-area’ operations alongside the US in Afghanistan. In 2003 France may have threatened a veto in the UN Security Council on the war that followed in Iraq, but provided the air bases needed to carry it out – just as eastern Europe became the host of black sites for the CIA, in its campaign of ‘extraordinary rendition’ and ‘enhanced interrogation’ in the American ‘war on terror’.

Almost two decades later, the extent of this subordination has been made plain in Ukraine. Readers of the quality press in Europe may still find reassurance there: as the philosopher Slavoj Žižek told Le Figaro (31 October 2022), ‘We can still be proud of Europe’, combining respect for individual dignity, the fight against climate change, and capacity for self-criticism. Yet it is hard to ignore that whatever its other virtues, the bloc has shown almost no diplomatic or military initiative since the demise of the 2014 Minsk accords (of which Europe and not the US was the guarantor).

Once the war began, those roles were outsourced to Washington. The incapacity to act independently of the US stems above all from longstanding tensions within the Franco-German tandem, which this latest crisis has intensified. The issue is not lack of means since France, Germany and Italy collectively spend more than twice what Russia does annually on arms. For economic sociologist Wolfgang Streeck, a different logic is at work, inscribed in the nature of the EU project since the end of the cold war: it has become, in his words, a ‘civil auxiliary of NATO’ (7) – registering symbolic protests against decisions of the Supreme Court in the US, while huddling ever more tightly under the nuclear umbrella it holds aloft.

The next test is China

Can Europe diverge from the US where fundamental interests are at stake? The next test hovers well beyond Ukraine, in China. Beijing, argues the Biden administration, must not be emboldened to move on Taiwan by signs of weakness against Russia. So far, European leaders have not shown much inclination to publicly question the wisdom of following the US into this new great power confrontation. At the June 2022 NATO summit in Madrid, they agreed to label Beijing a ‘systemic challenge’ for the first time, inviting South Korea, Japan, New Zealand and Australia to stake out the more and more nebulous perimeter of the ‘North Atlantic’.

It is unclear if they can tolerate the trade war that comes with this posture, now that China accounts for a larger overall share of EU imports and exports than the US. More to the point, will Washington allow the exemptions that Germany, the Netherlands and others may seek for their high-tech sectors, when its vast powers of financial compulsion can so easily be turned on them (8)? Even the unity attained over the war in Ukraine is being tested by pressures it has created at national level, from popular protests in the Czech Republic over household energy prices, to open fissures in the governing elite of Italy on weapons shipments, to the bitter anger of German businessmen at US ‘profiteering’ on natural gas.

If the UK has appeared to lead rather than follow in Europe, that is in large part a function of the special relationship, lending it the sort of prestige enjoyed by a prefect over younger pupils at a public school. Few were better prepared socially to take on this role than Johnson, who staked his premiership on Ukraine – from photo ops in Kyiv even in his last hours, until manoeuvring inside the Tory party finally ousted him.

How did the country he led become the most intransigent of the states supporting Ukraine at the side of the US? Just as in continental Europe, the war has exposed a longer-term UK dependence, made all the more apparent in the wake of Brexit. Policymakers have of course signalled the opposite: a commitment to ‘British leadership in the world’. That was the message behind the first ‘Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy’ (Global Britain in a Competitive Age, March 2021) calling for a smaller, leaner army, but also one that was a ‘more present and active force around the world’, capable of rapid deployment alongside naval and special forces strike groups, and a larger stockpile of nuclear weapons.

This was backed up by two projected bursts of military spending: to 2.5% of GDP in a decade, announced by Johnson; and to 3% under his short-lived successor Liz Truss, for a real-terms increase of £20-25bn. (Under current prime minister Rishi Sunak, the commitment has changed to ‘at least 2%’.) The UK remains one of the largest arms exporters in the world, with a particular strength in aeronautics that its diplomats have tried to leverage abroad – most recently in a complex deal to co-develop its next-generation Tempest stealth fighter jet with Japan and Italy.

Overlap with US priorities

As journalist Tom Stevenson has argued, however, the most consistent leitmotif of these attempts to chart a strategic path for ‘Global Britain’ is its overlap with American priorities. If plenty of imperial nostalgia is evident among the ‘defence intellectuals’ who inform policy – at a few institutions like the Royal United Services Institute, Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) and Department of War Studies at King’s College (London) – it is not always clear for which empire. This is especially glaring in the official volte-face on China.

The ‘golden decade’ of bilateral trade relations with Beijing announced under David Cameron in 2015 as a key vector for renewed inward investment lasted barely a few years, and is now over (9). It is not difficult to see why, given the aims of the integrated review: the dispatch of a new aircraft carrier to the Indo-Pacific, to be ‘permanently available to NATO’; making Korea a ‘highly significant area of focus’; and returning to points ‘east of Suez’ – already visibly underway since 2018, when Britain opened a naval base in Bahrain to assist US operations in the Persian Gulf and beyond.

The ‘special relationship’ is often seen as informal and ill-defined, even as a tremendous amount continues to be said and written about it. In fact, from the 1940s it has had fairly concrete effects: in exchange for keeping forward operating bases on its territories, the UK has gained privileged access to American technology – if not always over how and when it is used. Since the failure of its own Bluestreak programme in the 1950s, the main form this has taken is a succession of ballistic missile systems: Thor, Skybolt, Polaris and Trident, without which Britain could neither target, launch and deliver, nor maintain and test, its nuclear deterrent (10).

A more flattering version of the real ‘special relationship’ stresses intelligence sharing – another wartime collaboration carried over into the UKUSA agreement of 1947, and since extended to Australia, Canada and New Zealand, the other three members of the so-called Five Eyes. The number of US bases has fluctuated over the same period. In 1986 one investigative journalist counted over 130 facilities in Britain, making it a veritable ‘unsinkable aircraft carrier’ in the North Atlantic, pointed at the Soviet Union. Though the US presence has declined since the end of the cold war, it remains significant: RAF Menwith Hill is the largest military spy base outside the US, run by the NSA; RAF Lakenheath is the largest US fighter base in Europe. Britain is the third-largest outpost of the US Air Force in the world, after Japan and Germany, with around 10,000 personnel.

Decline of dissent

What has changed most dramatically since the 1990s is the kind of opposition these features of the ‘special relationship’ engender, and the attention they receive. That is true at elite level, where undue deference to the senior partner in the relationship once elicited criticisms and questions not just from a handful of leftwing MPs, but also from Conservatives with a sovereigntist streak. Today it is hard to imagine a prime minister refusing a US request to use RAF airfields, as Edward Heath did in 1973 during the Yom Kippur war.

It is just as evident in the waning influence of a grassroots anti-nuclear movement that reached its apogee in the early 1980s. Then Michael Foot, co-founder of CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament), led Labour on a platform of unilateral disarmament while calling for the withdrawal of US cruise missiles and ‘phasing out’ NATO for a European security pact. Under its current leader, Sir Keir Starmer, those views would be grounds for expulsion: de facto banned since February from rallying with Stop the War and from any criticism of NATO, socialist members and MPs continue to be purged after the ejection of the last Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – the only one besides Foot to seriously question the Atlanticist basis of British foreign policy (11). Starmer played a similar role as head of the crown prosecution service (2008-13), when his office sought to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at the US’s behest. Assange awaits the outcome of his appeals in a British prison.

The irony is that in the climate this has created it is far easier to criticise US foreign policy in the US than in Britain, including over Ukraine. In the UK, no equivalent has emerged of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a thinktank that in 2019 set out to disrupt the liberal interventionist orthodoxies that dominate the foreign policies of both parties in Washington. If disagreements exist among policymakers, or between civilian and military leaders, these have largely remained hidden.

Not so in the US, where Pentagon officials have regularly leaked against hawks at the National Security Agency (NSA) and the State Department (12). The mainstream press has likewise been more uniform across the board: from the Guardian to The Economist to the Telegraph, opinion has favoured supporting Ukraine until it ‘defeats’ Russia – while news is so slanted towards Kyiv as to create an expectation that victory is imminent, as Russia is reported to be running out of weapons, conscripts, and other key resources.

The result is not simply a distorted image of the war, but a kind of analytical vacuum at the centre of British politics. Sanctions severe enough to ‘bring down the Putin regime’ (coming on top of the impact of Brexit, Covid and Tory incompetence) have instead seen two premiers disappear, amidst a rise in energy prices for the poorest households that is more severe than anywhere else in western Europe. Next year the British economy is set to grow more slowly than that of every developed nation besides the one it has sought to ‘hobble’.

‘The worst crisis since Suez’

Rather than a run on the rouble, a selloff in gilts provoked by September’s mini-budget threatened pension funds with insolvency and raised borrowing costs to the point of forcing the Bank of England to intervene to stabilise them. As power quickly ebbed away from Truss, a new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, announced further spending cuts, even as public sector workers prepared to strike against a backdrop of median pay that has not risen since 2008. No announcement will be made on the defence budget until yet another integrated review, but defence secretary Ben Wallace let it be known that in his view there is no room to cut: at 72,000, the army is only big enough to ‘do a bit of tootling around’ at home.

The most striking comment about this panic came as it unfolded on TV (Sky News, 17 October 2022), when Tobias Elwood, chair of the Commons defence select committee, called it ‘the worst crisis since Suez’. Yet his analogy was more than a little cryptic: for where, in that case, was the equivalent of the military adventure that in 1956 spurred a run on the pound and the ouster of Sir Anthony Eden? This was left a discreet blank. One lesson of Suez was that Britain could no longer act with so much independence vis-à-vis the US. Over half a century after taking this lesson to heart, can it afford to act with so little?

Alexander Zevin

Alexander Zevin is a historian at City University of New York.

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Image: Germán & Co

Brent oil falls on fears of global economic slowdown

"Brent is at the middle of the trading range since late December of between $78 and $88 a barrel, with some investors taking profits on concerns over more U.S. interest rate hikes while others kept bullish sentiment on hopes for a demand recovery in China," said Satoru Yoshida, a commodity analyst with Rakuten Securities.

Reuters by Sudarshan Varadhan and Yuka Obayashi

Feb 21 (Reuters) - Brent oil prices fell on Tuesday as fears that a global economic slowdown would reduce fuel demand prompted investors to take profits on the previous day's gains.

Traders are awaiting the minutes of the latest Federal Reserve meeting, due on Wednesday, after recent data on core inflation raised the risk of interest rates remaining higher for longer.

Brent crude was down 66 cents, or 0.8%, at $83.41 a barrel as of 0750 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) futures for March, which expire on Tuesday, were up 4 cents, or 0.1%, at $76.38.

WTI futures did not settle on Monday because of a public holiday in the United States. The April WTI contract , currently the most active, was up 23 cents at $76.78.

"Brent is at the middle of the trading range since late December of between $78 and $88 a barrel, with some investors taking profits on concerns over more U.S. interest rate hikes while others kept bullish sentiment on hopes for a demand recovery in China," said Satoru Yoshida, a commodity analyst with Rakuten Securities.

"The market will likely remain in the tight range until there are more clear signs for the future direction of the U.S. monetary policy and the economic recovery path in China," he said.

With China's oil imports likely to hit a record high in 2023 and demand from India, the world's third-biggest oil importer, surging amid tightening supplies, all eyes are now on monetary policy in the United States, the world's largest economy and biggest oil consumer.

Some analysts say oil prices could rise in the coming weeks because of undersupply and a demand rebound, despite the U.S. interest rate hikes.

"Chinese demand for Russian crude is back to the levels seen at the beginning of the war in Ukraine," said Edward Moya, an analyst at OANDA.

"The West will try to pressure China and India from seeking alternative sources, which should keep the oil market tight," Moya said.

Russia plans to cut oil production by 500,000 barrels per day, or about 5% of its output, in March after the West imposed price caps on Russian oil and oil products.

While the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) raised its 2023 global oil demand growth forecast this month, its monthly report showed crude oil output in January declined in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran as part of the organisation's deal.

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"Your Silence Gives Consent"

(Plato)

Russia urges Sweden again to share Nord Stream probe findings

Sweden and Denmark, in whose exclusive economic zones the explosions occurred, have concluded the pipelines were blown up deliberately, but have not said who might be responsible.

Reuters by Lidia Kelly

Pipes for the NordStream 2 gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea, which are not used, are seen in the harbour of Mukran, Germany, on September 30, 2022. REUTERS/Fabian Bimmer

Feb 21 (Reuters) - Russia renewed its calls on Sweden late on Monday to share its findings from the ongoing investigation into the explosions that damaged the Nord Stream gas pipelines last year.

The U.N. Security Council will meet on Tuesday to discuss "sabotage" after Moscow asked for an independent inquiry into the September attacks on the pipelines that spewed gas into the Baltic Sea.

Sweden and Denmark, in whose exclusive economic zones the explosions occurred, have concluded the pipelines were blown up deliberately, but have not said who might be responsible.

"Almost five months have passed since the sabotage of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines. All this time, however, the Swedish authorities, as if on cue, remain silent," Russia's embassy to Sweden said on the Telegram messaging platform. "What is the leadership of Sweden so afraid of?"

The embassy reiterated the Russian foreign ministry's question whether Sweden had something to hide over the explosions.

It also reiterated Moscow's stance, without providing evidence, that the West was behind the blasts affecting the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines - multibillion-dollar infrastructure projects that carried Russian gas to Germany.

Construction of Nord Stream 2 was completed in September 2021, but was never put into operation after Germany shelved certification just days before Russia sent its troops into Ukraine a year ago this week.

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Ryssland uppmanar återigen… "Vad är ledningen i Sverige så rädd för?"

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Quote of the day…

Vad är han som tyst ger:

Uttrycket "den som är tyst beviljar" är ett populärt ordspråk med vilket det antyds att den som inte ger någon invändning om vad som sägs eller uttrycktes av en annan person, utan tvärtom är tyst, då är beviljats ​​den andra.

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Ryssland uppmanar återigen Sverige att dela med sig av resultaten av Nord Stream-undersökningen

Sverige och Danmark, i vars exklusiva ekonomiska zoner explosionerna inträffade, har dragit slutsatsen att rörledningarna sprängdes avsiktligt, men har inte sagt vem som kan vara ansvarig.

Reuters av Lidia Kelly

21 feb (Reuters) - Ryssland förnyade sent på måndagen sina uppmaningar till Sverige att dela med sig av resultaten från den pågående utredningen av de explosioner som skadade Nord Stream-gasledningarna förra året.

FN:s säkerhetsråd kommer att sammanträda på tisdag för att diskutera "sabotage" efter att Moskva begärt en oberoende utredning av attackerna i september mot rörledningarna som spydde ut gas i Östersjön.

Sverige och Danmark, i vars exklusiva ekonomiska zoner explosionerna inträffade, har dragit slutsatsen att rörledningarna sprängdes avsiktligt, men har inte sagt vem som kan vara ansvarig.

"Nästan fem månader har gått sedan sabotaget av gasledningarna Nord Stream 1 och Nord Stream 2. Under hela denna tid förblir dock de svenska myndigheterna, som på beställning, tysta", sade Rysslands ambassad i Sverige på meddelandeplattformen Telegram. "Vad är ledningen i Sverige så rädd för?"

Ambassaden upprepade det ryska utrikesministeriets fråga om Sverige hade något att dölja med anledning av explosionerna.

Den upprepade också Moskvas ståndpunkt, utan att ge bevis, att väst låg bakom sprängningarna som påverkade Nord Stream 1 och 2 - infrastrukturprojekt i mångmiljardklassen som transporterar rysk gas till Tyskland.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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News round-up, Monday, February 20, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

The oil and lithium belong to the nation, they belong to the people of Mexico and to all those who live in this region of Sonora, says the president.

Presidency of the Republic : 18 February 2023 : Press release

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Most read…

Biden makes surprise first visit to Ukraine, promises new arms supplies…

US President Joe Biden, who was scheduled to visit Poland this week, made his first visit to Kyiv since the start of the war.

Le Monde with AP and AFP   

In Sonora, President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, declares more than 230,000 hectares a lithium mining reserve zone…

The oil and lithium belong to the nation, they belong to the people of Mexico and to all those who live in this region of Sonora, says the president.

Presidency of the Republic : 18 February 2023 : Press release

Up in smoke: Cities grapple with run on wood-burning stoves

The smoky emissions from burning wood have serious health impacts — particularly in dense urban areas.

The problem is acute in London, where smoke from wood-burning stoves adds to the already high levels of vehicle pollution, causing severe pollution hot spots

POLITICO EU BY ASHLEIGH FURLONG

LNG: the three letters that have forever changed the European energy paradigm…

Liquefied natural gas, which arrives frozen by ship, already covers 40% of European needs, a figure that will continue to grow. Russia has practically no chance of becoming the EU's main supplier again.

EL PAÍS BY IGNACIO FARIZA

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Can we power the things we love and green the planet at the same time? AES is the next-generation energy company with over four decades of experience helping businesses transition to clean, renewable energy. Isn't it time to connect to your energy future?

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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Image: Germán & Co

Biden makes surprise first visit to Ukraine, promises new arms supplies…

US President Joe Biden, who was scheduled to visit Poland this week, made his first visit to Kyiv since the start of the war.

Le Monde with AP and AFP   

Published on February 20, 2023 

President Joe Biden walks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at St. Michael's Golden-Domed Cathedral on a surprise visit, Monday, February 20, 2023, in Kyiv. EVAN VUCCI / AP

US President Joe Biden made an unannounced visit to Ukraine Monday, February 20, to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky, a gesture of solidarity that comes days before the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of the country.

"One year later, Kyiv stands," Biden said. "And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands. The Americans stand with you, and the world stands with you." Biden spent more than five hours in the Ukrainian capital, consulting with Zelensky on next steps, honoring the country’s fallen soldiers and meeting with US embassy staff in the war-torn country.

Biden delivered remarks with Zelensky at Mariinsky Palace to announce an additional half billion dollars in US assistance and to reassure Ukraine of American and allied support as the conflict continues. "One year later, Kyiv stands. And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands," Biden said. "Joseph Biden, welcome to Kyiv! Your visit is an extremely important sign of support for all Ukrainians," Zelensky wrote on Telegram, in English.

Biden stressed his "unflagging commitment" in defending Ukraine's territorial integrity, and promised new arms. He announced an additional half-billion dollars in US assistance, including shells for howitzers, anti-tank missiles, air surveillance radars and other aid but no new advanced weaponry.

Zelensky said he and Biden spoke about "long-range weapons and the weapons that may still be supplied to Ukraine even though it wasn't supplied before." But he did not detail any new commitments.

Air sirens sound

Speaking alongside Zelensky, Biden recalled the fears nearly a year ago that Russia's invasion forces might quickly take the Ukrainian capital.

Biden also got a short firsthand taste of the terror that Ukrainians have lived with for close to a year, as air raids sirens howled over the capital just as he and Zelensky were exiting the gold-domed St. Michael's Cathedral, which they visited together. Looking solemn, they continued unperturbed as they laid a wreath and held a moment of silence at the Wall of Remembrance honoring Ukrainian soldiers killed since 2014.

Biden warned that the "brutal and unjust war" is far from won. "The cost that Ukraine has had to bear has been extraordinarily high. And the sacrifices have been far too great," Biden said. "We know that there'll be very difficult days and weeks and years ahead. But Russia's aim was to wipe Ukraine off the map. Putin's war of conquest is failing."

"He's counting on us not sticking together," Biden said of the Russian leader. "He thought he could outlast us. I don't think he's thinking that right now. God knows what he's thinking, but I don't think he's thinking that. But he's just been plain wrong. Plain wrong."

Secret trip

Speculation had been building for weeks that Biden would pay a visit to Ukraine around the February 24 anniversary of the Russian invasion. But the White House repeatedly had said that no presidential trip to Ukraine was planned, even after the Poland visit was announced earlier this month.

At the White House, planning for Biden's visit to Kyiv was tightly held – with a relatively small group of aides briefed on the plans – because of security concerns. Asked by a reporter on Friday if Biden might include stops beyond Poland, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby replied, "Right now, the trip is going to be in Warsaw."

Biden quietly departed from Joint Base Andrews near Washington shortly after 4 am on Sunday, making a stop at Ramstein Air Base in Germany before making his way into Ukraine.

At the White House, planning for Biden's visit to Kyiv was tightly held – with a relatively small group of aides briefed on the plans – because of security concerns. Asked by a reporter on Friday if Biden might include stops beyond Poland, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby replied, "Right now, the trip is going to be in Warsaw."

Biden quietly departed from Joint Base Andrews near Washington shortly after 4 am on Sunday, making a stop at Ramstein Air Base in Germany before making his way into Ukraine.

The White House would not go into specifics but said that "basic communication with the Russians occurred to ensure deconfliction" shortly before Biden's visit in an effort to avoid any miscalculation that could bring the two nuclear-armed nations into direct conflict.

This is Biden's first visit to a war zone as president. His recent predecessors, Donald Trump, Barack Obama and George W. Bush, made surprise visits to Afghanistan and Iraq during their presidencies to meet with US troops and those countries' leaders.

Image:outletminero.org

In Sonora, President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, declares more than 230,000 hectares a lithium mining reserve zone…

The oil and lithium belong to the nation, they belong to the people of Mexico and to all those who live in this region of Sonora, says the president.

Presidency of the Republic : 18 February 2023 : Press release

In Sonora, President AMLO declares more than 230,000 hectares a lithium mining reserve zone

Bacadéhuachi, Sonora, 18 February 2023 - President Andrés Manuel López Obrador declared a lithium mining reserve zone of 234,855 hectares located in the Sonoran municipalities of Arivechi, Divisaderos, Granados, Huásabas, Nácori Chico, Sahuaripa and Bacadéhuachi, the region with the greatest potential for the exploitation of the mineral in the state.

During the signing of the agreement instructing the Ministry of Energy to follow up on the declaration, the president recalled the decision to use the strategic mineral for the benefit of the people.

He said that the historical process that led to the expropriation of oil is related to this day, since the Porfirian regime handed over oil to foreigners without any benefit for the people, and it was not until 1917 when the Constitution established that the subsoil assets belong to the nation. Due to pressure from the US government not to pass the oil law, it was not until 1938 that President Lázaro Cárdenas del Río led the expropriation.

"What we are doing now, keeping in mind the proportions and at another time, is nationalising lithium so that it cannot be exploited by foreigners, neither from Russia, nor from China, nor from the United States. Oil and lithium belong to the nation, they belong to the people of Mexico, to you, to all those who live in this region of Sonora, to all Mexicans.

After mentioning the decree of 20 April 2022 that reformed the Mining Law to establish that lithium is patrimony of the nation, he explained that the technical process of exploration and extraction of this basic input for the automotive industry will begin.

"It is not possible to make electric cars - as is the commitment of the US government and the commitment of the Canadian government, and also our commitment, and it is something that we approved - we could not advance in this objective if we do not have lithium. So, a process of technological development begins in order to have the raw material, also with the purpose of installing plants for the production of batteries".

He indicated that this action is complementary to the Puerto Peñasco photovoltaic plant, of which the federal government concluded the first stage, with which our country is taking the first step in the use of clean energy.

He stressed that the state has what it takes to trigger the automotive industry, as it is the second largest copper-producing state in the world, which complements the industrial development sought by the Sonora Plan.

Governor Alfonso Durazo Montaño explained that the decision to nationalise lithium is related to the nationalisation of the oil and electricity industries so that natural resources remain in Mexico for the benefit of the economy and communities.

After reaffirming the commitment to look after the public interest and the defence of the nation, he recalled that on 5 August 2021, the President of the Republic issued an executive order to the automotive industry that at least half of all new vehicles must be electric by 2030.

In this regard, he said that Mexico and Sonora guarantee the fulfilment of the Sonora Plan in terms of sustainable energy, as the state has the largest lithium deposit and is the only producer of graphite in the country, as well as the second largest copper producer in the world.

After confirming that this government promotes investments with a social dimension, the Secretary of Economy, Raquel Buenrostro Sánchez, stressed that the nationalisation of lithium deepens the transformation project for the country in this century, by laying the foundations for an industrial and clean energy policy for the next 50 or 70 years, as our country is rich in materials for the energy transition, especially lithium.

He pointed out that the conversion of internal combustion units to electric power is underway and will grow exponentially in the coming years, for which lithium is required.

"What better opportunity for the industry than to do it hand in hand with the specialised knowledge and experience of Mexican workers. That is why all the automotive companies are looking to us to settle in our territory in various parts of the country."

He added that the declaration of the lithium reserve that President López Obrador formalised today, together with the industrial policy implemented by the Ministry of Economy, will have a bright future for decades to come.

"The nationalisation of lithium will be remembered by future generations as the turning point that gave way to the new industrial policy and import substitution of this century, an industrial policy that is committed to clean energy."

It is worth remembering that on 20 April 2022, the federal chief executive issued the decree that reformed the Mining Law to establish that lithium is patrimony of the nation, and reserves its exploration, exploitation, benefit and use in favour of the people of Mexico.

