Conspiracy theories swirl around Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine

Dan Patterson

The Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine became a target of conspiracy theories and disinformation campaigns as soon as it was announced, reaching millions of people on sites like Twitter, Reddit and 4chan, according to a recent analysis from a cyber defense firm.

COVID-19 conspiracy narratives, like the false belief that the vaccine was delayed for political reasons, flourished on social networks in the fall and early winter, according to the New York tech security firm Blackbird. The firm created an algorithm to analyze posts in real-time by hunting for signals of what CEO Wasim Khaled calls "synthetic amplification," which indicate activity by botnets and anti-vaccination influencers.


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How COVID-19 conspiracy theories reach millions of people online



These bogus notions about the vaccines, amplified by a relatively small number of fake accounts and real influencers, reached millions of people, Khaled said. © Provided by CBS News An algorithm discovered that COVID-19 conspiracies increased as the Pfizer vaccine was announced in 2020. / Credit: Blackbird AI

Botnets and inauthentic accounts — automated accounts not actively managed by humans — have behavioral signatures that are easy for AI to identify, but hard for social networks to eradicate. Companies like Facebook and Twitter use both machine-learning algorithms and human moderators to reduce the spread of conspiracies, but Khaled said botnets are effective because they're inexpensive and easy to deploy.

"Bots and influencers work in tandem," he explained. "We can't prove if they collude behind the scenes, but social media data shows clearly that they influence each other by sharing the same links, repeating the same phrases, tagging the same accounts and jumping in on trending hashtags."

For example, some botnets reach real influencers by spamming conspiracy links to trending hashtags. Another common tactic is to generate fake trends by synchronizing hundreds of posts using similar anti-vaccine and pseudoscientific claims.© Provided by CBS News Mainstream influencers can amplify COVID-19 vaccine misinformation and conspiracies. / Credit: Twitter

One common tactic is to co-opt trending topics by spamming content with provocative rhetoric that is intended to encourage engagement. This helps raise the visibility and reach of a piece of content, which increases the likelihood that a politically aligned influencer will further share the content. The content gains momentum by muddying the waters between facts and falsehoods. For example, themes that connect health restrictions like stay-at-home orders and mask-wearing with an assault on "freedom" and political "rights" prospered with bots and influencers for the duration of the pandemic.

Many online influencer accounts are famous and have millions of followers, but smaller accounts can carry a lot of clout as well. Khaled said that many of the conspiracies peddled by influencers use "anti-vax rhetoric and pseudoscientific messaging" to undermine people's confidence, such as the false notion mRNA vaccines alter human DNA, an idea that proliferated widely across Twitter when the Pfizer vaccine was announced last year.

The Twitter accounts @LotusOak2, @BrianGPowell, and @DVaugha49207961 reached millions of people by connecting COVID-19 vaccine conspiracies to existing anti-vaccination disinformation networks. These accounts pushed false narratives that the COVID-19 vaccine causes infertility by attaching them to the hashtags #InformedConscent, #sterilization, #BigPharma, #Genocide and #ExposeBillGates.

© Provided by CBS News According to the algorithm, small influencers played a large role in spreading vaccine conspiracies on social media. / Credit: Blackbird AI

"When an influencer likes or shares a post, even if it's a low-quality bot post, algorithms pick up that signal and spread the fake content far and wide. This means that partisan and divisive content has an advantage. The sheer volume of synthetic activity on social media is staggering," Khaled said. The posts the company identified were political in nature and sought "to exploit growing partisan divides within American society."

Pfizer's vaccine, announced just two days after the contentious November 7 election, uncorked a torrent of political and health conspiracies. One prominent theory discovered by the AI falsely alleged that pharmaceutical companies deliberately delayed the vaccine's announcement to harm former President Donald Trump. Another claims falsely that the COVID-19 vaccine is part of a population control scheme.