Also accompanying the President of the Republic were: the Secretary of Energy, Rocío Nahle García, as well as the Secretaries of: National Defence, Luis Cresencio Sandoval González; Finance and Public Credit, Rogelio Ramírez de la O; and Infrastructure, Communications and Transport, Jorge Nuño Lara.

Likewise, the undersecretary of Expenditure of the SHCP, Juan Pablo de Botton Falcón; the general coordinator of Social Communication and spokesperson for the Presidency, Jesús Ramírez Cuevas; the general director of Lithium for Mexico, Pablo Daniel Taddei Arriola; and the municipal president of Bacadéhuachi, Luis Alfonso Sierra Villaescusa.

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Source: austral.com

Up in smoke: Cities grapple with run on wood-burning stoves

The smoky emissions from burning wood have serious health impacts — particularly in dense urban areas.

The problem is acute in London, where smoke from wood-burning stoves adds to the already high levels of vehicle pollution, causing severe pollution hot spots

POLITICO EU BY ASHLEIGH FURLONG

FEBRUARY 15, 2023

This article is part of POLITICO’s Global Policy Lab: Living Cities, a collaborative journalism project exploring the future of cities.

LONDON — With energy prices skyrocketing, many Europeans have switched to wood-burning stoves to save on their heating bills — but that’s hampering efforts to curb air pollution, particularly in cities.

Despite its cozy, natural and green image as an alternative to fossil fuels, burning wood — and the emissions it creates — has serious health consequences. Smoke from wood-burning stoves contains fine particulate matter and other dangerous substances like carbon monoxide; in cities, these mix with pollution from traffic to form a lethal combination, exacerbating the risks of asthma and heart failure.

That’s putting cities across Europe in a bind, as they’ve committed to ambitious targets to go climate-neutral and significantly lower pollution. And instead of moving away from wood burning, high energy prices caused by the Ukraine war have prompted many households to adopt the form of heating.

The problem is acute in London, where smoke from wood-burning stoves adds to the already high levels of vehicle pollution, causing severe pollution hot spots.

With emissions on the rise, Mayor Sadiq Khan earlier this month unveiled new planning guidance that requires zero particulate emissions for new and refurbished developments, effectively banning the installation of wood-burning stoves in these developments.

The move is seen as an “example of how you can kind of do a step change to essentially banning them” in new developments, said Tessa Bartholomew-Good, campaign lead at Global Action Plan, an environmental NGO.

But it’s also sparked a call for broader action, including from Rosamund Kissi-Debrah, mother of nine-year-old Ella, the first person whose death from an asthma attack was officially linked to air pollution. She lived in a pollution hot spot.

Kissi-Debrah has called for a complete ban on the use of wood-burning stoves in the capital, arguing that while they might make sense in other parts of the country, they’re worsening the city’s already desperate air quality.

London is not alone in looking for ways to curb wood-burning stoves, with cities across Europe wrestling with similar trends and campaigners lamenting that the energy crisis has undone years-long efforts to convince people to ditch firewood.

It’s as if the last decade of progress was “lost within a year,” said Kåre Press-Kristensen, senior adviser on air quality and climate at the NGO Green Transition Denmark. “It’s kind of back to the Stone Age campfire — just in our living room.” 

Trial and error

Precise figures on the increase in wood burning in cities are difficult to come by, but the cumulative evidence points to a dramatic increase. 

The U.K. government on Tuesday released new data showing that particulate matter pollution from wood burning in homes has doubled over the past decade. Data from the country’s Stove Industry Alliance showed a 66 percent increase in stove sales between July and September compared to the same period in 2021.

Austria’s demand for chimney sweeps increased by a factor of four to five, according to the Federal Guild Master of Chimney Sweeps. In Germany, official statistics from December show that prices for firewood, wood pellets or other solid fuels increased by 96 percent in November 2022, compared to the same month the previous year. 

Researchers warn that the increase will be costly — both in terms of health impacts and public expenses.

The fine particulate matter, PM 2.5, released by wood burning has been shown to “flood” the home and impact on the community when released into the air outside.

Data from consultancy CE Delft found the health-related costs of outdoor air pollution caused by wood-burning stoves comes in at nearly €9 billion in the EU and U.K. The cost is particularly high in some countries such as Italy, where wood-burning stoves make up 75 percent of the total health costs of pollution from domestic heating and cooking.

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The Killer In The Kitchen

The health-related social costs of outdoor air pollution due to domestic heating and cooking in the EU and U.K. totaled €29 billion in 2018. Most of these impacts occur in urban areas. Several factors, including the fuels and heating technologies used and the amount of energy consumed, can explain the differences between countries.

Direct* health-related costs per household due to residential heating and cooking in urban and rural areas, in euros per year.

Source: POLITICO EU by cedelft.eu

Average health-related cost per household of technique-fuel combinations for heating in the EU and the U.K., in euros per year.

*Direct costs relate to direct emissions that arise at home from fossil fuels and biomass-based techniques. Indirect emissions are caused by electricity and heat production; it is unclear whether they occur in urban or rural areas and they are excluded from the chart.

SOURCE: Kortekand et al. (2022)

The report calculated that using a wood-burning stove leads to some €750 in annual health costs from pollution per household — compared to €210 for a diesel car.

With full-on bans out of reach in most cities, policymakers’ options for curtailing the use of wood-burning stoves are limited.

“Currently, there are no legal grounds to ban wood burning completely,” said Eva Oosters, vice mayor for environment and emissions-free transport in the Dutch city of Utrecht. Instead, the city is focused on trying to “encourage people to choose a healthier and cleaner environment.”

In December 2021, it implemented a subsidy for people to remove or replace their stove with a less polluting one. The scheme proved popular, but the city decided to scrap it this year, only providing a subsidy to remove stoves completely. 

Oslo, which ran a similar scheme, also changed its approach, after research showed that emissions levels remained high — potentially because people used the new stoves more frequently than the old ones. The city is now spending more resources on longer-term measures aimed at lowering energy use and making alternative energy sources more affordable.

“We are giving grants to improve energy efficiency in buildings, and we have district heating systems over large portions of the city — that is how you give people real [alternatives] to wood burning,” said Oslo’s Vice Mayor for Environment and Transport Sirin Stav.

For EU cities, there’s an additional hurdle.

Patrick Huth, senior expert at Environmental Action Germany, said discussions in Berlin around setting stricter requirements for wood-burning stoves come up against an awkward fact: Despite the additional pollution, Germany is still meeting the air quality limit values for particulate matter set by the EU.

“This is a huge problem, because if the air quality limit values are met, then there’s no pressure on cities to do more to make stricter emission limit values or to implement bans for this kind of pollution source,” he said. 

Brussels has proposed tightening the bloc’s air quality guidelines but the new limits are still twice as high as the latest recommendations from the World Health Organization.

Behavior change

Adding to the challenge for cities is a lack of awareness about the health impacts associated with wood burning. Most people don’t realize their stoves are dangerous to the health of their families and neighborhoods — and don’t enjoy being lectured.

“Educating people about the links between wood burning, air pollution and health — without judgment — is an essential step toward behavior change, regulation and supporting a transition to other energy sources for those who need it,” said Rachel Pidgeon from Impact on Urban Health, a nonprofit that helps cities tackle issues like air pollution.

But cities that launch information and behavior change campaigns face a tough audience, especially when discussing potential bans on wood burning in densely populated areas. 

In Norway, people have reacted “very negatively to our claims,” said Susana Lopez-Aparicio, the lead scientist on the Norwegian Institute for Air Research’s report. “[Wood burning] is very connected with Norwegian culture.”

People who burn wood are “tightly attached to it,” said Gary Fuller, senior lecturer in air quality measurement at Imperial College London, pointing to research that found users were not swayed when presented with results from pollution sensors.

They also tend to be relatively affluent and choose to burn logs not only because of high energy prices but because of the cozy social atmosphere it creates, according to research by Kantar for the British government.

That makes habits hard to shift, Fuller predicted. “Being able to change this behavior, just by information, is going to be really challenging.”

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Source: El País, Model of a methane tanker, with the Chinese flag in the background. DADO RUVIC (REUTERS)

LNG: the three letters that have forever changed the European energy paradigm…

Liquefied natural gas, which arrives frozen by ship, already covers 40% of European needs, a figure that will continue to grow. Russia has practically no chance of becoming the EU's main supplier again.

El País by IGNACIO FARIZA

Madrid - 20 FEB 2023

Europe is approaching the sad anniversary of the day it woke up as a different Europe. The Russian offensive, even before the first light of dawn broke over Kiev on 24 February, shattered much more than diplomatic relations between powers. With the first bombs falling on Ukrainian soil, decades of European subservience to cheap gas from the East were also blown apart.

Moscow was breaking with its biggest and most loyal customer, perhaps forever: almost 12 months later, although Russian LNG tankers continue to dock, fuel arrivals by pipeline from Russia are now minimal. The Eurasian giant is beginning to feel the impact of the sanctions, having to look to Asia for its livelihood. And the thesis that this new status quo - more expensive, logistically much more complex and more damaging to the environment, but also more secure from the point of view of security of supply - is here to stay is gaining ground in the European upper echelons.

The EU has been forced to completely turn around its sources of supply in record time. From having a direct supply almost on its doorstep, it has gone from having to fetch it from countries as far away as the United States, Qatar and Nigeria. Three letters - LNG: liquefied natural gas - have made this unprecedented reconfiguration possible: almost 40% of the gas consumed by the EU was of this type - that which arrives by ship in a frozen state - 60% more than a year earlier.

Shipments from the US, which is making a killing and has replaced Russia as the bloc's main supplier, have more than doubled. And those from Norway, Egypt, Trinidad and Tobago and Peru, although starting from a much lower level, have also shot up. This, however, is only an appetizer of what is to come: far from being a one-day phenomenon, these three acronyms, practically unknown to the general public, will become part of the collective imagination for decades to come.

"It is a trend that will continue," confirms Xi Nan, senior vice-president of the specialised consultancy Rystad Energy. "LNG was and still is the only way to replace Gazprom," adds Emmanuel Dubois-Pelerin, senior director at ratings firm S&P. For decades, he emphasises, the Russian gas company "was not only the largest source of gas for Europe but also the only one with very short-term flexibility". For example, from one month to the next in a cold winter. "All other sources - pipelines from Norway, Algeria and Azerbaijan - are maxed out, and EU and UK production continues to shrink inexorably," he says.

Russia out of the picture

Even if the war ends soon - something that virtually no observer envisages - Russia's chances of regaining its hegemonic position as Europe's leading gas supplier are minimal, if not non-existent. The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipeline, once the main channel for Russian fuel into the EU, has further complicated matters, but it is not the biggest problem: although costly, it is repairable. Diplomatic and commercial ties between the Eurasian giant and Russia are less so: all consulted analysts believe that even if Vladimir Putin's regime falls, Russia's pre-eminence is history.

"I don't think Russia will play that role in the future: in the coming years, Europe will rely on LNG and renewables," says Rystad Energy's Nan. "Our baseline scenario is that pipelines will be marginal in the future, staying close to the current level," outlines Dubois-Pelerin. Just one-sixth as much gas transits through them as in 2019, just before the pandemic and, above all, before the invasion of Ukraine. "Perhaps the dependence has shifted and it is now Russia that depends on Europe to maintain the influx of foreign exchange," adds the S&P analyst.

Germany ushers in a new era without Russian gas

"The destruction of Nord Stream and the construction of regasification terminals to compensate for the loss of Russian gas mean that LNG is now fully integrated into Europe's energy infrastructure," notes Henning Gloystein, Energy Director at risk consultancy Eurasia. "At least for the next 20 years.

The capacity of European regasification plants will soar by 25% between 2021 and 2023, according to calculations by the International Energy Agency (IEA). Neither these gigantic investments - each of these regasification plants, of which more than a dozen are planned, both on the Atlantic and Mediterranean sides, cost hundreds of millions of euros - nor the new supply contracts signed with companies and countries outside Moscow, also worth millions, can be easily reversed, even if the war were to end soon. This, in any case, is something that no one foresees.

“Russia," Gloystein says, "has lost all its reputation".

Gas under 50 euros

In contrast to the hecatomb that has been feared for months, the winter that is about to end has been much calmer than even the most optimistic observer could have imagined. Europe's gas reservoirs are at two-thirds of capacity, double the level of a year ago and 60% higher than the average of the last decade. Not even in 2020, when the virus plunged consumption to historic lows, did Europe have as much gas in storage as today. And that has helped to reduce - and a lot - the pressure on prices. Gas prices in the Old Continent closed last week below 50 euros per megawatt hour (MWh), an unprecedented level in a year and a half.

From this point, however, the downward margin is slim: LNG is, by definition, much more expensive than the one that arrives by pipe. This is because it entails unavoidable liquefaction costs - to change from a gaseous to a liquid state and freeze it -, transport costs - in some cases, tens of thousands of kilometres - and regasification costs - to return it to a gaseous state so that it can be consumed again. The levels of 20 euros per MWh of a couple of years ago, when most of the gas was piped from Russia, are unbeatable: now, with luck, the floor will be in the region of 30 or 40 euros.

The return of China - along with Japan, the world's largest importer of liquefied gas - also promises strong emotions. "Europe will have to compete with the rest of the world and particularly with Asia," predicts Jean-Baptiste Dubreuil of the IEA. As with any struggle, this fight between giants will leave third countries in the lurch: the lower-income emerging countries, which are being pushed out of a market in which they cannot compete. The best example is Pakistan - a giant usually out of the spotlight despite being, mind you, the fifth most populous country in the world - which, given the high cost of LNG, is going to quadruple its electricity generation with coal. A logical move in purely economic terms, but a disastrous one in environmental terms.

If a few months ago it was thought that the big bottleneck would be the regasification plants, now all eyes are on the opposite side: the liquefaction trains. "The global market will remain tense until 2025 due to the lack of investment in this type of project during the pandemic″, predicts Nan. Knowing that natural gas - now dominant in industry, heating and even in the electricity matrix of many Western countries - will eventually be eclipsed by renewables, green hydrogen and biomethane, no one wants to make a false move.

The opportunity for exporters is as great as the risk of embarking on pharaonic investments that may become obsolete in a few years. The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) forecasts that Europe's appetite for LNG will start to fall, little by little, from 2024 onwards. Demand could still be strong in 2023, but is set to fall as EU climate and energy security policies reduce gas demand by at least 40% by 2030," reads its latest monograph, published this week. "Europe's ambitious energy transition targets mean that much of the new [regasification] capacity could go unused."

Winter over, what about the next one?

While this winter is not yet over, the spotlight is already on the next one. In the coming months, Europe will have to deal with an added problem: unlike last spring - the season when the Old Continent takes advantage of the opportunity to refill its tanks - this year the task will have to be done on its own, without the wild card of piped imports from Russia. And even with the LNG boom, in December the IEA was forecasting a shortfall of around 15% of demand by 2023.

Two months later, the agency's head of natural gas analysis is downplaying the pessimism considerably. Since then, Dubreuil writes by email, lower demand - mainly due to milder-than-usual weather - has "significantly moderated the pressure". Still, he says, this apparent improvement in the outlook "should not be a distraction" from further reducing demand. Next year, he insists, "gas supply will remain tight, and the increase in LNG supply will not be sufficient to replace" all that was piped in from Russia. In a stress scenario - a cold winter, limited LNG availability and zero imports from Russia - the EU would face a shortfall of just under 10% of demand, according to his updated calculations.

Even more optimistic is Eurasia's Gloystein, who already sees the Rubicon of next winter as crossed: "Europe has contracted enough gas to get through this and next winter. The risk of fuel shortages has been mitigated". All, of course, at the cost of a huge amount of money. Not only because replacing piped gas with LNG is more expensive: double at best, but it can be more than tenfold, as was evident last summer, when it reached around 350 euros per MWh. "There is nothing wrong with taking a breather, but let's not be surprised when the crisis returns. Let it not be a rude awakening", warned Brookings Institution researcher Samantha Gross a few days ago. A warning to the navigators that should not be forgotten.

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News round-up, Friday, February 17, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

Governments risk expending so much money and attention on merely coping with the impacts of climate change that they neglect efforts to reduce global emissions, exacerbating the crisis.

The Washington Post

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Most read…

Artificial Intelligence may diagnose dementia in a day

Scientists are testing an artificial-intelligence system thought to be capable of diagnosing dementia after a single brain scan.

BBC by Pallab Ghosh, science correspondent 

Bruce Willis diagnosed with dementia, says family

…Family of Die Hard and Pulp Fiction actor, 67, releases statement to share diagnosis following retirement from acting owing to aphasia”

The Guardian

Beware a climate ‘doom loop,’ where crisis is harder to solve, report says

Humanity has a ‘brief and rapidly closing window’ to avoid a hotter, deadly future, U.N. climate report says

The washington pos By Leo Sands

Vietnam to further delay rules for multi-billion-dollar wind power - business group

That is despite EU companies' pressure for swift regulatory progress, according to public recommendations and an internal document about this week's meetings seen by Reuters.

Reuters by Francesco Guarascio

When Americans Lost Faith in the News

Half a century ago, most of the public said they trusted the news media. Today, most say they don’t. What happened to the power of the press?

The New Yorker by Louis Menand

Is a Woman Ever Going to Win the White House?

Trump’s performative macho is scaring voters in both parties away from women candidates.

The New Yorker by Susan B. Glasser

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Accelerating the future of energy, together. Is it possible?

Can we power the things we love and green the planet at the same time? AES is the next-generation energy company with over four decades of experience helping businesses transition to clean, renewable energy. Isn't it time to connect to your energy future?

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Seaboard: pioneers in power generation in the country

Armando Rodríguez, vice-president and executive director of the company, talks to us about their projects in the DR, where they have been operating for 32 years.

Sourrce by MERCADO Dominican Republic

28 JUNE 2022

More than 32 years ago, back in January 1990, Seaboard began operations as the first independent power producer (IPP) in the Dominican Republic. They became pioneers in the electricity market by way of the commercial operations of Estrella del Norte, a 40MW floating power generation plant and the first of three built for Seaboard by Wärtsilä.

Armando Rodríguez, vice president and executive director of Seaboard, joins us for this Mercado Interview to talk about the company's contributions to the Dominican Republic's electricity sector. "Our plants have been strategically located by the authorities of the electricity sector to make it possible to reduce blackouts in Santo Domingo and save foreign currency for all Dominicans," he explains.

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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What is Artificial Intelligency?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of a computer or a robot controlled by a computer to do tasks that are usually done by humans because they require human intelligence and discernment. Although there are no AIs that can perform the wide variety of tasks an ordinary human can do, some AIs can match humans in specific tasks.

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Bruce Willis diagnosed with dementia, says family

…Family of Die Hard and Pulp Fiction actor, 67, releases statement to share diagnosis following retirement from acting owing to aphasia”

The Guardian

Artificial Intelligence may diagnose dementia in a day

Scientists are testing an artificial-intelligence system thought to be capable of diagnosing dementia after a single brain scan.

BBC by Pallab Ghosh, science correspondent 

Published, 10 August 2021

It may also be able to predict whether the condition will remain stable for many years, slowly deteriorate or need immediate treatment.

Currently, it can take several scans and tests to diagnose dementia.

The researchers involved say earlier diagnoses with their system could greatly improve patient outcomes.

Bruce Willis diagnosed with dementia, says family

Identify patterns

"If we intervene early, the treatments can kick in early and slow down the progression of the disease and at the same time avoid more damage," Prof Zoe Kourtzi, of Cambridge University and a fellow of national centre for AI and data science The Alan Turing Institute, said.

"And it's likely that symptoms occur much later in life or may never occur."

Prof Kourtzi's system compares brain scans of those worried they might have dementia with those of thousands of dementia patients and their relevant medical records.

The algorithm can identify patterns in the scans even expert neurologists cannot see and match them to patient outcomes in its database.

Memory clinics

In pre-clinical tests, it has been able to diagnose dementia, years before symptoms develop, even when there is no obvious signs of damage on the brain scan.

The trial, at Addenbrooke's Hospital and other memory clinics around the country, will test whether it works in a clinical setting, alongside conventional ways of diagnosing dementia.

In the first year, about 500 patients are expected to participate.

Their results will go to their doctors, who can, if necessary, advise on the course of treatment.

Denis and Penelope Clark want to know how his condition will progress, so they can plan for their future

Consultant neurologist Dr Tim Rittman, who is leading the study, with neuroscientists at Cambridge University, called the artificial-intelligence system a "fantastic development".

"These set of diseases are really devastating for people," he said.

"So when I am delivering this information to a patient, anything I can do to be more confident about the diagnosis, to give them more information about the likely progression of the disease to help them plan their lives is a great thing to be able to do."

Sometimes struggling

Among the first to participate in the trial, Denis Clark, 75, retired from his job as an executive for a meat company five years ago.

Last year, his wife, Penelope, noticed he was sometimes struggling with his memory.

And they are now concerned he is developing dementia.

Denis tries to describe his symptoms but Penelope interjects to say he finds it hard to explain what is happening.

The couple are worried about having to sell their home to fund Denis's care.

So Penelope is relieved they should not have to wait long for a diagnosis and an indication of how any dementia is likely to progress.

Normally, Denis might need several brain scans to see whether he has dementia

"We could then plan financially," she said.

"We would know whether as a couple we could have a few holidays before things get so bad that I can't take Denis on holiday."

Mental problems

Another of Dr Rittman's patients, Mark Thompson, 57, who began having memory lapses 10 months ago, before the trial of the artificial-intelligence system began, said it would have made a big difference to him had it been available.

"I had test after test after test and at least four scans before I was diagnosed," he said.

"The medical team was marvellous and did everything they could to get to the bottom of what was wrong with me.

"But the uncertainty was causing me more... mental problems than any caused by the condition.

"Was it a tumour? Would they need to operate? It caused me so much stress not knowing what was wrong with me."

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Image: Germán & Co

Beware a climate ‘doom loop,’ where crisis is harder to solve, report says

Humanity has a ‘brief and rapidly closing window’ to avoid a hotter, deadly future, U.N. climate report says

The washington pos By Leo Sands

February 16, 2023

LONDON — The devastating effects of climate change on Earth could become so overwhelming that they undermine humanity’s capacity to tackle climate change’s root causes, researchers warned Wednesday.

They are calling it a “doom loop.”

The self-reinforcing dynamic, outlined in a report jointly published Wednesday by two British think tanks, warns of a spiral effect:

Governments risk expending so much money and attention on merely coping with the impacts of climate change that they neglect efforts to reduce global emissions, exacerbating the crisis.

“We’re pointing to a potential situation where the symptom of the climate and ecological crisis — the storms, the potential food crises, and things like this — start to distract us from the root causes,” report author Laurie Laybourn, an associate fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research think tank, said in an interview. “You get a feedback that starts to run out of control.”

The report’s authors do not believe that climate change has already triggered a global “doom loop” that is irreversible, but warn that in some places the dynamic could begin to take hold.

“We could get to the point where societies are faced with relentless disasters and crises, and all the other problems that the climate and ecological crisis is bringing, and will increasingly distract them from delivering decarbonization,” said Laybourn.

Humanity has a ‘brief and rapidly closing window’ to avoid a hotter, deadly future, U.N. climate report says

One example of the doom loop is economic. As African nations spend increasing sums on simply mitigating escalating climate change crises, they have less money to invest in reducing long term emissions targets, Laybourn said.

According to the African Development Bank, the impact of climate change is already costing the entire continent between 5 and 15 percent of its annual GDP growth, per capita.

“Those costs just become even more insurmountable,” Laybourn said. “In that situation, you are eroding the ability of countries across Africa and other parts of the world to be able to deliver more prosperous — and of course sustainable — conditions.”

It could make it more difficult for African nations to raise the $1.6 trillion they have agreed to spend between 2022 and 2030 toward meeting their climate action pledges.

Climate change made the economically devastating floods across West Africa last summer around 80 times more probable to occur, according to an analysis in November.

Around the world, a report published in 2022 in the journal Nature found that each additional ton of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere cost the equivalent of $185, when the economic toll of deadly heat waves, crop-killing droughts and rising seas linked to climate change is taken into account. These costs add up quickly, the authors behind Wednesday’s report say, and will deplete governments of the economic resources they need to tackle climate change’s root causes.

Costs of climate change far surpass government estimates, study says

Humanity has already unleashed more than a trillion tons of carbon dioxide since the start of the Industrial Revolution, driving up global temperatures by more than a degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit). Within the next decade, global average temperatures could reach 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels — a threshold scientists say is critical to avoid irreversible changes.

It is still technically possible, and even economically viable, for nations to curb carbon pollution on the scale that’s required, according to the United Nations-assembled panel of 278 top climate experts. However, the authors of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2022 report warn that “it cannot be achieved through incremental change.”

In Europe, Laybourn warned that climate change could force more and more refugees to flee increasingly uninhabitable homelands, triggering political backlashes in wealthier host nations — and further distracting voters from climate change, which he says is the issue’s root cause.

By the year 2100, extreme heat events will make parts of Asia and Africa uninhabitable for up to 600 million people, the United Nations and Red Cross warned in October.

“This doom dynamic could manifest itself in things like a more nativist politics,” Laybourn said. In “a more ecologically destabilized world, it’s more conflicted, with more people on the move.”

However, even if humanity begins to enter a “doom loop," it isn’t doomed, researchers say. Laybourn believes that it is still possible for humanity to extricate itself from it — because societies, he believes, ultimately do have control over how they respond to destabilizing crises.

“The psychological element of this is the fundamental quantity,” Laybourn said, pointing to the way in which individuals dramatically relearned everyday habits in the face of the covid-19 pandemic, over a short period of time, potentially saving many lives.

“Throughout history, in moments of destabilization — you can see the doom dynamic. You can also see a virtuous circle as well, where certain events, shocks, create positive social movements,” he said. "It can happen in astonishingly short periods of time.”

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Power-generating windmill turbines are pictured at a wind park in Bac Lieu province, Vietnam, July 8, 2017.

Vietnam to further delay rules for multi-billion-dollar wind power - business group

Reuters by Francesco Guarascio

HANOI, Feb 16 (Reuters) - Vietnam may not have a legal framework to regulate offshore wind farms until next year, a European Union business representative said on Thursday, a delay that could stall billions of dollars of foreign investment in the sector.

Vietnam has big offshore wind power potential given the strong winds and shallow waters near coastal densely populated areas, according to the World Bank Group, which estimates the sector could add at least $50 billion to its economy.

The Southeast Asian country's most recent draft power development plan from December, reviewed by Reuters, targets production of 7 gigawatt from offshore wind by 2030 from zero output now.

Its approval has been repeatedly delayed. It could now be further postponed, Minh Nguyen, vice president of the European chamber of commerce in Vietnam, told a conference on Thursday.

Hinging on its adoption is sizable investment in wind farms, including much of the $15.5 billion pledged by G7 countries in December for green energy transition projects.

Latest Updates

Minh said progress depended on new legislation on use of marine space for military, shipping or other purposes, which was not expected before October, citing talks between Vietnamese officials and EU businessmen earlier this week.

That is despite EU companies' pressure for swift regulatory progress, according to public recommendations and an internal document about this week's meetings seen by Reuters.

Some diplomats and experts say Vietnam is also keen to scrutinise Chinese investment in the sector for national security reasons, fearing windfarms could be used for surveillance.

Vietnam's foreign, industry and environment ministries and China's embassy in Vietnam did not immediately respond to separate requests for comment.

A delay would come as little surprise to investors in Vietnam, where bureaucratic and legislative delays are common.

Some are sanguine, however, confident that pilot projects could be approved quickly, even before legislation passes, while others see it as unlikely wind turbine makers would review investment plans given Vietnam's location and clout as a regional manufacturing powerhouse.

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Image: Germán & Co

When Americans Lost Faith in the News

Half a century ago, most of the public said they trusted the news media. Today, most say they don’t. What happened to the power of the press?

The New Yorker by Louis Menand

January 30, 2023

When the Washington Post unveiled the slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” on February 17, 2017, people in the news business made fun of it. “Sounds like the next Batman movie,” the New York Times’ executive editor, Dean Baquet, said. But it was already clear, less than a month into the Trump Administration, that destroying the credibility of the mainstream press was a White House priority, and that this would include an unabashed, and almost gleeful, policy of lying and denying. The Post kept track of the lies. The paper calculated that by the end of his term the President had lied 30,573 times.

Almost as soon as Donald Trump took office, he started calling the news media “the enemy of the American people.” For a time, the White House barred certain news organizations, including the Times, CNN, Politico, and the Los Angeles Times, from briefings, and suspended the credentials of a CNN correspondent, Jim Acosta, who was regarded as combative by the President. “Fake news” became a standard White House response—frequently the only White House response—to stories that did not make the President look good. There were many such stories.

Suspicion is, for obvious reasons, built into the relationship between the press and government officials, but, normally, both parties have felt an interest in maintaining at least the appearance of cordiality. Reporters need access so that they can write their stories, and politicians would like those stories to be friendly. Reporters also want to come across as fair and impartial, and officials want to seem coöperative and transparent. Each party is willing to accept a degree of hypocrisy on the part of the other.

With Trump, all that changed. Trump is rude. Cordiality is not a feature of his brand. And there is no coöperation in the Trump world, because everything is an agon. Trump waged war on the press, and he won, or nearly won. He persuaded millions of Americans not to believe anything they saw or heard in the non-Trumpified media, including, ultimately, the results of the 2020 Presidential election.

The press wasn’t silenced in the Trump years. The press was discredited, at least among Trump supporters, and that worked just as well. It was censorship by other means. Back in 1976, even after Vietnam and Watergate, seventy-two per cent of the public said they trusted the news media. Today, the figure is thirty-four per cent. Among Republicans, it’s fourteen per cent. If “Democracy Dies in Darkness” seemed a little alarmist in 2017, the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, made it seem prescient. Democracy really was at stake.

That we need a free press for our democracy to work is a belief as old as our democracy. Hence the First Amendment. Without the free circulation of information and opinion, voters will be operating in ignorance when they choose whom to vote for and what policies to support. But what if the information is bad? What if you can’t trust the reporter? What if there’s no such thing as “the facts”?

As Michael Schudson pointed out in “Discovering the News” (1978), the notion that good journalism is “objective”—that is, nonpartisan and unopinionated—emerged only around the start of the twentieth century. Schudson thought that it arose as a response to growing skepticism about the whole idea of stable and reliable truths. The standard of objectivity, as he put it, “was not the final expression of a belief in facts but the assertion of a method designed for a world in which even facts could not be trusted. . . . Journalists came to believe in objectivity, to the extent that they did, because they wanted to, needed to, were forced by ordinary human aspiration to seek escape from their own deep convictions of doubt and drift.” In other words, objectivity was a problematic concept from the start.

The classic statement of the problem is Walter Lippmann’s book “Public Opinion,” published a hundred and one years ago. Lippmann’s critique remains relevant today—the Columbia Journalism School mounted a four-day conference on “Public Opinion” last fall, and people found that there was still plenty to talk about. Lippmann’s argument was that journalism is not a profession. You don’t need a license or an academic credential to practice the trade. All sorts of people call themselves journalists. Are all of them providing the public with reliable and disinterested news goods?

Yet journalists are quick to defend anyone who uncovers and disseminates information, as long as it’s genuine, by whatever means and with whatever motives. Julian Assange is possibly a criminal. He certainly intervened in the 2016 election, allegedly with Russian help, to damage the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. But top newspaper editors have insisted that what Assange does is protected by the First Amendment, and the Committee to Protect Journalists has protested the charges against him.

Lippmann had another point: journalism is not a public service; it’s a business. The most influential journalists today are employees of large corporations, and their work product is expected to be profitable. The notion that television news is, or ever was, a loss leader is a myth. In the nineteen-sixties, the nightly “Huntley-Brinkley Report” was NBC’s biggest money-maker. “60 Minutes,” which débuted on CBS in 1968, ranked among the top ten most watched shows on television for twenty-three years in a row.

And the business is all about the eyeballs. When ratings drop, and with them advertising revenues, correspondents change, anchors change, coverage changes. News, especially but not only cable news, is curated for an audience. So, obviously, is the information published on social media, where the algorithm selects for the audience’s political preferences. It is hard to be “objective” and sell news at the same time.

What is the track record of the press since Lippmann’s day? In “City of Newsmen: Public Lies and Professional Secrets in Cold War Washington” (Chicago), Kathryn J. McGarr weighs the performance of the Washington press corps during the first decades of the Cold War. She shows, by examining archived correspondence, that reporters in Washington knew perfectly well that Administrations were misleading them about national-security matters—about whether the United States was flying spy planes over the Soviet Union, for example, or training exiles to invade Cuba and depose Fidel Castro. To the extent that there was an agenda concealed by official claims of “containing Communist expansion”—to the extent that Middle East policy was designed to preserve Western access to oil fields, or that Central American policy was designed to make the region safe for United Fruit—reporters were not fooled.

So why didn’t they report what they knew? McGarr, a historian at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, thinks it’s because the people who covered Washington for the wire services and the major dailies had an ideology. They were liberal internationalists. Until the United States intervened militarily in Vietnam—the Marines waded ashore there in 1965—that was the ideology of American élites. Like the government, and like the leaders of philanthropies such as the Ford Foundation and cultural institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art, newspaper people believed in what they saw as the central mission of Cold War policy: the defense of the North Atlantic community of nations. They supported policies that protected and promoted the liberal values in the name of which the United States had gone to war against Hitler.

Many members of the Washington press, including editors and publishers, had served in the government during the Second World War—in the Office of Strategic Services (the forerunner of the C.I.A.), in the Office of War Information, and in other capacities in Washington and London. They had been part of the war effort, and their sense of duty persisted after the war ended. Defending democracy was not just the government’s job. It was the press’s job, too.

When reporters were in possession of information that the American government wanted to keep secret, they therefore asked themselves whether publishing it would damage the Cold War mission. “Fighting for peace remained central to the diplomatic press corps’ conception of its responsibilities,” McGarr says. “Quality reporting meant being an advocate not for the government but for ‘the Peace.’ ”

There was another reason for caution: fear of nuclear war. After the Soviets developed an atomic weapon, in 1949, and until the Test Ban Treaty of 1963, end-of-the-world nuclear anxiety was widespread, and newsmen shared it. The Cold War was a balance-of-power war. That’s what the unofficial doctrine of the American government, “containment,” meant: keep things as they are. Whatever tipped the scale in the wrong direction might unleash the bomb, and so newspapers were careful about what they published.

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Source: The New Yorker. Nikki Haley is the only woman to seriously figure on the longlist of potential Republican candidates this election cycle. Photograph by Win McNamee

Is a Woman Ever Going to Win the White House?

Trump’s performative macho is scaring voters in both parties away from women candidates.

The New Yorker by Susan B. Glasser

February 16, 2023

Will America ever have a woman President? We’re closer to that than at any time in history, but what worries me most about this tired old question is that hardly anyone seems to be asking it anymore. On Tuesday, the California Democrat Dianne Feinstein—who, at the age of eighty-nine, is the oldest member of the Senate—made official what had long been evident: she will not seek reëlection next year. A host of ambitious younger Democratic politicians are already looking to run, including the Trump-prosecuting congressman Adam Schiff and the progressive favorite Katie Porter. In recent years, Feinstein has become something of an awkward symbol of Washington’s new gerontocracy, an officeholder clearly past her prime who refused to be hustled off the stage before she was ready. (It took a long time: my colleague Jane Mayer reported in 2020 on the painful effort.)

But I’ll always remember Feinstein as she was when she arrived in Washington in 1992—dubbed “the year of the woman”—after her victory and that of three other female Senate candidates. On the campaign trail, Feinstein had joked that “two per cent might be good for the fat content in milk, but it’s not good enough for women’s representation in the United States Senate.” The wins that year by Feinstein and Barbara Boxer meant that California was the first state to be represented in the Senate by two women, and altogether women made up seven per cent of the chamber after that election. Which, in truth, was still pathetic, but at least, it seemed, there was progress. Feinstein, a former mayor of San Francisco and a formidable figure who was poised to lead in Washington, embodied the feminist moment. Anything, even the White House, seemed attainable.

On paper, of course, the gender imbalance in American politics has changed substantially—and for the better—in the decades since then. Women are now twenty-five per cent of the Senate and twenty-seven per cent of the House. There are twelve women governors, and women are, for the first time, a majority of the Cabinet. Kamala Harris, who served for three years alongside Feinstein and continued the tradition of an all-female Senate delegation for California, is today the first female Vice-President. Given the actuarial realities facing Joe Biden, America’s first octogenarian chief executive, Harris stands a very real chance of becoming President. (To be fair, the actual actuarial table used by the Social Security Administration gives an eighty-year-old male such as Biden a life expectancy of 8.43 years.)

And yet it sure doesn’t seem like a moment of female ascendance. Roe v. Wade is no more. Feminism—whether first-, second-, or third-wave—is barely mentioned in the national political debate. Democrats every few years talk about resurrecting the Equal Rights Amendment; they haven’t slash can’t. After all the activism, all the #MeToo revelations, women currently make up ten per cent of Fortune 500 C.E.O.s—which is both a record high and ridiculously low.

Harris, meanwhile, could become President at any moment, but the thrust of many conversations in Democratic politics these days is a persistent worry about her weakness as a potential candidate if Biden, willingly or otherwise, does not run again. A deeply reported take by Jonathan Martin in Politico on Thursday makes the point that high-level Democrats don’t want Biden to run again but are afraid of saying so because their greater fear is Harris becoming the 2024 nominee and not being able to win in the general election. A recent Times piece was even harsher, quoting dozens of Democrats as saying that “she had not risen to the challenge of proving herself as a future leader of the party, much less the country.”

The prospects for a female breakthrough are hardly better among Republicans. On Tuesday, Nikki Haley, formally launched her candidacy for the 2024 G.O.P. Presidential nomination. South Carolina’s first woman governor before serving as Trump’s first Ambassador to the United Nations, Haley is the only woman to seriously figure on the longlist of potential Republican candidates this cycle, but in her announcement speech on Wednesday she treaded cautiously on the subject of her background. She is, after all, a daughter of Indian immigrants running in a party in which immigrant bashing is de rigueur. “This is not about identity politics,” Haley said. “I don’t believe in that. And I don’t believe in glass ceilings, either.” With polls showing her in the single digits, most pundits give her close to zero chance of winning. There is “no clear rationale for her candidacy,” the Wall Street Journal wrote in an editorial. “Nikki Haley Will Not Be the Next President,” the Times opined in a headline, conveying the sentiments of a panel of ten columnists whom it convened to assess her candidacy.

Notably, the brutal appraisals of her prospects hardly mention her gender, except to note it as an example of her un-Trumpiness in a Republican Party that has yet to repudiate the former President. The commentators are more concerned, perhaps understandably, about her wildly flexible ideology and her hawkish platform’s decidedly 2015 vibe. Is this what counts as progress?

In the video launching her campaign, Haley did offer a classic line from the I’m-a-woman-but-I’m-tough school of political advertising, one that could have been delivered by the original Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, in the nineteen-eighties. “You should know this about me,” Haley says in the video, “I don’t put up with bullies, and, when you kick back, it hurts them more if you’re wearing heels.” Some clichés, it seems, will never die. I would, however, love to see Haley follow through on that threat with a certain name-calling former President.

At a moment when both parties, for very different reasons, seem to be hurtling toward an outcome that few voters want—a rerun of the 2020 election, between two geriatric white men—Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 campaign looms large over the question of when, how, or whether a woman can finally shatter that ultimate glass ceiling.

In 2018, the Pew Research Center asked Americans whether they believed that they would see a woman President in their lifetime. Sixty-eight per cent said yes, which was lower than the previous time the question was asked, in 2014, when seventy-three per cent thought that would happen. Clinton’s defeat sent hopes, at least temporarily, into reverse.

This is the context for the current, paradoxical moment: expectations remain high, but so, too, do fears that a woman simply can’t win. There’s a fatalism to the question, post-Clinton, that is profoundly depressing. How naïve, now, all that “year of the woman” cheerleading seems. My 1992 self would not be thrilled by the fact that it took women three decades to get to a quarter of the Congress and one embattled female Vice-President.

The reality is that American politics since Trump beat Clinton has taken a turn back to the macho. The rise of a would-be strongman in the Republican Party has made performative displays of aggressive masculinity the prevailing style in the rebranded G.O.P. Whether Trump himself returns as the nominee or not, the up-and-comers in the Party are a bunch of confrontational men. They are brawlers like Ron DeSantis or Twitter trolls like Ted Cruz.

The Trump factor hangs heavy over the Democrats as well. I’ve heard many of them voice the conviction that Trump’s election proved how deeply rooted American sexism remains. And, yes, I know that for everyone who believes that, there is someone else is who convinced it’s just that Clinton was a terrible candidate or that Harris is an awful Vice-President or that it’s simply not the right time for a woman. And that, in the end, is the point: so long as the threat of Trump winning another term in the White House hangs over the country, many Democrats aren’t willing to risk nominating anyone besides another white man to take him on.

“Biden is the guy that can beat Trump,” Joyce Beatty, a senior Black Democratic congresswoman, told Politico. The current President is the only politician, as his departing chief of staff, Ron Klain, reminded my colleague Evan Osnos the other day, who has ever beaten Donald Trump. So, too bad, Kamala Harris and Nikki Haley. Once again, it appears, history will have to wait. 

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News round-up, Thursday, February 16, 2023.

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Quote of the day…

Some already believe that the hybridisation of generative AI and conventional search engines may be the biggest innovation in consumer technology since Apple released its first iPhone. Bing, which has always lived in the shadow of Google (3% and 90% of the world's search engine share, respectively), is for the first time threatening the colour-letter technology company's placid reign.

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Most read…

Why do we keep talking about artificial intelligence?

The fight for ad revenue that is shaping the future of the internet…

Google and Microsoft's headlong rush to launch a search engine you can talk to comes at a time of major change in the tech business.

El País, wtittten in Spanish by MANUEL G. PASCUAL

Translation by Germán & Co

Raquel Welch, actor, sex symbol, dies aged 82

Welch died Wednesday morning following a brief illness, Media Four announced in a statement.

In news

Russia says U.S. should prove it did not destroy Nord Stream

Moscow considers the destruction of Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines last September "an act of international terrorism" and will not allow it to be swept under the rug, the embassy said in a statement.

Reuter 

Putin is staring at defeat in his gas war with Europe

Mild weather this winter is set to help Europe shrug off Russia’s energy threats next year, too.

POLITICO EU by CHARLIE COOPER

World Bank Group President David Malpass to step down

Climate activists had called for the Trump appointee to be ousted for his climate crisis stance.

Le Monde with AFP

Who Was Pablo Neruda and Why Is His Death a Mystery?

Fifty years on, the true cause of death of the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, in the wake of the country’s 1973 coup d’état, has remained in doubt across the world.

In news

Glencore’s coal fudge risks satisfying no one

That highly polluting bonanza presents a dilemma for Nagle. On the one hand, purely financially motivated investors might want him to make even more money by ramping up production. On the other, green investors like Legal & General Investment Management and HSBC Asset Management are pushing to find out more details about how Nagle reconciles his plans with the objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change, according to the Financial Times. Activist investor Bluebell Capital Partners last year argued that Glencore should spin off the coal division, following in the steps of Anglo American.

Reuters, by Karen Kwok

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Can we power the things we love and green the planet at the same time? AES is the next-generation energy company with over four decades of experience helping businesses transition to clean, renewable energy. Isn't it time to connect to your energy future?

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Seafloat-hybrid-power-plant

Armando Rodriguez, Seaboard CEO for the Dominican Republic, concludes: 

 “We are very excited about this project because it will be a big benefit to the community in terms of the environment and the employment we will provide to the area.

Seaboard Dominican Republic

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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What is Artificial Intelligency?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of a computer or a robot controlled by a computer to do tasks that are usually done by humans because they require human intelligence and discernment. Although there are no AIs that can perform the wide variety of tasks an ordinary human can do, some AIs can match humans in specific tasks.

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Why do we keep talking about artificial intelligence?

The fight for ad revenue that is shaping the future of the internet…

Google and Microsoft's headlong rush to launch a search engine you can talk to comes at a time of major change in the tech business.

El País, wtittten in Spanish by MANUEL G. PASCUAL

Translation by Germán & Co

16 FEB 2023

Suddenly, it seems like Google has been wasting its time for the last decade. The great world dominator of search engines has gone in just a few days from being the benchmark technology company in artificial intelligence (AI) to seemingly being overtaken by Microsoft's new proposal. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella last week unveiled a revamped Bing search engine, which will incorporate a chatbot developed by OpenAI, the makers of the famous ChatGPT.

Google counter-programmed Microsoft by announcing a day earlier Bard, its own version of a search engine with intelligent chat. But it was not able to show how it works, not even at a big international press event in Paris two days later, which EL PAÍS attended. The only thing that could be seen there, in fact, took its toll: Bard's recorded example of intelligent search provided incorrect information about the James Webb telescope. Shares in Alphabet, Google's parent company, fell by 8% that day. The markets penalised the mistake, with the Mountain View company seen as improvising a response to Microsoft's attack.

Why all of a sudden so much interest in AI? Because ChatGPT has shown the general public its potential. Although the tool invents content, many thought that, by making certain adjustments, it could revolutionise the search engine experience. It is more pleasant to get information by talking to the machine than by typing in keywords. It is also interesting to be able to ask it to generate texts of a certain complexity, such as summaries, itineraries or essays. Large language models (LLM) make this possible, although their reliability is still in question.

Some already believe that the hybridisation of generative AI and conventional search engines may be the biggest innovation in consumer technology since Apple released its first iPhone. Bing, which has always lived in the shadow of Google (3% and 90% of the world's search engine share, respectively), is for the first time threatening the colour-letter technology company's placid reign.

The elephant in the room

But the frantic race to lead in the development of ever smarter search engines goes beyond riding a wave. Controlling the world's most widely used search engine and web browser has allowed Alphabet and Meta to dominate the global advertising market for more than a decade, bringing in an average annual revenue of $220 billion. This cash windfall has allowed it to buy strategic companies and launch a wide range of projects. Among them, his autonomous car Waymo or Calico, the biotechnology company whose aim is to combat ageing.

This bonanza may be coming to an end. Last year was the first since 2014 in which the sum of Alphabet and Meta accounted for less than 50% of the global advertising market, specifically 48.4%. It is the fifth year in a row that figure has fallen since peaking in 2017 (54.7%), and analysts expect it to fall further. The reasons: TikTok is coming on strong, and is already the search engine of choice for many young people; Amazon is also growing; and Apple, since allowing app tracking to be blocked, has hurt Meta's business.

The great manna of advertising may be running out for Google and Facebook. Facebook decided years ago what its answer to this problem and its inability to attract young audiences was: the metaverse. Google, for its part, has no plan B beyond AI. It has been investing in this technology for decades. That would explain its hasty reaction to Microsoft's gamble.

A rushed race

Nadella has turned Microsoft around in less than a decade. When the executive took the helm of the company in 2014, its revenues depended almost exclusively on Windows and the Office suite. He decided to bet big on cloud services and AI. Azure, the cloud division, is already responsible for a quarter of the group's turnover. Two years ago, Microsoft invested 1 billion in OpenAI, to which this year, after seeing the tremendous success of ChatGPT among the general public, it has added another 10 billion to develop the conversational chatbot that will accompany its search engine.

What has Alphabet done in the meantime? Among other things, it has laid the foundations for the technology from which chatbots draw today, as the company's own executives have been at pains to point out lately. Its Google Brain division and the British company DeepMind, which it acquired in 2014, are among the world's elite in the discipline. As the technology company's CEO, Sundar Pichai, recalled last week, the Transformer research project and its foundational paper, presented in 2017, is the touchstone on which the scientific community has built the so-called advanced generative artificial intelligence.

Bard, Google's bid to make its search engine smart, is a pocket-sized version of LaMDA, one of Google's most advanced linguistic modelling projects. Launched two years ago, LaMDA made international headlines last summer, when engineer Blake Lemoine, who was commissioned to review the ethical underpinnings of the robot's responses, said he thought the AI had gained a conscience. DeepMind, meanwhile, plans to offer a beta version of its own model, which it has dubbed Sparrow, this year.

To deny the effect that ChatGPT's emergence has had on the strategy of the big tech companies is, at this stage, unconvincing. And yet that is what Prabhakar Raghavan, vice president of Alphabet and one of the multinational's most powerful executives, did last week. "We've been following our own roadmap in artificial intelligence development for years. ChatGPT has not influenced us in any way," he said on Wednesday in Paris in a meeting with several media outlets, including EL PAÍS. It is a fact, however, that Google has introduced Bard, but without a launch date. Raghavan himself said he did not have an approximate one: "What matters most to us is to achieve the quality we want the service to have.

The tech industry is very fad-driven. Generative AI is clearly the hype of the moment. In addition to Microsoft and Google, Chinese tech giant Baidu also announced last week that it is working on its own version of a search engine/intelligent chatbot hybrid. Meta, meanwhile, cancelled its Galactica project, a language model capable of producing scientific articles based on millions of previously analysed documents, in November because it quickly proved to be sexist and racist.

In order to gain traction, chat search engines will have to prove that they provide reliable information. This is not easy. Examples of ChatGPT's fabricated content have flooded social media in recent months. Bard inadvertently showed a mistake in its presentation (that of the James Webb telescope) at last week's event. Bing, currently in testing, also makes up content if the screws are tightened.

Some of the world's leading experts warn of the folly of wanting to go too fast with this technology. "Great language models should be used as a writing aid, not for much else," said Yann LeCun, head of AI research at Meta and an eminent expert in the field. Demis Hassabis, CEO of DeepMind (Google), also suggests that these tools require a cautious approach: "It's good to be cautious on this front," he said. That caution is, at the moment, conspicuous by its absence.

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Raquel Welch, actor, and sex symbol, dies aged 82.

Welch died Wednesday morning following a brief illness, Media Four announced in a statement.

“I just assumed it was a crazy dinosaur epic we’d be able to sweep under the carpet one day,” she told The Associated Press in 1981. “Wrong. It turned out that I was the Bo Derek of the season, the lady in the loincloth about whom everyone said ‘ My God.

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Image: Germán & Co

Russia says U.S. should prove it did not destroy Nord Stream

Feb 16 (Reuters) - The United States should try to prove it was not behind the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines that connected Russia to Western Europe, the Russian embassy to the United States said on Thursday.

Moscow considers the destruction of Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines last September "an act of international terrorism" and will not allow it to be swept under the rug, the embassy said in a statement.

The embassy referred to a blog post by journalist Seymour Hersh citing an unidentified source as saying that U.S. Navy divers had destroyed the pipelines with explosives on the orders of President Joe Biden.

The White House has dismissed the allegations as "utterly false and complete fiction".

U.S. Department of State spokesman Ned Price said on Wednesday "it is pure disinformation that the United States was behind what transpired" with Nord Stream, provoking the fresh Russian comment.

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An LNG Terminal in Zeebrugge, Belgium

Putin is staring at defeat in his gas war with Europe

Mild weather this winter is set to help Europe shrug off Russia’s energy threats next year, too.

POLITICO EU by CHARLIE COOPER

FEBRUARY 15, 2023 

There's more bad news for Vladimir Putin. Europe is on course to get through winter with its vital gas storage facilities more than half full, according to a new European Commission assessment seen by POLITICO.

That means despite the Russian leader's efforts to make Europe freeze by cutting its gas supply, EU economies will survive the coldest months without serious harm — and they look set to start next winter in a strong position to do the same.

A few months ago, there were fears of energy shortages this winter caused by disruptions to Russian pipeline supplies.

But a combination of mild weather, increased imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG), and a big drop in gas consumption mean that more than 50 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas is projected to remain in storage by the end of March, according to the Commission analysis.

A senior European Commission official attributed Europe’s success in securing its gas supply to a combination of planning and luck.

“A good part of the success is due to unusually mild weather conditions and to China being out of the market [due to COVID restrictions],” the official said. “But demand reduction, storage policy and infrastructure work helped significantly."

Ending the winter heating season with such healthy reserves — above 50 percent of the EU’s roughly 100bcm total storage capacity — removes any lingering fears of a gas shortage in the short term. It also eases concerns about Europe’s energy security going into next winter.

The positive figures underlie the more optimistic outlook presented by EU leaders in recent days, with Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson saying on Tuesday that Europe had “won the first battle” of the “energy war” with Russia.

EU storage facilities — also vital for winter gas supply in the U.K., where storage options are limited — ended last winter only around 20 percent full. Brussels mandated that they be replenished to 80 percent ahead of this winter, requiring a hugely expensive flurry of LNG purchases by European buyers, to replace volumes of gas lost from Russian pipelines.

The wholesale price of gas rose to record levels during storage filling season — peaking at more than €335 per megawatt hour in August — with dire knock-on effects for household bills, businesses’ energy costs and Europe’s industrial competitiveness.

Gas prices have since fallen to just above €50/Mwh amid easing concerns over supplies. The EU has a new target to fill 90 percent of gas storage again by November 2023 — an effort that will now require less buying of LNG on the international market than it might have done had reserves been more seriously depleted.

"The expected high level of storages at above 50 percent [at] the end of this winter season will be a strong starting point for 2023/24 with less than 40 percent to be filled (against the difficult starting point of around 20 percent in storage at the end of winter season in 2022," the Commission assessment says.

Analysts at the Independent Commodity Intelligence Services think tank said this week that refilling storages this year could still be “as tough a challenge as last year” but predicted that the EU now had “more than enough import capacity to meet the challenge.”  

Across the EU, five new floating LNG terminals have been set up — in the Netherlands, Greece, Finland and two in Germany — providing an extra 30bcm of gas import capacity, with more due to come online this year and next.  

However, the EU’s ability to refill storages to the new 90 percent target ahead of next winter will likely depend on continued reduction in gas consumption.

Brussels set member states a voluntary target of cutting gas demand by 15 percent from August last year. Gas demand actually fell by more than 20 percent between August and December, according to the latest Commission data, partly thanks to efficiency measures but also the consequence of consumers responding to much higher prices by using less energy.

The 15 percent target may need to be extended beyond its expiry date of March 31 to avoid gas demand rebounding as prices fall. EU energy ministers are set to discuss the issue at two forthcoming meetings in February and Mar

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World Bank Group President David Malpass to step down

Climate activists had called for the Trump appointee to be ousted for his climate crisis stance.

Le Monde with AFP

Published on February 16, 2023

World Bank Group President David Malpass attends a news conference during the 2022 annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group, on October 13, 2022, in Washington. PATRICK SEMANSKY / AP

World Bank chief David Malpass announced Wednesday, February 15, that he would step down nearly a year early, ending a tenure at the head of the development lender that was clouded by questions over his climate stance.

The veteran of Republican administrations in the United States was appointed to the role in 2019 when Donald Trump was president and previously served as Under Secretary of the Treasury for international affairs. His tenure at the World Bank saw the organization grapple with global crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic, the Russian invasion of Ukraine and an international economic slowdown.

"After a good deal of thought, I've decided to pursue new challenges," the 66-year-old was quoted as saying in a statement from the bank, having informed its board of his decision. "This is an opportunity for a smooth leadership transition as the Bank Group works to meet increasing global challenges," Malpass added.

'I'm not a scientist'

In recent months, Malpass has come up against calls for his resignation or removal. Climate activists had called for Malpass to be ousted for what they said was an inadequate approach to the climate crisis and the chorus grew louder after his appearance at a New York Times-organized conference last September.

Pressed on stage to respond to a claim by former US vice president Al Gore that he was a climate denier, Malpass declined several times to say if he believed man-made emissions were warming the planet – responding, "I'm not a scientist." He later said he had no plans to stand down and moved to clarify his position, acknowledging that climate-warming emissions were coming from man-made sources, including fossil fuels. The White House previously rebuked Malpass, with Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre saying the expectation was for the bank to be a global leader on climate crisis response.

The bank said in a statement on Wednesday that it has "responded quickly" in the face of recent global challenges, in particular mobilizing a record $440 billion to tackle climate change, the pandemic and other issues. "Under (Malpass') leadership, the Bank Group more than doubled its climate finance to developing countries, reaching a record $32 billion last year," the statement added.

In a note to staff seen by AFP, Malpass said: "Developing countries around the world are facing unprecedented crises and I'm proud that the Bank Group has continued to respond with speed, scale, innovation, and impact." Malpass' term would have originally ended in 2024.

'WorldBank lost valuable time in fighting climate change'

Environmental groups welcomed his departure. "Under David Malpass, the @WorldBank lost valuable time in fighting climate change," tweeted Friends of the Earth. "Not only did he fail to stop actions that fuel climate chaos and injustice, Malpass pushed for Wall Street-friendly policies that go against the public interest."

In a statement, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the world has benefitted from his strong support for Ukraine, his work to assist the Afghan people and his commitment to helping low-income countries achieve debt sustainability through debt reduction. She added that the United States looks forward to a swift nomination process by the World Bank's board for the organization's next president. "We will put forward a candidate to lead the World Bank and build on the Bank's longstanding work... and who will carry forward the vital work we are undertaking to evolve the multilateral development banks," she said.

The head of the World Bank is traditionally an American, while the leader of the other major international lender in Washington, the International Monetary Fund, tends to be European. Prior to assuming his role as World Bank president, Malpass repeatedly lambasted the big development lenders as wasteful and ineffective and called for reforms.

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Image: NYT

Who Was Pablo Neruda and Why Is His Death a Mystery?

February 15, 2023 in news

Fifty years on, the true cause of death of the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda, in the wake of the country’s 1973 coup d’état, has remained in doubt across the world.

The Nobel laureate was not only one of the world’s most celebrated poets but also one of Chile’s most influential political activists. An outspoken communist, he supported Salvador Allende, Chile’s leftist president from 1970 to 1973, and worked in his administration.

Mr. Neruda’s death in a private clinic just weeks after the coup was determined to be the result of cancer, but the timing and the circumstances have long raised doubts about whether his death was something more nefarious.

On Wednesday, The New York Times reviewed the summary of findings compiled by international forensic experts who had examined Mr. Neruda’s exhumed remains and identified bacteria that can be deadly. In a one-page summary of their report, shared with The New York Times, the scientists confirmed that the bacteria was in his body when he died, but said they could not distinguish whether it was a toxic strain of the bacteria nor whether he was injected with it or instead ate contaminated food.

The findings once again leave open the question of whether Mr. Neruda was murdered.

Who was Pablo Neruda?

Mr. Neruda was a Chilean lawmaker, diplomat and Nobel laureate poet. He was regarded as one of Latin America’s greatest poets and was the leading spokesman for Chile’s leftist movement until the ascendancy of a socialist president, Mr. Allende, in 1970.

Born July 12, 1904, he grew up in Parral, a small agricultural community in southern Chile. His mother, a schoolteacher, died shortly after he was born; his father was a railway employee who did not support his literary aspirations. Despite that, Mr. Neruda started writing poetry at the age of 13.

During his lifetime, Mr. Neruda occupied several diplomatic positions in countries including Argentina, Mexico, Spain and France. To the end of his life, he was as engaged in political activism as in poetry.

Mr. Neruda died in a clinic in Santiago, Chile’s capital, at the age of 69. His death came less than two weeks after that of his friend and political ally, Mr. Allende, who died by suicide to avoid surrendering to the military after his government was toppled in September 1973.

How was he as a political figure?

During his time in Barcelona as a diplomat, Mr. Neruda’s experience of the Spanish Civil War pushed him into a more engaged political stance. “Since then,” he later wrote, “I have been convinced that it is the poet’s duty to take his stand.”

The diplomat lost his post because of his support of the Spanish Republic, which was dissolved after surrendering to the Nationalists of Gen. Francisco Franco. He also lobbied to save more than 2,000 refugees displaced by Mr. Franco’s dictatorship.

Mr. Neruda, a lifelong member of the Communist Party, served only one term in office. As a senator, he was critical of the government of President Gabriel González Videla, who ruled Chile from 1946 to 1952, which led Mr. Neruda into forced exile for four years.

He returned to his country in 1952, a left-wing literary figure, to support Mr. Allende’s campaign for the presidency, which was unsuccessful then and in another two attempts. In 1970, Mr. Neruda was named the Communist candidate for Chile’s presidency until he withdrew in favor of Mr. Allende — who was finally elected that year.

Why is he such a big deal?

Mr. Neruda is one of the Latin America’s most prominent figures of the 20th century for his poetry and his political activism — calling out U.S. meddling abroad, denouncing the Spanish Civil War and supporting Chile’s Communist Party. His books have been translated into more than 35 languages.

However, Mr. Neruda was also a controversial man who neglected his daughter, who was born with hydrocephalus and died at the age of 8, in 1943. And recently, he has been reconsidered in light of a description in his memoir of sexually assaulting a maid.

What are his most notable works?

Mr. Neruda was a prolific writer who released more than 50 publications in verse and prose, ranging from romantic poems to exposés of Chilean politicians and reflections on the anguish of a Spain plagued by civil war. His fervent activism for social justice and his extensive body of poems have echoed worldwide, making him an intellectual icon of the 20th century in Latin America.

He published his first book, “Crepusculario,” or “Book of Twilight,” in 1923 at 19, and the following year he released “Veinte Poemas de Amor y una Canción Desesperada,” (“20 Poems of Love and a Song of Despair.”) This collection established him as a major poet and, almost a century later, it is still a best-selling poetry book in the Spanish language.

His travels as a diplomat also influenced his work, as in the two volumes of poems titled “Residencia en la Tierra” (“Residence on Earth”). And his connection with communism was clear in his book “Canto General” (“General Song”), in which he tells the history of the Americas from a Hispanic perspective.

But his tendency toward communism could have delayed his Nobel Prize, awarded in 1971 for his overall work. According to the prize’s webpage, he produced “a poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent’s destiny and dreams.”

What is the controversy surrounding his death?

After Chile’s coup d’état, one of the most violent in Latin America, troops raided Mr. Neruda’s properties. The Mexican government offered to fly him and his wife, Matilde Urrutia, out of the country, but he was admitted to the Santa María clinic for prostate cancer.

On the evening of Sept. 23, 1973, the clinic reported that Mr. Neruda died of heart failure. Earlier that day, he had called his wife saying he was feeling ill after receiving some form of medication.

In 2011, Manuel Araya, Mr. Neruda’s driver at the time, publicly claimed that the doctors at the clinic poisoned him by injecting an unknown substance into his stomach, saying Mr. Neruda told him this before he died. Although witnesses, including his widow, dismissed the rumors, some challenged the claim that Mr. Neruda had died of cancer.

The accusations eventually led to an official inquiry. In 2013, a judge ordered the exhumation of the poet’s remains and for samples to be sent to forensic genetics laboratories. But international and Chilean experts ruled out poisoning in his death, according to the report released seven months later. The findings said there were no “relevant chemical agents” present that could be related to Mr. Neruda’s death and that “no forensic evidence whatsoever” pointed to a cause of death other than prostate cancer.

Yet in 2017, a group of forensic investigators announced that Mr. Neruda had not died of cancer — and that they had found traces of a potentially toxic bacteria in one of his molars. The panel handed its findings to the court and was asked to try to determine the origin of the bacteria.

In the final report given to a Chilean judge on Wednesday, those scientists said that other circumstantial evidence supported the theory of murder, including the fact that in 1981, the military dictatorship had poisoned prisoners with bacteria potentially similar to the strain found in Mr. Neruda. But they said that without further evidence, they could not determine the cause of Mr. Neruda’s death.

The post Who Was Pablo Neruda and Why Is His Death a Mystery? appeared first on New York Times.

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Image: Germán & Co

Glencore’s coal fudge risks satisfying no one

Reuters, by Karen Kwok

LONDON, Feb 15 (Reuters Breakingviews) - Gary Nagle has an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other. Instead of picking a side, he seems to be trying to keep both happy. The boss of $80 billion commodity giant Glencore (GLEN.L) is minting money from coal while prices are high, but planning to keep production of the fossil fuel roughly steady until 2025. It’s a plan that risks pleasing no one, while also dirtying the company’s valuation.

Unlike rivals Anglo American (AAL.L) and Rio Tinto (RIO.AX), (RIO.L), London-listed Glencore is still mining coal. Right now, that’s an extremely lucrative business. A global energy squeeze has pushed up demand and prices. Its EBITDA from the fuel grew more than threefold in 2022, and accounted for more than half of the group’s $34.1 billion total.

That highly polluting bonanza presents a dilemma for Nagle. On the one hand, purely financially motivated investors might want him to make even more money by ramping up production. On the other, green investors like Legal & General Investment Management and HSBC Asset Management are pushing to find out more details about how Nagle reconciles his plans with the objectives of the Paris Agreement on climate change, according to the Financial Times. Activist investor Bluebell Capital Partners last year argued that Glencore should spin off the coal division, following in the steps of Anglo American.

Nagle is not caving in to either side. His plan is to hang on to coal and keep annual production steady at around 110 million tonnes up to 2025. Using the prodigious cash flows from that business, he can reward shareholders while also funding investments in copper and cobalt. Over the longer term, he’ll then start shutting coal mines, with at least a dozen closures planned before 2035.

The risk is that Nagle’s compromise pleases neither the green crowd nor the others. That’s arguably reflected in an enterprise value that’s roughly 4 times forecast EBITDA for the next 12 months, based on Refinitiv data, compared with 4.5 and 5.2 for Anglo and Rio respectively. Just over three-quarters of Glencore’s investors supported Nagle’s climate strategy last year. He should brace for a lower number in 2023.

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News round-up, Wednesday, February 15, 2023

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Quote of the day…

"Of course, the loss of the European market is a very serious test for Russia in the gas aspect," Yury Shafranik, Russian fuel and energy minister from 1993 to 1996, told Reuters.

Reuters by Vladimir Soldatkin

Now, a team at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital has developed an artificial intelligence-based method to screen currently available medications as possible treatments for Alzheimer’s disease.

By MGH News and Public Affairs March 4, 2021 Research

"Downside risks are apparent and may include further geopolitical tensions in eastern Europe, China's ongoing domestic challenges amid the pandemic, and potential spillovers from China's still fragile real estate sector," OPEC said.

Reuter by Alex Lawler

Investigation#StoryKillers. 'Le Monde' and its media partners were able to identify thousands of accounts on social media controlled by 'Team Jorge,' and to analyze its fake information campaigns.

Le Monde by Damien Leloup  and Florian Reynaud, Published on February 15, 2023

“There has been an expectation that it will go away quickly and painlessly — and I don’t think that’s at all guaranteed,” Jerome H. Powell, the Fed chair, said at an event last week. “The base case for me is that it will take some time, and we’ll have to do more rate increases, and then we’ll have to look around and see whether we’ve done enough.”

NYT by Jeanna Smialek

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Most read…

Moscow's decades-old gas ties with Europe lie in ruins

After President Vladimir Putin's "special military operation" in Ukraine began almost a year ago, a combination of Western sanctions and Russia's decision to cut supplies to Europe drastically reduced the country's energy exports.

SOURCE: REUTERS BY VLADIMIR SOLDATKIN

OPEC raises 2023 oil demand growth view, points to tighter market

"Key to oil demand growth in 2023 will be the return of China from its mandated mobility restrictions and the effect this will have on the country, the region and the world," OPEC said in the report.

"Concern hovers around the depth and pace of the country's economic recovery and the consequent impact on oil demand.”

Reuter by Alex Lawler

Billionaires, whistleblowers, criminals, political opponents: The targets of the disinformation factory

Le Monde by Damien Leloup  and Florian Reynaud

Inflation Cooled Just Slightly, With Worrying Details

Consumer Price Index inflation has been slowing compared with a year ago, but evidence is mounting that it could be a long road back to normal.

NYT by Jeanna Smialek, Feb. 14, 2023

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Accelerating the future of energy, together. Is it possible?

Can we power the things we love and green the planet at the same time? AES is the next-generation energy company with over four decades of experience helping businesses transition to clean, renewable energy. Isn't it time to connect to your energy future?

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Seafloat-hybrid-power-plant

Armando Rodriguez, Seaboard CEO for the Dominican Republic, concludes: 

 “We are very excited about this project because it will be a big benefit to the community in terms of the environment and the employment we will provide to the area.

Seaboard Dominican Republic

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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What is Artificial Intelligency?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of a computer or a robot controlled by a computer to do tasks that are usually done by humans because they require human intelligence and discernment. Although there are no AIs that can perform the wide variety of tasks an ordinary human can do, some AIs can match humans in specific tasks.

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Source: Europeanscientist.com

AI and Alzheimer's Disease

AI reveals current drugs that may help combat Alzheimer’s disease

Now, a team at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital has developed an artificial intelligence-based method to screen currently available medications as possible treatments for Alzheimer’s disease.

By MGH News and Public Affairs March 4, 2021 Research

New treatments for Alzheimer’s disease are desperately needed, but numerous clinical trials of investigational drugs have failed to generate promising options.

Now, a team at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital has developed an artificial intelligence-based method to screen currently available medications as possible treatments for Alzheimer’s disease.

The method could represent a rapid and inexpensive way to repurpose existing therapies into new treatments for this progressive, debilitating neurodegenerative condition. It could also help reveal new, unexplored targets for therapy by pointing to mechanisms of drug action.

“Repurposing FDA-approved drugs for Alzheimer’s disease is an attractive idea that can help accelerate the arrival of effective treatment, but unfortunately, even for previously approved drugs, clinical trials require substantial resources, making it impossible to evaluate every drug in patients with Alzheimer’s disease,” said Artem Sokolov, HMS instructor in biomedical informatics in the Blavatnik Institute and director of informatics and modeling in the Laboratory of Systems Pharmacology at HMS. “We therefore built a framework for prioritizing drugs, helping clinical studies to focus on the most promising ones.” 

In an article published on Feb. 15 in Nature Communications, Sokolov and colleagues describe their framework, called DRIAD, or Drug Repurposing In AD, which relies on machine learning, a branch of artificial intelligence in which systems are “trained” on vast amounts of data and “learn” to identify telltale patterns, augmenting researchers’ and clinicians’ decision-making. 

DRIAD works by measuring what happens to human brain neural cells when treated with a drug. The method then determines whether the changes induced by a drug correlate with molecular markers of disease severity.

The approach also allowed the researchers to identify drugs that had protective as well as damaging effects on brain cells.

“We also approximate the directionality of such correlations, helping to identify and filter out neurotoxic drugs that accelerate neuronal death instead of preventing it,” said co-first author Steve Rodriguez, HMS instructor in neurology at Mass General.

DRIAD also allows researchers to examine which proteins are targeted by the most promising drugs and whether there are common trends among the targets, an approach designed by Clemens Hug, an HMS associate in therapeutic science in the Laboratory of Systems Pharmacology and a co-first author of the paper.

The team applied the screening method to 80 FDA-approved and clinically tested drugs for a wide range of conditions. The analysis yielded a ranked list of candidates, with several anti-inflammatory drugs used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and blood cancers emerging as top contenders.

These drugs belong to a class of medications known as Janus kinase inhibitors. The drugs work by blocking the action of inflammation-fueling Janus kinase proteins, suspected to play a role in Alzheimer’s disease and known for their role in autoimmune conditions. The team’s analyses also pointed to other potential treatment targets for further investigation.

“We are excited to share these results with the academic and pharmaceutical research communities. Our hope is that further validation by other researchers will refine the prioritization of these drugs for clinical investigation,” said Mark Albers, HMS assistant professor of neurology at Mass General and a faculty member of the Laboratory of Systems Pharmacology at HMS.

One of these drugs, baricitinib, will be investigated by Albers in a clinical trial for patients with subjective cognitive complaints, mild cognitive impairment, and Alzheimer’s disease that will be launching soon at Mass General and at Holy Cross Health in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. “In addition, independent validation of the nominated drug targets could provide new insights into the mechanisms behind Alzheimer’s disease and lead to novel therapies,” said Albers, who is also associate director of the Massachusetts Center for Alzheimer Therapeutic Science at Mass General.

This work was supported by the National Institute on Aging, CART fund, and Harvard Catalyst Program for Faculty Development and Diversity Inclusion.

Rodriguez, Albers, and Sokolov are inventors on a patent application for novel targets in neurodegenerative diseases. Additional ethics declarations for all authors involved in the study appear in the publication.

Ernesto Cardenal’s Prayer for Marilyn Monroe

She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we’re not saints psychoanalysis was recommended to her...

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Image: Germán & Co

Moscow's decades-old gas ties with Europe lie in ruins

After President Vladimir Putin's "special military operation" in Ukraine began almost a year ago, a combination of Western sanctions and Russia's decision to cut supplies to Europe drastically reduced the country's energy exports.

Source: Reuters by Vladimir Soldatkin

Today

NOVY URENGOY, Russia, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Meticulously crafted over decades as a major revenue stream for the Kremlin, Moscow's gas trade with Europe is unlikely to recover from the ravages of military conflict.

After President Vladimir Putin's "special military operation" in Ukraine began almost a year ago, a combination of Western sanctions and Russia's decision to cut supplies to Europe drastically reduced the country's energy exports.

The latest sanctions, including price caps, are likely to disrupt oil trade further but it is easier to find new markets for crude and refined products than for gas.

Russia's gas trade with Europe has been based on thousands of miles of pipes beginning in Siberia and stretching to Germany and beyond. Until last year, they locked Western buyers into a long-term supply relationship.

"Of course, the loss of the European market is a very serious test for Russia in the gas aspect," Yury Shafranik, Russian fuel and energy minister from 1993 to 1996, told Reuters.

A former senior manager at Gazprom (GAZP.MM) was more direct.

"The work of hundreds of people, who for decades built the exporting system, now has been flushed down the toilet," the former manager told Reuters on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

Current employees, however, say it is business as usual.

"Nothing has changed for us. We had a pay rise twice last year," a Gazprom's official, who is not authorised to speak to press, told Reuters in Novy Urengoy. The Arctic city is often referred to as Russia's "gas capital" because it was built to serve the biggest gas fields.

'STATE WITHIN A STATE'

The state gas export giant Gazprom, which has offices there, was formed in the dying days of the Soviet Union in 1989 under the Ministry of Gas Industry, headed by Viktor Chernomyrdin.

"Chernomyrdin never allowed anyone to put his nose into Gazprom. It was a state within a state, and remains so to an extent," Shafranik said.

Since the military operation began on Feb. 24 last year, less information has been available.

Like many Russian companies, Gazprom stopped disclosing details of its financial results.

According to Reuters' estimates, based on export fees and export volumes data, Gazprom's revenues from overseas sales were around $3.4 billion in January down from $6.3 billion in the same period last year.

The figures, combined with forecasts of exports and average gas prices, imply Gazprom's exporting revenues will almost halve this year, widening the $25 billion budget deficit Russia posted in January.

Already, the company's natural gas exports last year almost halved to reach a post-Soviet low and the downward trend has continued this year.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen estimated Russia cut 80% of gas supplies to the EU in the eight months after the conflict began in Ukraine.

As a result, Russia supplied only around 7.5% of western Europe's gas needs by the end of last year, compared with around 40% in 2021.

Before the conflict, Russia had been confident of selling more to Europe, not less.

Elena Burmistrova, the head of Gazprom's exporting unit, told an industry event in Vienna in 2019 the company's record-high exports outside Soviet Union of more than 200 billion cubic metres (bcm) achieved in 2018 were the "new reality".

Last year, the total was just above 100 bcm.

Russia's transporting capacities were undermined last year after mysterious blasts in the Baltic Sea at the Nord Stream pipelines from Russia to Germany. Russia and the West blamed each other for the blasts.

Pulitzer Prize-winning U.S. reporter Seymour Hersh in a blog said the United States was responsible, which the United States said was 'utterly false'.

Washington has long criticised Germany's policy of reliance on Russian energy, which until last year, Berlin had said was a means to improve relations.

THE DEAL OF THE 20TH-CENTURY

For his part, Putin had been seeking to diversify Russia's gas markets long before last year, but the policy has gathered momentum.

In October, he mooted an idea of a gas hub in Turkey to divert the Russian gas flows from the Baltic Sea and North-West Europe.

Russia is also seeking to boost its pipeline gas sales to China, the world's largest energy consumer and top buyer of crude oil, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and coal.

Supplies began via the Power of Siberia Pipeline in late 2019 and Russia aims to raise the annual exports to around 38 bcm from 2025.

Moscow also has an agreement with Beijing for another 10 bcm per year from a yet-to-be built pipeline from the Pacific island of Sakhalin, while Russia is also developing plans for Power of Siberia 2 from Western Siberia, which in theory could supply an additional 50 bcm per year to China.

Whether that relationship can be as lucrative as the decades of supplying gas to Europe remains to be seen.

Gazprom's most important assets are located in West Siberia and in the wider Arctic Yamal region, where the 100,000-strong city of Novy Urengoy, which celebrates its 50th-anniversary in 2025, houses seasonal workers in utilitarian, high-rise blocks.

One of the fields in the tundra area, around 3,500 kilometres (2,175 miles) northeast of Moscow, where they work is Urengoy.

Following the discovery of the field, which is among the world's largest in 1966, the Soviet Politburo began talks with Western Germany on exchanging gas for pipes, as Russia then lacked production technology.

The resulting agreement, dubbed the "contract of the century" was finalised in 1970 after the then Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, nicknamed "Mr Nyet" in the West for his uncompromising approach, said "da" to the gas-for-pipes deal, which involved supplies of heavy equipment for Moscow as well as gas for Europe.

The 20-year supply deal is worth about $30 billion in current gas prices.

It meant that for decades, Europe and, especially Germany, benefited from relatively cheap, long-term contracts, and relied on Russian natural gas, or methane, for heating households and as a feedstock for the petrochemical industry.

COMPLEX NEGOTIATIONS AHEAD

The negotiations with China on new gas sales are expected to be complex, not least because China is not expected to need additional gas until after 2030, industry analysts said.

Russia also faces far more competition than in the past from renewable energy as the world seeks to limit the impact of climate change, as well as rival pipeline gas supplies to China, including from Turkmenistan.

LNG, which can be shipped anywhere in the world, has further reduced the need for pipeline gas.

Gazprom and China have kept their agreed gas price a secret. Ron Smith, analyst at Moscow-based BCS brokerage, expected the price for 2022 to average $270 per 1,000 cubic metres, much lower than prices in Europe.

It is also below Gazprom's export price of $700 per 1,000 cubic metres, expected by Russian Economy Ministry this year.

Last year, Russia's energy finances, which are not broken down publicly into oil and gas, were supported by the market impact of fears of shortage.

In Europe, gas prices hit record levels and international oil prices shortly after the special military operation began spiked close to their all-time high.

Since then, prices for gas and oil have eased and Western price caps introduced in December and early this year are designed to erode Russia's revenues further.

The Kremlin meanwhile has set Gazprom the mammoth task of building 24,000 kilometres of new pipelines to provide gas for 538,000 households and apartments in Russia from 2021 to 2025.

Domestic gas prices are regulated by the government and there have been discussions about liberalising the gas market, a sensitive issue for Russian households.

Back in Novy Urengoy, where temperatures fall to as low as almost minus 50 Celsius (minus 58 Fahrenheit), Achimgaz, a joint venture between Gazprom and Germany's Wintershall Dea (WINT.UL), also has offices and the flag of Austrian energy company OMV (OMVV.VI) flaps outside an administrative building.

Asked about its presence there, an OMV spokesperson said only the building housed offices of the operator of the Yuzhno-Russkoye field, where the company has a stake.

OMV in March scrapped plans to take a stake in a Gazprom gas field project, while Wintershall Dea, in which BASF (BASFn.DE) holds just under 73% percent, said last month it was pulling out of Russia.

The Gazprom official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the company will regret that.

"We will just have to use more gas for our domestic households instead of exporting it to Europe. China also needs gas," the official said.

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Source:https: Wibestbroker.com

OPEC raises 2023 oil demand growth view, points to tighter market

"Downside risks are apparent and may include further geopolitical tensions in eastern Europe, China's ongoing domestic challenges amid the pandemic, and potential spillovers from China's still fragile real estate sector," OPEC said.

Reuter by Alex Lawler

LONDON, Feb 14 (Reuters) - OPEC has raised its 2023 global oil demand growth forecast in its first upward revision for months, due to China's relaxation of COVID-19 restrictions, and trimmed supply forecasts for Russia and other non-OPEC producers, pointing to a tighter market.

Global oil demand will rise this year by 2.32 million barrels per day (bpd), or 2.3%, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said on Tuesday in a monthly report.

The projection is 100,000 bpd higher than last month's forecast.

A tighter supply and demand balance could support oil prices that have held relatively steady since December and stand at a little less than $86 a barrel. OPEC had kept its 2023 demand growth forecast steady for the past two months after a series of downgrades as the economic outlook worsened.

"Key to oil demand growth in 2023 will be the return of China from its mandated mobility restrictions and the effect this will have on the country, the region and the world," OPEC said in the report.

"Concern hovers around the depth and pace of the country's economic recovery and the consequent impact on oil demand."

OPEC expects Chinese demand to grow by 590,000 bpd in 2023, up from last month's forecast of 510,000 bpd. China's oil consumption dropped for the first time in years in 2022, held back by its COVID containment measures.

The OPEC report was upbeat on economic prospects, nudging up its 2023 global growth forecast to 2.6% from 2.5%, though it said that a relative slowdown remained evident and cited high inflation and expected further increases to interest rates.

Other upside factors are the likelihood that the U.S. Federal Reserve will manage a soft landing for the U.S. economy and further commodity price weakness, OPEC said, although various potentially negative factors persist.

OUTPUT CUTS

"Downside risks are apparent and may include further geopolitical tensions in eastern Europe, China's ongoing domestic challenges amid the pandemic, and potential spillovers from China's still fragile real estate sector," OPEC said.

Oil was down more than $1, moving towards $85, after the report was released.

The report also showed that OPEC's crude oil production fell in January after the wider OPEC+ alliance pledged output cuts to support the market.

For November last year, with prices weakening, OPEC+ agreed to a 2 million bpd reduction in its output target - the largest since the early days of the pandemic in 2020. OPEC's share of the cut is 1.27 million bpd.

In the report, OPEC said its crude oil output in January fell by 49,000 bpd to 28.88 million bpd as declines in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran offset increases elsewhere.

OPEC also lowered its forecast of 2023 growth in supply from producers outside the group to 1.4 million bpd, from 1.5 million bpd last month, citing lower expectations from Russia and the United States.

Russia said last week it will cut oil production by 500,000 bpd in March after the West imposed price caps on Russian oil and oil products over its invasion of Ukraine.

OPEC, which was already forecasting a decline in Russian output in 2023, said in the report it now expected Russian production to fall by 900,000 bpd this year, down from a decline of 850,000 bpd expected last month.

With non-OPEC supply lower and demand growth higher, the report raised its estimate of the amount of crude OPEC needs to pump in 2023 to balance the market by 200,000 bpd to 29.4 million bpd - about 500,000 more than OPEC pumped in January.

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Image: Germán & Co

Billionaires, whistleblowers, criminals, political opponents: The targets of the disinformation factory

Investigation#StoryKillers. 'Le Monde' and its media partners were able to identify thousands of accounts on social media controlled by 'Team Jorge,' and to analyze its fake information campaigns.

Le Monde by Damien Leloup  and Florian Reynaud, Published on February 15, 2023

Everyone and anyone can be a target for the disinformation campaigns that rich clients have paid handsomely to hire the services of " Team Jorge," this discreet Israeli operative whose infrastructure Le Monde and its media partners, coordinated by Forbidden Stories, were able to analyze. At the heart of its operational tools are the "AIMS" (for "Advanced impact media solutions"), a network of 30,000 highly sophisticated fake profiles on Twitter, Facebook and Reddit, used to spread false information. These profiles target businessmen, politicians, whistleblowers and crime suspects all over the world. Here is an overview of some of the main targets of these disinformation mercenaries.

#StoryKillers: Investigation into the disinformation machine

For several months, 20 different media outlets, including Le Monde, worked with the Forbidden Stories consortium to investigate companies that specialize in the manipulation of public opinion and the dissemination of fake news. Within the framework of this project called #StoryKillers, three journalists from the consortium posed as intermediaries for a potential French client in order to set up meetings with operatives selling "turnkey" influence tools.

This investigation revealed the existence of "Team Jorge", an extremely discreet Israeli company that claims to have interfered in dozens of elections around the world. It offers its clients an arsenal of illegal services, from hacking into e-mail accounts and private messaging systems to the massive dissemination of influence campaigns thanks to a gigantic network of fake accounts on social networks.

Target: Peter Nygard, Canadian billionaire accused of multiple sex crimes

Who is he? Peter Nygard, who made his fortune in fashion, has been accused by multiple women, some of them minors at the time, of sexual assault or rape – accusations that have been corroborated by multiple pieces of evidence, according to the FBI. In early 2020, Team Jorge launched a massive online influencer campaign to put the case at the top of the media agenda. Nygard has been in prison since December 2020, awaiting trial.

The modus operandi: The avatar network was used to widely distribute links to an attack site, Nygardrapestories.com, now offline, containing numerous articles accusing the billionaire. Dozens of fake accounts were also used to call out journalists, stars and partners of Peter Nygard's companies on the accusations against him; part of the campaign specifically targeted Oprah Winfrey, the famous American anchorwoman, who had devoted a segment to the billionaire in the 1990s, long before the first accusations emerged, to encourage her to publicly accuse the billionaire.

Effectiveness: Moderate. Nygard had already, since at least 2018, been in the crosshairs of justice in the United States and Canada, but the campaign seems to have attracted attention – a Newsweek article on the subject included several tweets from the campaign.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: Among the possible clients is another billionaire, American Louis Bacon. The revelations of several women accusing Nygard were encouraged by Bacon, who funded their travel to testify and hired private investigators to probe the case. The two billionaires have been in open conflict for years, amidst neighborhood feuds in the Bahamas, where they both own luxurious adjoining properties. Bacon's lawyers did not respond when contacted.

Target: Xavier Justo, Swiss whistleblower

Who is he? In 2015, Xavier Justo, a Swiss banker working in Malaysia, had lifted the veil on what would become the "1MDB" corruption scandal. His revelations would contribute to the 2018 electoral defeat of Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, who was directly implicated in the embezzlement case.

The modus operandi: At the end of 2020, a website and a YouTube channel usurping the identity of Justo went up online. They presented him as someone only in it for the money, whose word was not reliable and recycled confessions of the Swiss banker, obtained according to him under duress when he had been arrested in Thailand shortly after his revelations. This site and this channel were then widely distributed on social media, by the network of avatars of Team Jorge, as part of a larger operation of defamation, calling Justo a thief, a drug addict, a blackmailer...

Effectiveness: Unknown. The precise purpose of the campaign remains unclear.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: Several figures involved in the 1MDB scandal may have had a motivation to try to discredit Justo, starting with former Prime Minister Najib Razak, but as of the date of this campaign, he was in jail. Chinese-Malaysian businessman Jho Low, a key figure in the scandal and still on the run today, may also have had an interest in taking on the whistleblower.

Targets: Far-right activists British Tommy Robinson and American Lisa Barbounis

Who are they? Tommy Robinson is a well-known activist from the English far right, specializing in Islamophobic gatherings and conspiracy theories, founder of the pressure group English Defense League and who has been convicted by the courts on several occasions. American Lisa Barbounis is a former employee of the Middle East Forum (MEF), an ultraconservative think tank and supporter of Tommy Robinson. In 2019, she spent a long time in England participating in the campaign to support the activist.

The modus operandi: In mid-July 2021, avatars controlled by Team Jorge publish dozens of messages attacking Robinson and Barbounis. Robinson was designated, on rather factual grounds and often with the help of legitimate articles published by the general press, as a far-right activist. Barbounis, on the other hand, was accused of being an "influence agent" close to Russia, and the campaign focused on her new job as an advisor to a Texas congressman, half-heartedly accusing her of being a spy for Vladimir Putin. The campaign has also widely disseminated accusations, from the Daily Mail, which cited a Middle East Forum lawsuit against Barbounis, accusing her of having an extramarital affair with a Robinson lieutenant, and of embezzling money from the Middle East Forum to buy cocaine, among other things.

Effectiveness: None. The campaign seems to have had no resonance of any magnitude.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: The campaign bears all the hallmarks of an internal score-settling within Anglo-American far-right circles. In 2019, Barbounis filed a complaint, along with three other women, against the MEF, accusing its director of sexual harassment, among other things. These complaints, like the one filed by MEF against Barbounis, ended in dismissals. The MEF denies knowledge of any influence campaign about this issue.

Target: Tomas Zeron, former Mexican police official

Who is he? Tomas Zeron de Lucio is an ex-police figure in Mexico. A former member of the Mexico State Attorney's Office, from 2013 to 2016 he was the director of the Agencia de Investigacion Criminal (AIC), a then newly created administrative body responsible for centralizing federal criminal investigations. In 2016, Zeron resigned during a scandal surrounding his handling of the investigation into the scandal of the 43 missing students from Ayotzinapa in 2014. Suspected of evidence tampering and torture, an Interpol international arrest warrant was issued against him and he currently lives in Israel.

The modus operandi: During the summer of 2020, some 40 Twitter accounts and several Facebook accounts attributed to Team Jorge began posting articles and videos painting an embellished depiction of Zeron, presenting him as a competent investigator who had worked effectively against organized crime and being the victim of a political cabal. Some avatars claimed that no arrest warrant had been issued against the former police officer, arguing that his red notice was missing from the Interpol website. At least one article that may have been written directly on behalf of Team Jorge and published online in June 2020 sang the praises of the former AIC director and claimed that President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador ("AMLO") had been corrupted by Mexican cartels and was waging a political campaign against former investigators and in particular Zerón.

Effectiveness: Likely zero. Articles created directly on behalf of the campaign did not resonate on social media outside of the fake accounts run by the AIMS network.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: The first likely backer of the campaign is Zeron himself, first of all because it is entirely dedicated to singing the praises of the former investigator and attacking President AMLO, presented as the source of the prosecution against him. Most importantly, Zeron also has ties to the Israeli cybersecurity industry, as the agency he headed is accused of having purchased a license for Pegasus spyware, developed by the company NSO. His lawyers claim that he "is not responsible for any publicity campaign in his favor".

Target: Alexander Zingman and Vitali Fishman, Belarusian businessmen

Who are they? The Belarusian businessman Alexander Zingman, reputedly close to autocratic leader Alexander Lukashenko, has been very active in Africa for the past two decades, and more particularly in Zimbabwe, where he is honorary consul. He was one of the architects of a series of trade agreements that directly benefited Lukashenko's son.

The modus operandi: In early summer 2020, fake Facebook and Twitter accounts belonging to the AIMS network were used to publish a series of posts, in Russian and English, touting Zingman's business talent. The messages highlighted the success of the electric buses he produces or thanked him for bringing humanitarian aid to Zimbabwe after Cyclone Idai in 2019. A parallel campaign violently attacked another Belarusian national: Vitali Fishman, also close to the Lukashenko regime. The two men, both suspected of being linked to arms trafficking in Africa, were at the time fighting.

Effectiveness: Hard to estimate. In 2021, Zingman was briefly detained in the Democratic Republic of Congo on suspicion of arms trafficking, then released without charge. AIMS were likely not the only tool used in this conflict. In January 2022, Mr. Fishman filed a complaint in the United States, claiming to be the target of a massive online smear campaign. The sites and social media accounts mentioned in the complaint are directly linked to the architecture of fake Team Jorge accounts.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: The fact that the same network touted Zingman while attacking one of his rivals makes him a possible customer. Both Fishman and Zingman have longstanding connections in Israeli ultraconservative circles and cyber industry. When contacted by Le Monde, Zingman denies having ever used fake account or fake news services, and explains that he himself has been the target of several disinformation campaigns.

Target: California Governor Gavin Newsom

Who is he? The Governor of California since 2018, former mayor of San Francisco and a heavyweight in the US Democratic Party.

The modus operandi: In September 2022, in the home stretch of the election campaign during which Gavin Newsom was running for a second term, dozens of fake Twitter and Facebook accounts, claiming to be those of environmental advocates, attacked the governor's energy policy. In particular, they criticized him for refusing to develop more nuclear power – California only has one nuclear power plant, in Diablo Canyon, whose license was narrowly renewed because of seismic risks. A petition attacked Newsom's alleged inaction as California's crumbling power grid suffered frequent blackouts.

Efficiency: Moderate. The petition garnered several thousand signatures but did not appear to have had a tangible impact on state energy policy.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: The timing of the fake accounts' activity is intriguing; they primarily posted in the summer of 2022, during the home stretch of the California gubernatorial campaign. But by then, the only openly pro-nuclear candidate, "eco-modernist" Michael Shellenberger, was out of the race – he came in third in the Democratic primary in early June with 4.1% of the votes. And the Diablo Canyon plant has already received an extension. Another possible avenue is plant builders – the avatars specifically touted the benefits of molten salt reactors, a technology mastered by only a handful of companies.

Target: Cryptocurrency companies Binance and Nexo

Who are they? Binance is the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange company. It allows you to trade bitcoin, ethereum and other cryptoassets for traditional currencies. Nexo is a cryptocurrency collateralized lending company, which also operates its own stablecoin (a cryptocurrency backed by collateral, an asset or fiat currency), also known as nexo.

The modus operandi: On September 5, 2022, Binance announced that it would now automatically convert a number of stablecoins into its own stablecoin binance. The decision was deemed anti-competitive by the issuers of the affected stablecoins, including Nexo. In the following days, avatars from the AIMS fake account network published dozens of messages attacking Binance's decision and its CEO. At the same time, other avatars posted elaborate exchanges claiming that Nexo was a forward-looking company with safe products, and claiming that the US court's prosecution of the company for investment law violations was a conspiracy by competitors.

Effectiveness: Low. Binance has not reversed its decision and investigations continue against Nexo. The company's stablecoin price has more or less stabilized. While the campaign was quite elaborate in its rhetoric, it also made some gross errors, such as misspelling the Twitter account of Binance's boss.

The suspected Team Jorge clients: The campaign primarily benefited Nexo, but could have been the work of a major investor in the company's stablecoin, or even Team Jorge itself. The Israeli operative has claimed to sometimes use its avatars to influence the price of crypto-currencies. Nexo insists it has "never used any such services. It would be unimaginable that a company with several million users, managing billions of euros in funds, and with dozens of regulatory licenses would use such services."

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Image: NYT

Inflation Cooled Just Slightly, With Worrying Details

Consumer Price Index inflation has been slowing compared with a year ago, but evidence is mounting that it could be a long road back to normal.

NYT by Jeanna Smialek, Feb. 14, 2023

WASHINGTON — Inflation has slowed from its painful 2022 peak but remains uncomfortably rapid, data released Tuesday showed, and the forces pushing prices higher are proving stubborn in ways that could make it difficult to wrestle cost increases back to the Federal Reserve’s goal.

The Consumer Price Index climbed by 6.4 percent in January compared with a year earlier, faster than economists had forecast and only a slight slowdown from 6.5 percent in December. While the annual pace of increase has cooled from a peak of 9.1 percent in summer 2022, it remains more than three times as fast as was typical before the pandemic.

And prices continued to increase rapidly on a monthly basis as a broad array of goods and services, including apparel, groceries, hotel rooms and rent, became more expensive. That was true even after stripping out volatile food and fuel costs.

Taken as a whole, the data underlined that while the Federal Reserve has been receiving positive news that inflation is no longer accelerating relentlessly, it could be a long and bumpy road back to the 2 percent annual price gains that used to be normal. Prices for everyday purchases are still climbing at a pace that risks chipping away at economic security for many households.

“We’re certainly down from the peak of inflation pressures last year, but we’re lingering at an elevated rate,” said Laura Rosner-Warburton, senior economist at MacroPolicy Perspectives. “The road back to 2 percent is going to take some time.”

Stock prices sank in the hours after the report, and market expectations that the Fed will raise interest rates above 5 percent in the coming months increased slightly. Central bankers have already lifted borrowing costs from near zero a year ago to above 4.5 percent, a rapid-fire adjustment meant to slow consumer and business demand in a bid to wrestle price increases under control.

But the economy has so far held up in the face of the central bank’s campaign to slow it down. Growth did cool last year, with the rate-sensitive housing market pulling back and demand for big purchases like cars waning, but the job market has remained strong and wages are still climbing robustly.

That could help to keep the economy chugging along into 2023. Consumption overall had shown signs of slowing meaningfully, but it may be poised for a comeback. Economists expect retail sales data scheduled for release on Wednesday to show that spending climbed 2 percent in January after falling 1.1 percent in December, based on estimates in a Bloomberg survey.

Signs of continued economic momentum could combine with incoming price data to convince the Fed that it needs to do more to bring inflation fully under control, which could entail pushing rates higher than expected or leaving them elevated for longer. Central bankers have been warning that the process of wrangling cost increases might prove bumpy and difficult.

Inflation F.A.Q.

What is inflation?

Inflation is a loss of purchasing power over time, meaning your dollar will not go as far tomorrow as it did today. It is typically expressed as the annual change in prices for everyday goods and services such as food, furniture, apparel, transportation and toys.

What causes inflation?

It can be the result of rising consumer demand. But inflation can also rise and fall based on developments that have little to do with economic conditions, such as limited oil production and supply chain problems.

Is inflation bad?

It depends on the circumstances. Fast price increases spell trouble, but moderate price gains can lead to higher wages and job growth.

How does inflation affect the poor?

Inflation can be especially hard to shoulder for poor households because they spend a bigger chunk of their budgets on necessities like food, housing and gas.

Can inflation affect the stock market?

Rapid inflation typically spells trouble for stocks. Financial assets in general have historically fared badly during inflation booms, while tangible assets like houses have held their value better.

“There has been an expectation that it will go away quickly and painlessly — and I don’t think that’s at all guaranteed,” Jerome H. Powell, the Fed chair, said at an event last week. “The base case for me is that it will take some time, and we’ll have to do more rate increases, and then we’ll have to look around and see whether we’ve done enough.”

A broad range of products and services kept inflation elevated in January: Pricier hotels, car insurance and vehicle repairs all contributed to the increase in the overall index.

Some goods, including used cars and clothing for women, dropped in price on a monthly basis. Even so, the slowdown for some physical products was less pronounced than it had been. Price increases for overall apparel accelerated, for instance.

Moderating price increases for goods and commodities have driven the overall inflation slowdown in recent months. Fed officials have embraced the cool-down but have also warned that it may not continue, because it has come as pandemic disruptions faded and tangled supply chains unsnarled.

“Supply chains can’t recover twice,” Lorie Logan, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, said in a speech on Tuesday.

Pre-owned vehicles offer a good example of why the drag from falling prices for some goods may prove temporary. Used-car prices have been declining back to normal thanks to lagging demand and rebounding supply, and that has been helping to subtract from overall price increases. But used-car costs are already beginning to pick up again at a wholesale level, which suggests that the trend is unlikely to last indefinitely.

That is why central bankers and economists are closely watching what happens with prices for services, like health care and restaurant meals, pedicures and tax accounting.

Services inflation, which includes restaurant meals and other non-goods purchases, remains unusually rapid and has shown little sign of slowing down.Credit...Casey Steffens for The New York Times

Service prices may prove to be more closely tied to underlying momentum in the economy: Labor is a major cost for many service companies, so businesses are likely to charge more when unemployment is low and they have to increase pay to compete for workers.

So far, such inflation shows little sign of letting up. Service prices excluding energy continued to increase rapidly in January, owing in part to the jump in rental and other housing costs.

That rapid rent inflation is expected to abate in the months ahead as a recent pullback in asking rents on newly leased apartments gradually feeds into official inflation data. But how much — and for how long — increases in housing costs will fade is uncertain.

“It is a little bit unclear what the underlying momentum is in shelter,” said Sonia Meskin, head of U.S. macro at BNY Mellon Investment Management, explaining that strong job gains and solid wage growth could keep pressures on the market. “Shelter tends to correlate with a tight labor market.”

Hiring in America remains unusually strong, despite recent high-profile layoffs in the technology industry. Employers added more than half a million jobs in January, an unexpectedly robust number, and gains in average hourly earnings and other pay trackers remain rapid, though they have begun to slow.

The unsavory question confronting officials at the Fed is whether the labor market will need to weaken in order to wrestle inflation lower. Many central bankers have suggested that wage increases are probably too hot to be consistent with 2 percent inflation, their official target. Central bankers define their inflation goal using a related but more delayed inflation measure, the Personal Consumption Expenditures index.

“I don’t think they’re going to feel comfortable until the labor market turns a little more decisively,” said Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist at J.P. Morgan.

While some policymakers have argued that the Fed should be careful not to constrain the labor market more than is necessary in its battle against inflation, that so-called dovish wing of the central bank’s policymaking set is poised to lose a key member. President Biden is going to make Lael Brainard, the Fed’s vice chair, the new head of his National Economic Council, according to people familiar with the matter.

Ms. Brainard has emphasized in recent speeches that the central bank may be able to wrestle inflation lower without slowing demand so much that it results in significant job losses. And she has focused on drivers of inflation outside of the labor market, including swollen corporate profits and aftershocks from high fuel prices.

But as she has emphasized those hopeful reasons that price increases might moderate, many other Fed officials have focused more keenly on the risk that services outside of housing will continue to climb at their current pace — keeping inflation too hot for comfort.

If that price measure “remained in its current range, while other categories returned to their prepandemic pace, total inflation going forward would settle much closer to 3 percent than to our 2 percent goal,” Ms. Logan from the Dallas Fed warned on Tuesday. She explained services inflation “as a symptom of an overheated economy, particularly a tight labor market.”

John C. Williams, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, said on Tuesday that controlling inflation “will likely entail a period of subdued growth and some softening of labor market conditions.”

For now, a mounting body of evidence suggests that inflation is not fading as quickly as economists and central bankers had hoped even a month or two ago, said Jason Furman, an economist at Harvard who was an Obama administration economic adviser.

“It turns out that a lot of that was probably a false dawn,” Mr. Furman said. “The whole perspective we have on inflation is much worse.”

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News round-up, Monday, February 13, 2023

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Quote of the day…

We’re experiencing a mental health crisis. Approximately 15.5% of the global population is affected by mental illnesses, and those numbers are rising. Although there are many who require treatment, more than 50% of mental illnesses remain untreated. In the United States, one in five adults suffers from some form of mental illness. Every 40 seconds one person dies from suicide and for every adult who dies from suicide, there are more than 20 others who have attempted to end their life. The ramifications of this go beyond our families and cultures as mental health also has a tremendous economic impact for the cost of treatment as well as the loss of productivity.

Forbes by Bernard Marr

Despite all its problems, Latin America has much to contribute in a troubled world. The far West, as Alain Rouquié called it, has medium development, decisive environmental resources in relation to climate change and natural resources that can contribute exponentially to the information age and digitalisation. Making them count requires a long view and a strategic capacity that we see little of in our rulers at the moment. A change of course is essential if we want to make an impact in the 21st century.

Ernesto Ottone (Valparaíso, 1948) was among those who rejected the proposal for a new Constitution in the plebiscite on 4 September, like 62% of Chileans. "I reject it because I am convinced that it is the best way for a good Constitution", he told EL PAÍS before the referendum.

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Most Read…

What’s Going On Up There? Theories but No Answers in Shootdowns of Mystery Craft.

The U.S. and Canada are investigating three unidentified flying objects shot down over North America in the past three days. Militaries have adjusted radars to try to spot more incursions.

NYT by Julian E. Barnes, Helene Cooper and Edward Wong

The countries warn the EU against an overhaul of the energy market in “crisis mode”.

The European Commission is drafting an overhaul of the EU’s electricity market rules with the aim of better cushioning consumer bills ahead of fossil fuel price spikes and avoiding a repeat of the surge in electricity wort sparked by cuts in Russia’s gas supplies last year.

Ukdaily.news by Mia Gordon

Chile faces largest wildfires since 2017

In DepthFires fueled by drought and heatwaves killed 24 and destroyed 373,000 hectares since February 1.

LE MONDE BY FLORA GENOUX (BUENOS AIRES (ARGENTINA) CORRESPONDENT)

"The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or re-foundation".

This Chilean sociologist, with a communist past and key advisor to the government of socialist Ricardo Lagos, says that a change of course in Latin America is indispensable "if we want to influence the 21st century".

EL PAÍS BY ROCÍO MONTES

Argentina will receive a million-dollar investment to facilitate the export of gas from Vaca Muerta to Brazil and Chile.

CAF - Development Bank of Latin America - will provide 540 million dollars for the construction of a gas pipeline network. Its vice-president, Christian Asinelli, defends the use of natural gas in the region as a "just transition energy".

El País by LORENA ARROYO

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Seafloat-hybrid-power-plant

Armando Rodriguez, Seaboard CEO for the Dominican Republic, concludes: 

 “We are very excited about this project because it will be a big benefit to the community in terms of the environment and the employment we will provide to the area.

Seaboard Dominican Republic

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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What is Artificial Intelligency?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of a computer or a robot controlled by a computer to do tasks that are usually done by humans because they require human intelligence and discernment. Although there are no AIs that can perform the wide variety of tasks an ordinary human can do, some AIs can match humans in specific tasks.

The Incredible Ways Artificial Intelligence Is Now Used In Mental Health

Forbes by Bernard Marr

Stigma

Stereotypes surrounding those with mental illnesses prevent patients from seeking the help they need. According to a World Health Organization study, 30 to 80 percent of those with mental health issues don’t seek treatment. It’s common to hear stereotypes about people with mental health issues like they’re dangerous, incompetent, or responsible for their illness. 

We’re experiencing a mental health crisis. Approximately 15.5% of the global population is affected by mental illnesses, and those numbers are rising. Although there are many who require treatment, more than 50% of mental illnesses remain untreated. In the United States, one in five adults suffers from some form of mental illness. Every 40 seconds one person dies from suicide and for every adult who dies from suicide, there are more than 20 others who have attempted to end their life. The ramifications of this go beyond our families and cultures as mental health also has a tremendous economic impact for the cost of treatment as well as the loss of productivity.

The critical shortfall of psychiatrists and other mental health specialists to provide treatment exacerbates this crisis. In fact, nearly 40% of Americans live where there is a shortage of mental health professionals; 60% of U.S. counties don’t have a psychiatrist. Those that do have access to mental health professionals often forgo treatment because they can’t afford it. Those with depression visit primary care physicians an average of five times a year versus three times for those who don’t have it. Others seek help in emergency rooms which are more expensive. More than $201 billion is spent on mental health annually making mental health the most expensive part of our healthcare system after knocking out heart conditions for the honor.

Examples of current uses of AI in mental health

Researchers are testing different ways that artificial intelligence can help screen, diagnose and treat mental illness.

Researchers from the World Well-Being Project (WWBP) analyzed social media with an AI algorithm to pick out linguistic cues that might predict depression. It turns out that those suffering from depression express themselves on social media in ways that those dealing with other chronic conditions do not such as mentions of loneliness and using words such as "feelings," "I" and "me." The team's findings were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, but after analyzing half a million Facebook posts from people who consented to provide their Facebook status updates and medical records, they were able to identify depression-associated language markers. What the researchers found was that linguistic markers could predict depression up to three months before the person receives a formal diagnosis. Other researchers use technology to explore the way facial expressions, enunciation of words and tone and language could indicate suicide risk.

In addition to researchers, there are several companies using artificial intelligence to help tackle the mental health crisis. Quartet's platform flags possible mental conditions and can refer patients to a provider or a computerized cognitive behavioral therapy program. Ginger’s contribution is a chat application used by employers that provides direct counseling services to employees. Its algorithms analyze the words someone uses and then relies on its training from more than 2 billion behavioral data samples, 45 million chat messages and 2 million clinical assessments to provide a recommendation. The CompanionMX system has an app that allows patients being treated with depression, bipolar disorders, and other conditions to create an audio log where they can talk about how they are feeling. The AI system analyzes the recording as well as looks for changes in behavior for proactive mental health monitoring. Bark, a parental control phone tracker app, monitors major messaging and social media platforms to look for signs of cyberbullying, depression, suicidal thoughts and sexting on a child’s phone.

These are just a few of the innovative solutions that support mental health.

4 Benefits of using AI to help solve the mental health crisis

There are several reasons why AI could be a powerful tool to help us solve the mental health crisis. Here are four benefits:

1.      Support mental health professionals

As it does for many industries, AI can help support mental health professionals in doing their jobs. Algorithms can analyze data much faster than humans, can suggest possible treatments, monitor a patient’s progress and alert the human professional to any concerns. In many cases, AI and a human clinician would work together.

1.      24/7 access

Due to the lack of human mental health professionals, it can take months to get an appointment. If patients live in an area without enough mental health professionals, their wait will be even longer. AI provides a tool that an individual can access all the time, 24/7 without waiting for an appointment.

1.      Not expensive

The cost of care prohibits some individuals from seeking help. Artificial intelligent tools could offer a more accessible solution.

1.      Comfort talking to a bot

While it might take some people time to feel comfortable talking to a bot, the anonymity of an AI algorithm can be positive. What might be difficult to share with a therapist in person is easier for some to disclose to a bot.

Obstacles to overcome

While there is great promise for using AI to help the current mental health crisis, there are still obstacles to overcome. There are significant privacy concerns as well as making people comfortable and willing to accept various levels of being monitored in their day-to-day lives. In addition, there is no regulation for these applications, so it is advised that any app be used in conjunction with a mental health professional. As AI tools are created, it is essential that they are protocols in place to make them safe and effective and built and trained with a diverse data set, so they aren't biased toward a particular population.

Overall, AI has the promise to provide critical resources we need to overcome our mental health crisis.

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Ernesto Cardenal’s Prayer for Marilyn Monroe

She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we’re not saints psychoanalysis was recommended to her...

One of Latin America’s most acclaimed poets, he wrote verses that offered a cosmic fusion of spirituality, politics, science and history, while appearing at frequent lectures and readings that made him a kind of international ambassador for Nicaragua.

Father Cardenal drew few boundaries between his callings. The son of a wealthy Nicaraguan family, he fought with a revolutionary group in his late 20s, then emerged as a leading proponent of liberation theology, which emphasizes Jesus’s message to the poor and oppressed.

The washington post By Harrison Smith

March 2, 2020

Ernesto Cardenal’s Prayer for Marilyn Monroe

Lord

receive this young woman known around the world as Marilyn Monroe
although that wasn’t her real name
(but You know her real name, the name of the orphan raped at the age of 6
and the shopgirl who at 16 had tried to kill herself)
who now comes before You without any makeup
without her Press Agent
without photographers and without autograph hounds,
alone like an astronaut facing night in space.

She dreamed when she was little that she was naked in a church
(according to the Time account)
before a prostrated crowd of people, their heads on the floor
and she had to walk on tiptoe so as not to step on their heads.
You know our dreams better than the psychiatrists.
Church, home, cave, all represent the security of the womb
but something else too …
The heads are her fans, that’s clear
(the mass of heads in the dark under the beam of light).
But the temple isn’t the studios of 20th Century-Fox.
The temple—of marble and gold—is the temple of her body
in which the Son of Man stands whip in hand
driving out the studio bosses of 20th Century-Fox
who made Your house of prayer a den of thieves.

Lord
in this world polluted with sin and radioactivity
You won’t blame it all on a shopgirl
who, like any other shopgirl, dreamed of being a star.
Her dream just became a reality (but like Technicolor’s reality).
She only acted according to the script we gave her
—the story of our own lives. And it was an absurd script.
Forgive her, Lord, and forgive us
for our 20th Century
for this Colossal Super-Production on which we all have worked.
She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we’re not saints
psychoanalysis was recommended to her.
Remember, Lord, her growing fear of the camera
and her hatred of makeup—insisting on fresh makeup for each scene—
and how the terror kept building up in her
and making her late to the studios.

Like any other shopgirl
she dreamed of being a star.
And her life was unreal like a dream that a psychiatrist interprets and files.

Her romances were a kiss with closed eyes
and when she opened them
she realized she had been under floodlights
as they killed the floodlights!
and they took down the two walls of the room (it was a movie set)
while the Director left with his scriptbook
because the scene had been shot.
Or like a cruise on a yacht, a kiss in Singapore, a dance in Rio
the reception at the mansion of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
all viewed in a poor apartment’s tiny living room.

The film ended without the final kiss.
She was found dead in her bed with her hand on the phone.
And the detectives never learned who she was going to call.
She was
like someone who had dialed the number of the only friendly voice
and only heard the voice of a recording that says: WRONG NUMBER.
Or like someone who had been wounded by gangsters
reaching for a disconnected phone.

Lord
whoever it might have been that she was going to call
and didn’t call (and maybe it was no one
or Someone whose number isn’t in the Los Angeles phonebook)
You answer that telephone!

(Translated from the Spanish by Jonathan Cohen)

---

The Pentagon and intelligence agencies have intensified their study of unexplained incidents near military bases in recent years.

Image: Germán & Co

What’s Going On Up There? Theories but No Answers in Shootdowns of Mystery Craft.

The U.S. and Canada are investigating three unidentified flying objects shot down over North America in the past three days. Militaries have adjusted radars to try to spot more incursions.

NYT by Julian E. Barnes, Helene Cooper and Edward Wong

Published Feb. 12, 2023

WASHINGTON — If the truth is out there, it certainly is not apparent yet.

Pentagon and intelligence officials are trying to make sense of three unidentified flying objects over Alaska, Canada and Michigan that U.S. fighter jets shot down with missiles on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The latest turn in the aerial show taking place in the skies above North America comes after a helter-skelter weekend involving what at times seemed like an invasion of unidentified flying objects.

The latest object had first been spotted on Saturday over Montana, initially sparking debate over whether it even existed. On Saturday, military officials detected a radar blip over Montana, which then disappeared, leading them to conclude it was an anomaly. Then a blip appeared Sunday over Montana, then Wisconsin and Michigan. Once military officials obtained visual confirmation, they ordered an F-16 to shoot it down over Lake Huron.

There are two big questions around the episodes: What were the craft? And why does the United States appear to be seeing more suddenly, and shooting down more?

There are no answers to the first question yet. American officials do not know what the objects were, much less their purpose or who sent them.

For the second, it is not clear if there are suddenly more objects. But what is certain is that in the wake of the recent incursion by a Chinese spy balloon, the U.S. and Canadian militaries are hypervigilant in flagging some objects that might previously have been allowed to pass.

After the transit of the spy balloon this month, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, adjusted its radar system to make it more sensitive. As a result, the number of objects it detected increased sharply. In other words, NORAD is picking up more incursions because it is looking for them, spurred on by the heightened awareness caused by the furor over the spy balloon, which floated over the continental United States for a week before an F-22 shot it down on Feb. 4.

“We have been more closely scrutinizing our airspace at these altitudes, including enhancing our radar, which may at least partly explain the increase in objects that we’ve detected over the past week,” Melissa Dalton, the assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense and hemispheric affairs, said at a news conference on Sunday evening.

American officials have not completely discounted theories that there could also be more objects, period. Some officials theorize that the objects could be from China, or another foreign power, and may be aimed at testing detection abilities after the spy balloon.

The object spotted approaching Lake Huron on Sunday was flying at 20,000 feet and presented a potential threat to civil aviation, so President Biden ordered it shot down, U.S. officials said. It had an octagonal structure with strings hanging off but had no discernible payload, they added.

U.S. and Canadian officials say the objects shot down on Friday and Saturday were also flying lower than the spy balloon, posing a greater danger to civilian aircraft, which prompted leaders to order them destroyed. Those two objects were flying over parts of Alaska and the Yukon that have few residents, and the third object downed on Sunday was over water, so risks posed by falling debris were minimal, they said.

The spy balloon that drifted across the United States flew much higher, at 60,000 feet, and did not pose a danger to aircraft. But any falling debris could have hit people on the ground, Pentagon officials said.

Throughout the weekend, officials said they were still trying to determine what the three objects were. The first, a Defense Department official said, is most likely not a balloon — and it broke into pieces after it was shot down on Friday. Saturday’s object was described by Canadian authorities as cylindrical, and American officials say it is more likely it was a balloon of some kind. Sunday’s object appeared unlikely to be a balloon, one official said.

NORAD radar tracked the first two objects for at least 12 hours before they were shot down. But Defense Department officials have never said whether they picked the objects up on radar before they neared American airspace. One official said it is unclear what keeps the objects aloft.

U.S. officials said they are reviewing video and other sensor readings collected by the American pilots who observed the objects before their destruction. But the exact nature of the objects, where they are from and what they were intended for will not be confirmed until the F.B.I. and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have the chance to thoroughly examine the debris, officials said.

Asked during a news conference on Sunday whether he had ruled out extraterrestrial origins, Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, the commander of the Air Force’s Northern Command, said, “I haven’t ruled out anything at this point.” But in interviews Sunday, national security officials discounted any thoughts that what the Air Force shot out of the sky represented any sort of alien visitors. No one, one senior official said, thinks these things are anything other than devices fashioned here on Earth.

Luis Elizondo, the military intelligence officer who ran the Pentagon’s U.F.O. program until 2017, concurred. But he said that the Biden administration must find a way to balance vigilance over what is going on in the skies above America against “chasing our tail” whenever something unknown shows up — a tough task, he said.

For years, adversaries have sent low-tech gadgets into the skies above the United States, Mr. Elizondo said.

“What’s happening now is you have low-end technology being used to harass America,” he said in an interview. “It is a high-impact, low-cost way for China to do this, and the more you look up in the sky, the more you will see.”

At the urging of Congress, the Pentagon and intelligence agencies have intensified their study of unexplained incidents near military bases in recent years. The studies on what the intelligence community calls unidentified aerial phenomena have pinpointed previously undetected efforts to conduct surveillance on American military exercises and bases. Many of those unexplained incidents have been balloons, and some of them are now believed to be attempted surveillance activity by China or other powers, both using balloons and surveillance drones.

In a public report released last month, the intelligence community said that of 366 unexplained incidents, 163 were later identified as balloons. A related classified document whose findings were reported this month by The New York Times said at least two incidents at U.S. military bases could be examples of advanced aerial technology, possibly developed by China.

“We can now assess flight patterns and trajectory in a much more scientific way,” said Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat who wrote the recent legislation mandating greater internal military reporting and analysis of aerial phenomena, leading to more documentation of sightings. “You need to know who’s using the technology and what it is.”

The most alarming theory under consideration by some U.S. officials is that the objects are sent by China or another power in an attempt to learn more about American radar or early warning systems.

A senior administration official said one theory — and the person stressed that it is just a theory — is that China or Russia sent the objects to test American intelligence-gathering capabilities. They could be sent to learn both how quickly the United States becomes aware of an intrusion and how quickly the military can respond to such an incursion, the official said.

American officials are united in their belief that the spy balloon that transited the United States was a Chinese machine meant to conduct surveillance on American military bases. Officials said it was unclear if China had complete control of the balloon during its whole journey. But officials said China did have at least a limited ability to steer it, and the balloon maneuvered on Feb. 3 before it was shot down the next day.

Another American official said the Chinese spy balloon was equipped with a self-destruct mechanism, but Beijing did not use it, a potential sign that Chinese officials wanted to continue to collect intelligence, even after it was discovered.

The disclosure of the balloon by the Pentagon on Feb. 2 led to a public diplomatic crisis between China and the United States. Beijing said it had the right to respond further. On Sunday, a Chinese newspaper reported that local maritime authorities in Shandong Province on the east coast had spotted an “unidentified flying object” in waters by the city of Rizhao and were preparing to shoot it down. State-run news organizations reposted the information.

If any of the devices destroyed in North America over the past three days were Chinese, it would amount to a major provocation on the heels of the spy balloon, one reason some officials said not to jump to the conclusion that the objects are surveillance devices sent from Beijing.

Officials in Beijing seem to want to limit tensions over the spy balloon, suggesting to some U.S. officials that the latest objects are less likely to be deliberate Chinese provocations or tests.

Pentagon officials have been raising flags about deficiencies in North America’s aging warning systems, radar and sensors.

Speaking last year at the Aspen Security Conference in Colorado, General VanHerck said that the United States had struggled to detect certain intrusions, what he called “domain awareness challenges.” General VanHerck said the NORAD radars could not adequately detect hypersonics and other threats.

But, he also said, the United States and Canada were investing in new over-the-horizon radar to better identify potential threats, as well as artificial intelligence systems to help pick out possible intrusions.

“I’m very encouraged with where we’re going,” General VanHerck said last July, “but we still have some challenges to work on.”

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Image: Germán & Co

The countries warn the EU against an overhaul of the energy market in “crisis mode”.

Ukdaily.news by Mia Gordon

February 13, 2023

The European Commission is drafting an overhaul of the EU’s electricity market rules with the aim of better cushioning consumer bills ahead of fossil fuel price spikes and avoiding a repeat of the surge in electricity wort sparked by cuts in Russia’s gas supplies last year.

The seven countries, led by Denmark, said in a letter that the existing market design in Europe had encouraged lower electricity prices for years, helped expand renewable energy and ensured that enough electricity was produced to meet demand and avoid shortages.

“We must resist the temptation to kill the golden goose that has been our single market for electricity for the past decade,” said Lars Aagaard, Denmark’s energy minister.

Countries said there was some room for improvement, especially given the surge in electricity costs over the past year. However, any changes must ensure the market continues to function and incentivize massive investments in renewable energy, they said.

“Any reform that goes beyond targeted adjustments to the existing framework should be underpinned by an in-depth impact assessment and not adopted in crisis mode,” reads the letter to the Commission, seen by Reuters.

Other countries, including Spain and France, are pursuing deeper reforms. Spain has proposed a switch to longer-term fixed price contracts for power plants to try to limit price spikes.

The seven countries said in their letter that related schemes – such as Contracts for Difference (CfDs) – could play a role, but they should be voluntary, focused on new renewable energy and still “responsive” to the market.

Electricity industry lobby group Eurelectric has also warned against making CFDs mandatory as it could undermine competition in the electricity market and discourage investors.

In their letter, the seven countries supported an idea already discussed by the Commission to make it easier for consumers to choose between electricity contracts with fluctuating and fixed prices.

However, they pushed back another Commission proposal to extend a temporary EU measure reclaiming windfall revenues from non-gas generators.

“That could jeopardize investor confidence in the investments needed,” the countries said in the letter, citing EU estimates that hundreds of billions of euros in renewable energy investments are needed annually to help countries convert from Russian fossil fuels get off.

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The fire in the vicinity of the city of Dichato, in the south of Chile, on February 10, 2023.

Image: Le Monde by JAVIER TORRES / AFP

Chile faces largest wildfires since 2017

Le Monde by Flora Genoux (Buenos Aires (Argentina) correspondent)

Published on February 12, 2023 

In DepthFires fueled by drought and heatwaves killed 24 and destroyed 373,000 hectares since February 1.

Helpless firefighters standing in front of a wall of flames, inhabitants trying to smother the blaze with buckets of water, a line of fire, visible from the sky, advancing relentlessly over the forest... The violent fires that have been raging in Chile since February 1, in the middle of the southern summer, are delivering their share of apocalyptic images.

The so-called south-central region of the country – the provinces of Maule, Nuble, Biobio and Araucania, located some 280 km South of Santiago – saw thousands of hectares destroyed.

The toll as of Friday, February 10, stood at 24 dead, 1,250 homes wrecked and more than 2,000 being taken care of by health services. In total, more than 373,000 hectares were blown by the disaster. The country is witnessing the worst fires since 2017 during which 467,000 hectares disappeared.

Chilean President Gabriel Boric spoke earlier this week of "very difficult days" while the fires had already been active for a week. He called for the cooperation of all institutions including the private sector.

"In five days, we are seeing a burned area equivalent to two years of fire," Carolina Toha, minister of the interior, said on Monday. This week, more than 5,600 Chilean firefighters continued to fight the flames, with the support of international organizations.

Argentina, Mexico, but also Spain or the United States sent material and human rescue teams. France announced on Tuesday it was sending 80 firemen and rescue workers. The day before, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Twitter: "The Chilean people can count on the support of France to fight against this plague."

The European Union also announced it was sending over firefighters, doctors and experts. "No matter how many planes or how much money is dedicated to fighting the fires, they have become uncontrollable," Roberto Rondanelli, a meteorologist at the University of Chile, said. On Friday, 321 fires were still active. The experts are clear: The origin of the fires is above all human, whether criminal or accidental. "There is a legitimate suspicion related to the intentionality [of the fires], which is under investigation," Boric said on Wednesday. At least 28 people have been arrested.

However, a series of factors explain the speed and intensity of the fires. First, there is climate change, the vehicle for a historic "mega-drought" in Chile which has been ongoing for about 13 years.

The drought is reflected in a historic rainfall deficit of 30% over the period 2010-2019, according to a report by Chile's Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CR2). In the last 50 years, maximum summer temperatures increased by 0.43°C per decade, the CR2 wrote in a note last week.

"All events with temperatures above 40°C have occurred in the last decade," it said. Regions afflicted by the fires were experiencing a heatwave with temperatures sometimes exceeding the 40°C threshold.

An alert for high temperature ran until Saturday for an area encompassing more than 900 km from North to South, from the Coquimbo region to Nuble.

Pine and eucalyptus trees as far as the eye can see

"There is also a strong accumulation of combustible material," Miguel Castillo, a forest engineer at the University of Chile said. Pine and eucalyptus trees are planted as far as the eye can see by the wood industry.

An engine for the regional economy, the idea was encouraged under Chile's military dictatorship (1973-1990). The industry is confronted with territorial conflicts involving part of the indigenous Mapuche population who claim ancestral lands held by forest owners.

In 2022, exports from the wood sector amounted to €6.5 billion according to the Chilean Forestry Institute, amounting to more than 111,000 jobs.

However, pine and eucalyptus are exotic trees that require more water than endemic species. They dry up the waterways that could serve as a natural barrier to the flames. "With high heat, they also tend to dry out faster than endemic trees. Therefore, they burn more and facilitate the spread of fires, a phenomenon also reinforced by their density," Rondanelli said.

The winds that blew over the region over the past few days contributed to the spread of the fires. "It is absolutely necessary to rethink the productive system by planting endemic trees. After the great fires of 2017, where there were endemic trees, pine and eucalyptus trees were planted instead," said Rondanelli.

Despite a smaller amount of hectares burned this time (the great fires of 2017 resulted in the death of 11) the country is mourning more deaths. "This is related to the number of outbreaks which are more numerous and scattered. This represents a greater challenge in terms of coordination, prioritization and access to areas to be evacuated," Castillo said.

The proximity of tree plantations to residential areas is also blamed for the higher number of deaths. In 2014, a proposal to modify forest regulation was presented by Alejandro Navarro who was then a leftwing senator of the Biobio region.

It provided for a minimum distance of 500 meters between plantations and residential areas or roads. In 2015, another parliamentary initiative encompassing the previous text also proposed banning new plantations of "highly combustible" species. This time, the legislation did not go through.

As the smoke from the fires reaches as far as the capital, Santiago, CO2 emissions generated by the fires are triggering concern. With the risk of more episodes of this magnitude in the future, the fires "may become one of the most important causes of greenhouse gas emissions in the country," according to the CR2.

In 2017, fires alone accounted for 90% of total emissions in a baseline year, 2016. They also pose a great threat to biodiversity, Maisa Rojas, minister for the environment, said.

Faced with the emergency, the Chilean government announced a series of aid mechanisms destined for the residents of the affected regions. On Friday, authorities ordered a curfew to prevent possible looting of evacuated homes.

Germán & Co

"The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or re-foundation".

This Chilean sociologist, with a communist past and key advisor to the government of socialist Ricardo Lagos, says that a change of course in Latin America is indispensable "if we want to influence the 21st century".

El País by ROCÍO MONTES

Santiago de Chile - 11 Feb 2023 

Ernesto Ottone (Valparaíso, 1948) was among those who rejected the proposal for a new Constitution in the plebiscite on 4 September, like 62% of Chileans. "I reject it because I am convinced that it is the best way for a good Constitution", he told EL PAÍS before the referendum. With a communist past until the end of the 1970s - he was a world leader of his youth - the sociologist was a key strategic adviser to the government of the socialist Ricardo Lagos (2000-2006). He is an intellectual who looks to the public rather than a politician who looks to books. In his latest publication, Crónica de una odisea, del estallido social al estallido de las urnas, he describes the last three years in Chile as a "turbulent, unstable and tense period, very different from the one that has accompanied the country's progress since the return to democracy". In this interview, conducted in his flat in Providencia, in the Chilean capital, in the middle of summer with the city empty, he analyses the political scene facing Chile in 2023.

Question: What has happened in Chile since the plebiscite of 4 September, when 62% of voters rejected the proposed new constitution?

Answer. September 4 was not a triumph of conservatism over change, as was perceived by some observers outside the country, but it was the return of history. The compulsory vote showed a more complete Chile, not only that of the mobilised forces, and produced a result that stunned the government.

Q. What was the text that was rejected like?

A. The text that the constitutional convention presented to the plebiscite was a mixture of constitutional text and partisan political programme, which hurt representative democracy and the balance of power and which artificially exacerbated the issue of nationalities. This was not accepted by Chileans who want a new constitution that reflects a social, modern, democratic and inclusive state. Chileans do not want to replace the authoritarian traces of the past with new authoritarian dangers.

Q. How did President Boric's government, which was for the alternative that lost, stand after the referendum?

A. President Boric weakened his authority and his role as head of state by merging with that project. Partly because he partially shared it, I believe, and partly under pressure from the ruling group around him, which in truth represents only a minority sector, I fear, of those who brought him to the government, because the rest were reformist voters who voted against the extreme right candidate in the 2021 presidential elections. Today the government has included sectors of the traditional left, which occupy important positions that help to contain the excesses of doctrinarism and imperfection, although they do not always succeed in doing so.

Q. Chile is making a second attempt at a new constitution. Do you think this is necessary?

A. Yes, of course. Chileans rejected a text, not the idea of a new Constitution that has greater legitimacy, that responds to the challenges of the 21st century, that frames a social state and that protects individual liberties and encourages greater inclusiveness. I believe that the newly initiated new process, with greater institutional thickness, will be able to achieve a Constitution acceptable to the vast majority of the country.

Q. 2023 will be a difficult year for Chile, with an economic recession...

A. The situation is difficult for this year, not only in Chile, but in the whole world. It will require a lot of political capacity, you can't keep taking one step in one direction and another in the opposite direction. The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or refoundation.

Q. The president has very high disapproval, 66%, according to the latest Cadem. How do you overcome this bad moment of popularity?

A. He will only be able to recover from his high level of disapproval if his ability to govern improves, if he generates broad agreements on economic and social problems in the fight against crime, on changing the tax system and improving the pension system, on the functioning of the education and health systems in a non-traumatic way. In short, if it is dominated by a state vocation that has so far appeared only intermittently.

Q. This year, Chile commemorates the 50th anniversary of the 1973 coup d'état. How do you see Chile on this date?

A. Chile has no room to increase its internal conflicts and generate a more polarised situation. The commemoration of the 1973 coup d'état should be read as a national decision never to repeat that tragedy. This requires first and foremost a well-functioning democracy. It must be commemorated in a sober, profound and historic way. The "never again" and the republican character that marked the 30th anniversary 20 years ago, in 2003, when Chile was moving forward in all areas, must be present.

Q. Are you one of those who believe that the far right is growing stronger in Chile and that it has presidential options?

A. For that to happen there would have to be a collapse of the traditional right and a predominance in its electorate of those who most yearn for authoritarianism. The rebirth of reformist centre and centre-left forces would have to fail and the more extreme sectors of the radical left would have to predominate. This could generate in the country a demand for authoritarianism at any price, led by the extreme right. I hope that this does not happen, that the gods do not blind the democrats. But to avoid such tendencies, realism, political generosity and deep democratic convictions are required.

Q. While this is happening in Chile, how do you, a sociologist who made a career in ECLAC, see the rest of Latin America?

A. Latin America is one of the regions hardest hit by this sad and fragmented phase of a globalisation in decline. There is no longer one dictatorship in Latin America, but three. There are countries with a strong democratic degradation, others with inconsistent democracies, within a short period of time there have been two attempted coups d'état and democratic institutions have been weakened in general.

Q. We are in a violent region...

A. We make up 8.6% of the world's population, but one third of the world's crimes - excluding war crimes - are committed in our region. After the end of the economic boom between 2003 and 2013, the economy began to fall, and the poverty and equality indicators, which had indicated progress in the right direction, began to go back in the wrong direction. This situation will be very difficult to reverse with the current economic situation. Citizen demands have no capacity to respond and the fragility of democracies is spreading.

Q. Are we facing a pendulum swing to the left, considering the sign of several Latin American governments?

A. There is the illusion of a pink tide, but it is very heterogeneous and probably volatile. In general, elections tend to be won by those in opposition. The danger of the spread of authoritarian populism of different signs is just around the corner. But this is not an inevitable fate as in the Greek tragedies. It does, however, require a gigantic effort.

Q. Where should this effort be focused?

A. Resuming economic growth, generating a productive transformation that adds value to our generous natural resource base. Modernising our states and democratic institutions, enhancing cooperation between the public, private and civil society sectors, and relaunching efforts to achieve greater levels of equality and poverty reduction by prioritising public policies and creating a progressive fiscal pact. Combat organised crime through coordinated intelligence, preventing the development of corruption and better management of mega-cities. Overcoming the region's invisibility in the world, the absence of a single voice to put forward its interests, and avoiding the ideologisation of regional organisations that are often linked to discourses of the past that are alien to the current reality.

Q. Do you see any room for optimism?

A. Despite all its problems, Latin America has much to contribute in a troubled world. The far West, as Alain Rouquié called it, has medium development, decisive environmental resources in relation to climate change and natural resources that can contribute exponentially to the information age and digitalisation. Making them count requires a long view and a strategic capacity that we see little of in our rulers at the moment. A change of course is essential if we want to make an impact in the 21st century.

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Source: El País

Argentina will receive a million-dollar investment to facilitate the export of gas from Vaca Muerta to Brazil and Chile.

CAF - Development Bank of Latin America - will provide 540 million dollars for the construction of a gas pipeline network. Its vice-president, Christian Asinelli, defends the use of natural gas in the region as a "just transition energy".

El País by LORENA ARROYO

01 FEB 2023

For more than a decade, Vaca Muerta has represented a hope for Argentina's battered economy that has yet to materialise. The 30,000-kilometre field in Patagonia makes Argentina the country with the second largest shale gas resources in the world. But getting it out and transporting it has proved a complex task since exploitation began in 2012. Now, a new investment agreement has rekindled the hopes of those hoping for a definitive take-off of the field.

Economy Minister Sergio Massa announced last week that he had reached an agreement with CAF - Development Bank of Latin America* to finance a gas pipeline that will facilitate exports to Chile and Brazil. "It will be 540 million dollars to build the La Carlota-Tío Pujio gas pipeline, the Reversal del Norte and the compressor plants," the minister said on his Twitter account. The investment, which will be approved in March by CAF's board of directors, foresees the construction of kilometres of pipelines to transport gas from Vaca Muerta, in the west of the country, to Santa Fe, in the northeast. This, the minister said, would increase "the possibilities of gas export volumes" to neighbouring countries.

According to Reuters, with these works the country expects to be able to reverse the energy balance deficit of $5 billion recorded in 2022 and achieve a surplus of about $12 billion in 2025. "From the point of view of the country's productive activities, obviously developing the potential of Vaca Muerta is very important for the economy," acknowledged CAF vice-president Christian Asinelli in an interview with América Futura. The official stresses that the work to be financed by the multilateral organisation will be beneficial for the region's energy integration and will reduce Argentina's dependence on current imports of Bolivian gas.

A "just transition energy"

"With this infrastructure work, what is being done is to connect the gas from Vaca Muerta with a section of a gas pipeline that will allow gas to be taken from the south of the country to the north," he explains. In addition, "with a series of investments in five gas conversion plants", it will be possible to link these gas pipelines with Bolivia to send gas to Brazil, on the one hand, and to the north of Chile, on the other. According to his estimates, if everything goes according to plan, the construction of 132 kilometres of pipelines and the reconversion of the five plants that would allow gas to be transferred from northern Argentina to Bolivia could be ready in less than two years.

Faced with criticism from some sectors that natural gas is not a clean energy - since it emits methane, one of the gases that contributes most to climate change - CAF defends its use as a "transition energy" towards a green matrix through fair processes that benefit the region's population. "For countries like Argentina, it is a fair transition energy," Asinelli points out. "For Latin America and the Caribbean, what we need is to look for spaces that improve, from an environmental point of view, but without forgetting the people, the needs, social growth and the reduction of poverty," he adds, pointing out that in the region there is a "different consensus than in Europe" on energy issues.

"Gas for us is a transitional energy that will help us to achieve the standards of the sustainable development goals, but through a process that is fair for our countries, where we can use our natural resources by lowering the amount of emissions, that is, by stopping using coal plants and using gas, which is clearly an energy that pollutes much less. It is not the ultimate goal, but it is the path that can lead us towards what we call a just transition, where the human and social aspects are not forgotten either," he adds.

Asinelli recognises that those who make public policies have to find a balance between benefiting populations, caring for people and making the right decisions to care for the environment, a task that, he says, "is sometimes not easy". In this sense, the CAF official stresses that the decision to invest in Vaca Muerta has been taken after analysing the previous environmental impact studies and that the disbursements will be made as the work progresses: "I believe that this process of using gas as a transition energy, if it is done well, will clearly bring more development, which is what we are looking for".

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News round-up, Monday, February 13, 2023

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Quote of the day…

We’re experiencing a mental health crisis. Approximately 15.5% of the global population is affected by mental illnesses, and those numbers are rising. Although there are many who require treatment, more than 50% of mental illnesses remain untreated. In the United States, one in five adults suffers from some form of mental illness. Every 40 seconds one person dies from suicide and for every adult who dies from suicide, there are more than 20 others who have attempted to end their life. The ramifications of this go beyond our families and cultures as mental health also has a tremendous economic impact for the cost of treatment as well as the loss of productivity.

Forbes by Bernard Marr

Despite all its problems, Latin America has much to contribute in a troubled world. The far West, as Alain Rouquié called it, has medium development, decisive environmental resources in relation to climate change and natural resources that can contribute exponentially to the information age and digitalisation. Making them count requires a long view and a strategic capacity that we see little of in our rulers at the moment. A change of course is essential if we want to make an impact in the 21st century.

Ernesto Ottone (Valparaíso, 1948) was among those who rejected the proposal for a new Constitution in the plebiscite on 4 September, like 62% of Chileans. "I reject it because I am convinced that it is the best way for a good Constitution", he told EL PAÍS before the referendum.

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Most Read…

What’s Going On Up There? Theories but No Answers in Shootdowns of Mystery Craft.

The U.S. and Canada are investigating three unidentified flying objects shot down over North America in the past three days. Militaries have adjusted radars to try to spot more incursions.

NYT by Julian E. Barnes, Helene Cooper and Edward Wong

The countries warn the EU against an overhaul of the energy market in “crisis mode”.

The European Commission is drafting an overhaul of the EU’s electricity market rules with the aim of better cushioning consumer bills ahead of fossil fuel price spikes and avoiding a repeat of the surge in electricity wort sparked by cuts in Russia’s gas supplies last year.

Ukdaily.news by Mia Gordon

Chile faces largest wildfires since 2017

In DepthFires fueled by drought and heatwaves killed 24 and destroyed 373,000 hectares since February 1.

LE MONDE BY FLORA GENOUX (BUENOS AIRES (ARGENTINA) CORRESPONDENT)

"The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or re-foundation".

This Chilean sociologist, with a communist past and key advisor to the government of socialist Ricardo Lagos, says that a change of course in Latin America is indispensable "if we want to influence the 21st century".

EL PAÍS BY ROCÍO MONTES

Argentina will receive a million-dollar investment to facilitate the export of gas from Vaca Muerta to Brazil and Chile.

CAF - Development Bank of Latin America - will provide 540 million dollars for the construction of a gas pipeline network. Its vice-president, Christian Asinelli, defends the use of natural gas in the region as a "just transition energy".

El País by LORENA ARROYO

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Seafloat-hybrid-power-plant

Armando Rodriguez, Seaboard CEO for the Dominican Republic, concludes: 

 “We are very excited about this project because it will be a big benefit to the community in terms of the environment and the employment we will provide to the area.

Seaboard Dominican Republic

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Cooperate with objective and ethical thinking…

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What is Artificial Intelligency?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is the ability of a computer or a robot controlled by a computer to do tasks that are usually done by humans because they require human intelligence and discernment. Although there are no AIs that can perform the wide variety of tasks an ordinary human can do, some AIs can match humans in specific tasks.

The Incredible Ways Artificial Intelligence Is Now Used In Mental Health

Forbes by Bernard Marr

Stigma

Stereotypes surrounding those with mental illnesses prevent patients from seeking the help they need. According to a World Health Organization study, 30 to 80 percent of those with mental health issues don’t seek treatment. It’s common to hear stereotypes about people with mental health issues like they’re dangerous, incompetent, or responsible for their illness. 

We’re experiencing a mental health crisis. Approximately 15.5% of the global population is affected by mental illnesses, and those numbers are rising. Although there are many who require treatment, more than 50% of mental illnesses remain untreated. In the United States, one in five adults suffers from some form of mental illness. Every 40 seconds one person dies from suicide and for every adult who dies from suicide, there are more than 20 others who have attempted to end their life. The ramifications of this go beyond our families and cultures as mental health also has a tremendous economic impact for the cost of treatment as well as the loss of productivity.

The critical shortfall of psychiatrists and other mental health specialists to provide treatment exacerbates this crisis. In fact, nearly 40% of Americans live where there is a shortage of mental health professionals; 60% of U.S. counties don’t have a psychiatrist. Those that do have access to mental health professionals often forgo treatment because they can’t afford it. Those with depression visit primary care physicians an average of five times a year versus three times for those who don’t have it. Others seek help in emergency rooms which are more expensive. More than $201 billion is spent on mental health annually making mental health the most expensive part of our healthcare system after knocking out heart conditions for the honor.

Examples of current uses of AI in mental health

Researchers are testing different ways that artificial intelligence can help screen, diagnose and treat mental illness.

Researchers from the World Well-Being Project (WWBP) analyzed social media with an AI algorithm to pick out linguistic cues that might predict depression. It turns out that those suffering from depression express themselves on social media in ways that those dealing with other chronic conditions do not such as mentions of loneliness and using words such as "feelings," "I" and "me." The team's findings were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, but after analyzing half a million Facebook posts from people who consented to provide their Facebook status updates and medical records, they were able to identify depression-associated language markers. What the researchers found was that linguistic markers could predict depression up to three months before the person receives a formal diagnosis. Other researchers use technology to explore the way facial expressions, enunciation of words and tone and language could indicate suicide risk.

In addition to researchers, there are several companies using artificial intelligence to help tackle the mental health crisis. Quartet's platform flags possible mental conditions and can refer patients to a provider or a computerized cognitive behavioral therapy program. Ginger’s contribution is a chat application used by employers that provides direct counseling services to employees. Its algorithms analyze the words someone uses and then relies on its training from more than 2 billion behavioral data samples, 45 million chat messages and 2 million clinical assessments to provide a recommendation. The CompanionMX system has an app that allows patients being treated with depression, bipolar disorders, and other conditions to create an audio log where they can talk about how they are feeling. The AI system analyzes the recording as well as looks for changes in behavior for proactive mental health monitoring. Bark, a parental control phone tracker app, monitors major messaging and social media platforms to look for signs of cyberbullying, depression, suicidal thoughts and sexting on a child’s phone.

These are just a few of the innovative solutions that support mental health.

4 Benefits of using AI to help solve the mental health crisis

There are several reasons why AI could be a powerful tool to help us solve the mental health crisis. Here are four benefits:

1.      Support mental health professionals

As it does for many industries, AI can help support mental health professionals in doing their jobs. Algorithms can analyze data much faster than humans, can suggest possible treatments, monitor a patient’s progress and alert the human professional to any concerns. In many cases, AI and a human clinician would work together.

1.      24/7 access

Due to the lack of human mental health professionals, it can take months to get an appointment. If patients live in an area without enough mental health professionals, their wait will be even longer. AI provides a tool that an individual can access all the time, 24/7 without waiting for an appointment.

1.      Not expensive

The cost of care prohibits some individuals from seeking help. Artificial intelligent tools could offer a more accessible solution.

1.      Comfort talking to a bot

While it might take some people time to feel comfortable talking to a bot, the anonymity of an AI algorithm can be positive. What might be difficult to share with a therapist in person is easier for some to disclose to a bot.

Obstacles to overcome

While there is great promise for using AI to help the current mental health crisis, there are still obstacles to overcome. There are significant privacy concerns as well as making people comfortable and willing to accept various levels of being monitored in their day-to-day lives. In addition, there is no regulation for these applications, so it is advised that any app be used in conjunction with a mental health professional. As AI tools are created, it is essential that they are protocols in place to make them safe and effective and built and trained with a diverse data set, so they aren't biased toward a particular population.

Overall, AI has the promise to provide critical resources we need to overcome our mental health crisis.

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Ernesto Cardenal’s Prayer for Marilyn Monroe

She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we’re not saints psychoanalysis was recommended to her...

One of Latin America’s most acclaimed poets, he wrote verses that offered a cosmic fusion of spirituality, politics, science and history, while appearing at frequent lectures and readings that made him a kind of international ambassador for Nicaragua.

Father Cardenal drew few boundaries between his callings. The son of a wealthy Nicaraguan family, he fought with a revolutionary group in his late 20s, then emerged as a leading proponent of liberation theology, which emphasizes Jesus’s message to the poor and oppressed.

The washington post By Harrison Smith

March 2, 2020

Ernesto Cardenal’s Prayer for Marilyn Monroe

Lord

receive this young woman known around the world as Marilyn Monroe
although that wasn’t her real name
(but You know her real name, the name of the orphan raped at the age of 6
and the shopgirl who at 16 had tried to kill herself)
who now comes before You without any makeup
without her Press Agent
without photographers and without autograph hounds,
alone like an astronaut facing night in space.

She dreamed when she was little that she was naked in a church
(according to the Time account)
before a prostrated crowd of people, their heads on the floor
and she had to walk on tiptoe so as not to step on their heads.
You know our dreams better than the psychiatrists.
Church, home, cave, all represent the security of the womb
but something else too …
The heads are her fans, that’s clear
(the mass of heads in the dark under the beam of light).
But the temple isn’t the studios of 20th Century-Fox.
The temple—of marble and gold—is the temple of her body
in which the Son of Man stands whip in hand
driving out the studio bosses of 20th Century-Fox
who made Your house of prayer a den of thieves.

Lord
in this world polluted with sin and radioactivity
You won’t blame it all on a shopgirl
who, like any other shopgirl, dreamed of being a star.
Her dream just became a reality (but like Technicolor’s reality).
She only acted according to the script we gave her
—the story of our own lives. And it was an absurd script.
Forgive her, Lord, and forgive us
for our 20th Century
for this Colossal Super-Production on which we all have worked.
She hungered for love and we offered her tranquilizers.
For her despair, because we’re not saints
psychoanalysis was recommended to her.
Remember, Lord, her growing fear of the camera
and her hatred of makeup—insisting on fresh makeup for each scene—
and how the terror kept building up in her
and making her late to the studios.

Like any other shopgirl
she dreamed of being a star.
And her life was unreal like a dream that a psychiatrist interprets and files.

Her romances were a kiss with closed eyes
and when she opened them
she realized she had been under floodlights
as they killed the floodlights!
and they took down the two walls of the room (it was a movie set)
while the Director left with his scriptbook
because the scene had been shot.
Or like a cruise on a yacht, a kiss in Singapore, a dance in Rio
the reception at the mansion of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
all viewed in a poor apartment’s tiny living room.

The film ended without the final kiss.
She was found dead in her bed with her hand on the phone.
And the detectives never learned who she was going to call.
She was
like someone who had dialed the number of the only friendly voice
and only heard the voice of a recording that says: WRONG NUMBER.
Or like someone who had been wounded by gangsters
reaching for a disconnected phone.

Lord
whoever it might have been that she was going to call
and didn’t call (and maybe it was no one
or Someone whose number isn’t in the Los Angeles phonebook)
You answer that telephone!

(Translated from the Spanish by Jonathan Cohen)

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The Pentagon and intelligence agencies have intensified their study of unexplained incidents near military bases in recent years.

Image: Germán & Co

What’s Going On Up There? Theories but No Answers in Shootdowns of Mystery Craft.

The U.S. and Canada are investigating three unidentified flying objects shot down over North America in the past three days. Militaries have adjusted radars to try to spot more incursions.

NYT by Julian E. Barnes, Helene Cooper and Edward Wong

Published Feb. 12, 2023

WASHINGTON — If the truth is out there, it certainly is not apparent yet.

Pentagon and intelligence officials are trying to make sense of three unidentified flying objects over Alaska, Canada and Michigan that U.S. fighter jets shot down with missiles on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The latest turn in the aerial show taking place in the skies above North America comes after a helter-skelter weekend involving what at times seemed like an invasion of unidentified flying objects.

The latest object had first been spotted on Saturday over Montana, initially sparking debate over whether it even existed. On Saturday, military officials detected a radar blip over Montana, which then disappeared, leading them to conclude it was an anomaly. Then a blip appeared Sunday over Montana, then Wisconsin and Michigan. Once military officials obtained visual confirmation, they ordered an F-16 to shoot it down over Lake Huron.

There are two big questions around the episodes: What were the craft? And why does the United States appear to be seeing more suddenly, and shooting down more?

There are no answers to the first question yet. American officials do not know what the objects were, much less their purpose or who sent them.

For the second, it is not clear if there are suddenly more objects. But what is certain is that in the wake of the recent incursion by a Chinese spy balloon, the U.S. and Canadian militaries are hypervigilant in flagging some objects that might previously have been allowed to pass.

After the transit of the spy balloon this month, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD, adjusted its radar system to make it more sensitive. As a result, the number of objects it detected increased sharply. In other words, NORAD is picking up more incursions because it is looking for them, spurred on by the heightened awareness caused by the furor over the spy balloon, which floated over the continental United States for a week before an F-22 shot it down on Feb. 4.

“We have been more closely scrutinizing our airspace at these altitudes, including enhancing our radar, which may at least partly explain the increase in objects that we’ve detected over the past week,” Melissa Dalton, the assistant secretary of defense for homeland defense and hemispheric affairs, said at a news conference on Sunday evening.

American officials have not completely discounted theories that there could also be more objects, period. Some officials theorize that the objects could be from China, or another foreign power, and may be aimed at testing detection abilities after the spy balloon.

The object spotted approaching Lake Huron on Sunday was flying at 20,000 feet and presented a potential threat to civil aviation, so President Biden ordered it shot down, U.S. officials said. It had an octagonal structure with strings hanging off but had no discernible payload, they added.

U.S. and Canadian officials say the objects shot down on Friday and Saturday were also flying lower than the spy balloon, posing a greater danger to civilian aircraft, which prompted leaders to order them destroyed. Those two objects were flying over parts of Alaska and the Yukon that have few residents, and the third object downed on Sunday was over water, so risks posed by falling debris were minimal, they said.

The spy balloon that drifted across the United States flew much higher, at 60,000 feet, and did not pose a danger to aircraft. But any falling debris could have hit people on the ground, Pentagon officials said.

Throughout the weekend, officials said they were still trying to determine what the three objects were. The first, a Defense Department official said, is most likely not a balloon — and it broke into pieces after it was shot down on Friday. Saturday’s object was described by Canadian authorities as cylindrical, and American officials say it is more likely it was a balloon of some kind. Sunday’s object appeared unlikely to be a balloon, one official said.

NORAD radar tracked the first two objects for at least 12 hours before they were shot down. But Defense Department officials have never said whether they picked the objects up on radar before they neared American airspace. One official said it is unclear what keeps the objects aloft.

U.S. officials said they are reviewing video and other sensor readings collected by the American pilots who observed the objects before their destruction. But the exact nature of the objects, where they are from and what they were intended for will not be confirmed until the F.B.I. and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have the chance to thoroughly examine the debris, officials said.

Asked during a news conference on Sunday whether he had ruled out extraterrestrial origins, Gen. Glen D. VanHerck, the commander of the Air Force’s Northern Command, said, “I haven’t ruled out anything at this point.” But in interviews Sunday, national security officials discounted any thoughts that what the Air Force shot out of the sky represented any sort of alien visitors. No one, one senior official said, thinks these things are anything other than devices fashioned here on Earth.

Luis Elizondo, the military intelligence officer who ran the Pentagon’s U.F.O. program until 2017, concurred. But he said that the Biden administration must find a way to balance vigilance over what is going on in the skies above America against “chasing our tail” whenever something unknown shows up — a tough task, he said.

For years, adversaries have sent low-tech gadgets into the skies above the United States, Mr. Elizondo said.

“What’s happening now is you have low-end technology being used to harass America,” he said in an interview. “It is a high-impact, low-cost way for China to do this, and the more you look up in the sky, the more you will see.”

At the urging of Congress, the Pentagon and intelligence agencies have intensified their study of unexplained incidents near military bases in recent years. The studies on what the intelligence community calls unidentified aerial phenomena have pinpointed previously undetected efforts to conduct surveillance on American military exercises and bases. Many of those unexplained incidents have been balloons, and some of them are now believed to be attempted surveillance activity by China or other powers, both using balloons and surveillance drones.

In a public report released last month, the intelligence community said that of 366 unexplained incidents, 163 were later identified as balloons. A related classified document whose findings were reported this month by The New York Times said at least two incidents at U.S. military bases could be examples of advanced aerial technology, possibly developed by China.

“We can now assess flight patterns and trajectory in a much more scientific way,” said Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat who wrote the recent legislation mandating greater internal military reporting and analysis of aerial phenomena, leading to more documentation of sightings. “You need to know who’s using the technology and what it is.”

The most alarming theory under consideration by some U.S. officials is that the objects are sent by China or another power in an attempt to learn more about American radar or early warning systems.

A senior administration official said one theory — and the person stressed that it is just a theory — is that China or Russia sent the objects to test American intelligence-gathering capabilities. They could be sent to learn both how quickly the United States becomes aware of an intrusion and how quickly the military can respond to such an incursion, the official said.

American officials are united in their belief that the spy balloon that transited the United States was a Chinese machine meant to conduct surveillance on American military bases. Officials said it was unclear if China had complete control of the balloon during its whole journey. But officials said China did have at least a limited ability to steer it, and the balloon maneuvered on Feb. 3 before it was shot down the next day.

Another American official said the Chinese spy balloon was equipped with a self-destruct mechanism, but Beijing did not use it, a potential sign that Chinese officials wanted to continue to collect intelligence, even after it was discovered.

The disclosure of the balloon by the Pentagon on Feb. 2 led to a public diplomatic crisis between China and the United States. Beijing said it had the right to respond further. On Sunday, a Chinese newspaper reported that local maritime authorities in Shandong Province on the east coast had spotted an “unidentified flying object” in waters by the city of Rizhao and were preparing to shoot it down. State-run news organizations reposted the information.

If any of the devices destroyed in North America over the past three days were Chinese, it would amount to a major provocation on the heels of the spy balloon, one reason some officials said not to jump to the conclusion that the objects are surveillance devices sent from Beijing.

Officials in Beijing seem to want to limit tensions over the spy balloon, suggesting to some U.S. officials that the latest objects are less likely to be deliberate Chinese provocations or tests.

Pentagon officials have been raising flags about deficiencies in North America’s aging warning systems, radar and sensors.

Speaking last year at the Aspen Security Conference in Colorado, General VanHerck said that the United States had struggled to detect certain intrusions, what he called “domain awareness challenges.” General VanHerck said the NORAD radars could not adequately detect hypersonics and other threats.

But, he also said, the United States and Canada were investing in new over-the-horizon radar to better identify potential threats, as well as artificial intelligence systems to help pick out possible intrusions.

“I’m very encouraged with where we’re going,” General VanHerck said last July, “but we still have some challenges to work on.”

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Image: Germán & Co

The countries warn the EU against an overhaul of the energy market in “crisis mode”.

Ukdaily.news by Mia Gordon

February 13, 2023

The European Commission is drafting an overhaul of the EU’s electricity market rules with the aim of better cushioning consumer bills ahead of fossil fuel price spikes and avoiding a repeat of the surge in electricity wort sparked by cuts in Russia’s gas supplies last year.

The seven countries, led by Denmark, said in a letter that the existing market design in Europe had encouraged lower electricity prices for years, helped expand renewable energy and ensured that enough electricity was produced to meet demand and avoid shortages.

“We must resist the temptation to kill the golden goose that has been our single market for electricity for the past decade,” said Lars Aagaard, Denmark’s energy minister.

Countries said there was some room for improvement, especially given the surge in electricity costs over the past year. However, any changes must ensure the market continues to function and incentivize massive investments in renewable energy, they said.

“Any reform that goes beyond targeted adjustments to the existing framework should be underpinned by an in-depth impact assessment and not adopted in crisis mode,” reads the letter to the Commission, seen by Reuters.

Other countries, including Spain and France, are pursuing deeper reforms. Spain has proposed a switch to longer-term fixed price contracts for power plants to try to limit price spikes.

The seven countries said in their letter that related schemes – such as Contracts for Difference (CfDs) – could play a role, but they should be voluntary, focused on new renewable energy and still “responsive” to the market.

Electricity industry lobby group Eurelectric has also warned against making CFDs mandatory as it could undermine competition in the electricity market and discourage investors.

In their letter, the seven countries supported an idea already discussed by the Commission to make it easier for consumers to choose between electricity contracts with fluctuating and fixed prices.

However, they pushed back another Commission proposal to extend a temporary EU measure reclaiming windfall revenues from non-gas generators.

“That could jeopardize investor confidence in the investments needed,” the countries said in the letter, citing EU estimates that hundreds of billions of euros in renewable energy investments are needed annually to help countries convert from Russian fossil fuels get off.

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The fire in the vicinity of the city of Dichato, in the south of Chile, on February 10, 2023.

Image: Le Monde by JAVIER TORRES / AFP

Chile faces largest wildfires since 2017

Le Monde by Flora Genoux (Buenos Aires (Argentina) correspondent)

Published on February 12, 2023 

In DepthFires fueled by drought and heatwaves killed 24 and destroyed 373,000 hectares since February 1.

Helpless firefighters standing in front of a wall of flames, inhabitants trying to smother the blaze with buckets of water, a line of fire, visible from the sky, advancing relentlessly over the forest... The violent fires that have been raging in Chile since February 1, in the middle of the southern summer, are delivering their share of apocalyptic images.

The so-called south-central region of the country – the provinces of Maule, Nuble, Biobio and Araucania, located some 280 km South of Santiago – saw thousands of hectares destroyed.

The toll as of Friday, February 10, stood at 24 dead, 1,250 homes wrecked and more than 2,000 being taken care of by health services. In total, more than 373,000 hectares were blown by the disaster. The country is witnessing the worst fires since 2017 during which 467,000 hectares disappeared.

Chilean President Gabriel Boric spoke earlier this week of "very difficult days" while the fires had already been active for a week. He called for the cooperation of all institutions including the private sector.

"In five days, we are seeing a burned area equivalent to two years of fire," Carolina Toha, minister of the interior, said on Monday. This week, more than 5,600 Chilean firefighters continued to fight the flames, with the support of international organizations.

Argentina, Mexico, but also Spain or the United States sent material and human rescue teams. France announced on Tuesday it was sending 80 firemen and rescue workers. The day before, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Twitter: "The Chilean people can count on the support of France to fight against this plague."

The European Union also announced it was sending over firefighters, doctors and experts. "No matter how many planes or how much money is dedicated to fighting the fires, they have become uncontrollable," Roberto Rondanelli, a meteorologist at the University of Chile, said. On Friday, 321 fires were still active. The experts are clear: The origin of the fires is above all human, whether criminal or accidental. "There is a legitimate suspicion related to the intentionality [of the fires], which is under investigation," Boric said on Wednesday. At least 28 people have been arrested.

However, a series of factors explain the speed and intensity of the fires. First, there is climate change, the vehicle for a historic "mega-drought" in Chile which has been ongoing for about 13 years.

The drought is reflected in a historic rainfall deficit of 30% over the period 2010-2019, according to a report by Chile's Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CR2). In the last 50 years, maximum summer temperatures increased by 0.43°C per decade, the CR2 wrote in a note last week.

"All events with temperatures above 40°C have occurred in the last decade," it said. Regions afflicted by the fires were experiencing a heatwave with temperatures sometimes exceeding the 40°C threshold.

An alert for high temperature ran until Saturday for an area encompassing more than 900 km from North to South, from the Coquimbo region to Nuble.

Pine and eucalyptus trees as far as the eye can see

"There is also a strong accumulation of combustible material," Miguel Castillo, a forest engineer at the University of Chile said. Pine and eucalyptus trees are planted as far as the eye can see by the wood industry.

An engine for the regional economy, the idea was encouraged under Chile's military dictatorship (1973-1990). The industry is confronted with territorial conflicts involving part of the indigenous Mapuche population who claim ancestral lands held by forest owners.

In 2022, exports from the wood sector amounted to €6.5 billion according to the Chilean Forestry Institute, amounting to more than 111,000 jobs.

However, pine and eucalyptus are exotic trees that require more water than endemic species. They dry up the waterways that could serve as a natural barrier to the flames. "With high heat, they also tend to dry out faster than endemic trees. Therefore, they burn more and facilitate the spread of fires, a phenomenon also reinforced by their density," Rondanelli said.

The winds that blew over the region over the past few days contributed to the spread of the fires. "It is absolutely necessary to rethink the productive system by planting endemic trees. After the great fires of 2017, where there were endemic trees, pine and eucalyptus trees were planted instead," said Rondanelli.

Despite a smaller amount of hectares burned this time (the great fires of 2017 resulted in the death of 11) the country is mourning more deaths. "This is related to the number of outbreaks which are more numerous and scattered. This represents a greater challenge in terms of coordination, prioritization and access to areas to be evacuated," Castillo said.

The proximity of tree plantations to residential areas is also blamed for the higher number of deaths. In 2014, a proposal to modify forest regulation was presented by Alejandro Navarro who was then a leftwing senator of the Biobio region.

It provided for a minimum distance of 500 meters between plantations and residential areas or roads. In 2015, another parliamentary initiative encompassing the previous text also proposed banning new plantations of "highly combustible" species. This time, the legislation did not go through.

As the smoke from the fires reaches as far as the capital, Santiago, CO2 emissions generated by the fires are triggering concern. With the risk of more episodes of this magnitude in the future, the fires "may become one of the most important causes of greenhouse gas emissions in the country," according to the CR2.

In 2017, fires alone accounted for 90% of total emissions in a baseline year, 2016. They also pose a great threat to biodiversity, Maisa Rojas, minister for the environment, said.

Faced with the emergency, the Chilean government announced a series of aid mechanisms destined for the residents of the affected regions. On Friday, authorities ordered a curfew to prevent possible looting of evacuated homes.

Germán & Co

"The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or re-foundation".

This Chilean sociologist, with a communist past and key advisor to the government of socialist Ricardo Lagos, says that a change of course in Latin America is indispensable "if we want to influence the 21st century".

El País by ROCÍO MONTES

Santiago de Chile - 11 Feb 2023 

Ernesto Ottone (Valparaíso, 1948) was among those who rejected the proposal for a new Constitution in the plebiscite on 4 September, like 62% of Chileans. "I reject it because I am convinced that it is the best way for a good Constitution", he told EL PAÍS before the referendum. With a communist past until the end of the 1970s - he was a world leader of his youth - the sociologist was a key strategic adviser to the government of the socialist Ricardo Lagos (2000-2006). He is an intellectual who looks to the public rather than a politician who looks to books. In his latest publication, Crónica de una odisea, del estallido social al estallido de las urnas, he describes the last three years in Chile as a "turbulent, unstable and tense period, very different from the one that has accompanied the country's progress since the return to democracy". In this interview, conducted in his flat in Providencia, in the Chilean capital, in the middle of summer with the city empty, he analyses the political scene facing Chile in 2023.

Question: What has happened in Chile since the plebiscite of 4 September, when 62% of voters rejected the proposed new constitution?

Answer. September 4 was not a triumph of conservatism over change, as was perceived by some observers outside the country, but it was the return of history. The compulsory vote showed a more complete Chile, not only that of the mobilised forces, and produced a result that stunned the government.

Q. What was the text that was rejected like?

A. The text that the constitutional convention presented to the plebiscite was a mixture of constitutional text and partisan political programme, which hurt representative democracy and the balance of power and which artificially exacerbated the issue of nationalities. This was not accepted by Chileans who want a new constitution that reflects a social, modern, democratic and inclusive state. Chileans do not want to replace the authoritarian traces of the past with new authoritarian dangers.

Q. How did President Boric's government, which was for the alternative that lost, stand after the referendum?

A. President Boric weakened his authority and his role as head of state by merging with that project. Partly because he partially shared it, I believe, and partly under pressure from the ruling group around him, which in truth represents only a minority sector, I fear, of those who brought him to the government, because the rest were reformist voters who voted against the extreme right candidate in the 2021 presidential elections. Today the government has included sectors of the traditional left, which occupy important positions that help to contain the excesses of doctrinarism and imperfection, although they do not always succeed in doing so.

Q. Chile is making a second attempt at a new constitution. Do you think this is necessary?

A. Yes, of course. Chileans rejected a text, not the idea of a new Constitution that has greater legitimacy, that responds to the challenges of the 21st century, that frames a social state and that protects individual liberties and encourages greater inclusiveness. I believe that the newly initiated new process, with greater institutional thickness, will be able to achieve a Constitution acceptable to the vast majority of the country.

Q. 2023 will be a difficult year for Chile, with an economic recession...

A. The situation is difficult for this year, not only in Chile, but in the whole world. It will require a lot of political capacity, you can't keep taking one step in one direction and another in the opposite direction. The time will come when President Boric will have to choose between reform or refoundation.

Q. The president has very high disapproval, 66%, according to the latest Cadem. How do you overcome this bad moment of popularity?

A. He will only be able to recover from his high level of disapproval if his ability to govern improves, if he generates broad agreements on economic and social problems in the fight against crime, on changing the tax system and improving the pension system, on the functioning of the education and health systems in a non-traumatic way. In short, if it is dominated by a state vocation that has so far appeared only intermittently.

Q. This year, Chile commemorates the 50th anniversary of the 1973 coup d'état. How do you see Chile on this date?

A. Chile has no room to increase its internal conflicts and generate a more polarised situation. The commemoration of the 1973 coup d'état should be read as a national decision never to repeat that tragedy. This requires first and foremost a well-functioning democracy. It must be commemorated in a sober, profound and historic way. The "never again" and the republican character that marked the 30th anniversary 20 years ago, in 2003, when Chile was moving forward in all areas, must be present.

Q. Are you one of those who believe that the far right is growing stronger in Chile and that it has presidential options?

A. For that to happen there would have to be a collapse of the traditional right and a predominance in its electorate of those who most yearn for authoritarianism. The rebirth of reformist centre and centre-left forces would have to fail and the more extreme sectors of the radical left would have to predominate. This could generate in the country a demand for authoritarianism at any price, led by the extreme right. I hope that this does not happen, that the gods do not blind the democrats. But to avoid such tendencies, realism, political generosity and deep democratic convictions are required.

Q. While this is happening in Chile, how do you, a sociologist who made a career in ECLAC, see the rest of Latin America?

A. Latin America is one of the regions hardest hit by this sad and fragmented phase of a globalisation in decline. There is no longer one dictatorship in Latin America, but three. There are countries with a strong democratic degradation, others with inconsistent democracies, within a short period of time there have been two attempted coups d'état and democratic institutions have been weakened in general.

Q. We are in a violent region...

A. We make up 8.6% of the world's population, but one third of the world's crimes - excluding war crimes - are committed in our region. After the end of the economic boom between 2003 and 2013, the economy began to fall, and the poverty and equality indicators, which had indicated progress in the right direction, began to go back in the wrong direction. This situation will be very difficult to reverse with the current economic situation. Citizen demands have no capacity to respond and the fragility of democracies is spreading.

Q. Are we facing a pendulum swing to the left, considering the sign of several Latin American governments?

A. There is the illusion of a pink tide, but it is very heterogeneous and probably volatile. In general, elections tend to be won by those in opposition. The danger of the spread of authoritarian populism of different signs is just around the corner. But this is not an inevitable fate as in the Greek tragedies. It does, however, require a gigantic effort.

Q. Where should this effort be focused?

A. Resuming economic growth, generating a productive transformation that adds value to our generous natural resource base. Modernising our states and democratic institutions, enhancing cooperation between the public, private and civil society sectors, and relaunching efforts to achieve greater levels of equality and poverty reduction by prioritising public policies and creating a progressive fiscal pact. Combat organised crime through coordinated intelligence, preventing the development of corruption and better management of mega-cities. Overcoming the region's invisibility in the world, the absence of a single voice to put forward its interests, and avoiding the ideologisation of regional organisations that are often linked to discourses of the past that are alien to the current reality.

Q. Do you see any room for optimism?

A. Despite all its problems, Latin America has much to contribute in a troubled world. The far West, as Alain Rouquié called it, has medium development, decisive environmental resources in relation to climate change and natural resources that can contribute exponentially to the information age and digitalisation. Making them count requires a long view and a strategic capacity that we see little of in our rulers at the moment. A change of course is essential if we want to make an impact in the 21st century.

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Source: El País

Argentina will receive a million-dollar investment to facilitate the export of gas from Vaca Muerta to Brazil and Chile.

CAF - Development Bank of Latin America - will provide 540 million dollars for the construction of a gas pipeline network. Its vice-president, Christian Asinelli, defends the use of natural gas in the region as a "just transition energy".

El País by LORENA ARROYO

01 FEB 2023

For more than a decade, Vaca Muerta has represented a hope for Argentina's battered economy that has yet to materialise. The 30,000-kilometre field in Patagonia makes Argentina the country with the second largest shale gas resources in the world. But getting it out and transporting it has proved a complex task since exploitation began in 2012. Now, a new investment agreement has rekindled the hopes of those hoping for a definitive take-off of the field.

Economy Minister Sergio Massa announced last week that he had reached an agreement with CAF - Development Bank of Latin America* to finance a gas pipeline that will facilitate exports to Chile and Brazil. "It will be 540 million dollars to build the La Carlota-Tío Pujio gas pipeline, the Reversal del Norte and the compressor plants," the minister said on his Twitter account. The investment, which will be approved in March by CAF's board of directors, foresees the construction of kilometres of pipelines to transport gas from Vaca Muerta, in the west of the country, to Santa Fe, in the northeast. This, the minister said, would increase "the possibilities of gas export volumes" to neighbouring countries.

According to Reuters, with these works the country expects to be able to reverse the energy balance deficit of $5 billion recorded in 2022 and achieve a surplus of about $12 billion in 2025. "From the point of view of the country's productive activities, obviously developing the potential of Vaca Muerta is very important for the economy," acknowledged CAF vice-president Christian Asinelli in an interview with América Futura. The official stresses that the work to be financed by the multilateral organisation will be beneficial for the region's energy integration and will reduce Argentina's dependence on current imports of Bolivian gas.

A "just transition energy"

"With this infrastructure work, what is being done is to connect the gas from Vaca Muerta with a section of a gas pipeline that will allow gas to be taken from the south of the country to the north," he explains. In addition, "with a series of investments in five gas conversion plants", it will be possible to link these gas pipelines with Bolivia to send gas to Brazil, on the one hand, and to the north of Chile, on the other. According to his estimates, if everything goes according to plan, the construction of 132 kilometres of pipelines and the reconversion of the five plants that would allow gas to be transferred from northern Argentina to Bolivia could be ready in less than two years.

Faced with criticism from some sectors that natural gas is not a clean energy - since it emits methane, one of the gases that contributes most to climate change - CAF defends its use as a "transition energy" towards a green matrix through fair processes that benefit the region's population. "For countries like Argentina, it is a fair transition energy," Asinelli points out. "For Latin America and the Caribbean, what we need is to look for spaces that improve, from an environmental point of view, but without forgetting the people, the needs, social growth and the reduction of poverty," he adds, pointing out that in the region there is a "different consensus than in Europe" on energy issues.

"Gas for us is a transitional energy that will help us to achieve the standards of the sustainable development goals, but through a process that is fair for our countries, where we can use our natural resources by lowering the amount of emissions, that is, by stopping using coal plants and using gas, which is clearly an energy that pollutes much less. It is not the ultimate goal, but it is the path that can lead us towards what we call a just transition, where the human and social aspects are not forgotten either," he adds.

Asinelli recognises that those who make public policies have to find a balance between benefiting populations, caring for people and making the right decisions to care for the environment, a task that, he says, "is sometimes not easy". In this sense, the CAF official stresses that the decision to invest in Vaca Muerta has been taken after analysing the previous environmental impact studies and that the disbursements will be made as the work progresses: "I believe that this process of using gas as a transition energy, if it is done well, will clearly bring more development, which is what we are looking for".

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