The AI technology found that some of the top hashtags used by bots and influencers to spread conspiracies were #StopTheSteal, #VaccineGate, #MAGA, #BigPhrama and #SleepyJoe. The tags #StopTheSteal and #MAGA2020LandslideVictory were particularly effective at connecting the Pfizer-election theft conspiracy with broad conspiracies about election fraud.

The QAnon conspiracy theory group used social media influencers and bots to promote the conspiracy theory video "Plandemic," in which discredited scientist Judy Mikovits argues against vaccines and public-safety measures like wearing masks. QAnon also attached vaccine conspiracy theories to the New World Order population control conspiracy and to the Great Reset, a post-pandemic policy proposal drafted by the World Economic Forum.

© Provided by CBS News The algorithm discovered COVID-19 vaccine conspiracy theories that falsely allege the vaccine was delayed for political reasons. / Credit: Twitter

Khaled declined to attribute bot activity to a specific actor, saying that "social media is a dynamic and malleable battle space." Sophisticated botting tools are available for purchase at low cost, and hacking software is widely available for free on the dark web.

Disinformation spreaders are generally motivated by money or political influence. Some are large, organized networks. But many more are small or independent operators. In the U.S., accounts deliberately or inadvertently spreading COVID-19 conspiracies belong to spammers and for-hire cybercriminals, clout-chasing influencers, politicians and political entities, and agenda-driven grassroots organizations, according to Khaled.

Such parties uses conspiracies "to frame the world in terms of powerful and sinister hidden forces," Khaled said. "Our AI found that fear is a useful motivator."

Canadian maker of promising mRNA vaccine looks to test it against Pfizer in new trial

OTTAWA — A homegrown mRNA vaccine for COVID-19 shows promising results in its first small trial and its maker is hoping to test it directly against the vaccine from Pfizer-BioNTech.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Calgary-based Providence Therapeutics says its vaccine produced no serious adverse events and developed good antibodies against COVID-19 that "compare favourably" with the two mRNA vaccines already on the market from Pfizer and Moderna.

"We're extremely pleased," said Providence CEO Brad Sorenson.

The Phase 1 trial included 60 healthy adults between 18 and 64, with more than half of them receiving two doses of the vaccine, four weeks apart. The results have not yet been peer-reviewed.

Sorenson said the next step is supposed to be a Phase 2 head-to-head trial that would test the effectiveness of Providence against Pfizer. Most vaccines in Phase 2 have been tested only against a placebo, but Sorenson said in a pandemic he feels it is unethical to give someone a placebo when they could otherwise be vaccinated.

But to do the trial, Providence needs 500 doses of Pfizer, which he said neither the company nor the National Research Council has been willing to provide.

A spokeswoman for Pfizer said Thursday the company's focus is only on getting the vaccine to meet an "urgent public health need" and will only sell its vaccine to the federal government.

"As such, we are not providing supply of our vaccine to third-parties to study the vaccine in comparative trials," said Christina Antoniou.

Pfizer is the main component of Canada's vaccination campaign to date, accounting for two-thirds of the deliveries as of this week.

A spokesman for Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne said the government has informed Providence Ottawa is willing to help fund its Phase 2 trial, and continue to work with the company.

"Minister Champagne has spoken directly with Providence Therapeutics’ CEO and the chair of their board of directors to discuss our continued support for their work as they bring their vaccine candidate through the early stages of development," said John Power.

A spokesman for the National Research Council said it doesn't have access to doses of Pfizer or Moderna to help Providence, but is discussing the request with other departments that might be able to help, including Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Sorenson said Providence is also discussing with the World Health Organization the possibility of doing a Phase 3 trial in a developing country.

Sorenson said if Health Canada supports both trials, they could be wrapped up by the end of the year. But Sorenson said he doesn't feel supported by Ottawa and has threatened to take the business outside the country.

The company has production agreements in place that should be able to produce 200 million doses a year, he said.

Providence is one of six Canadian companies that received funding from the National Research Council for COVID-19 vaccines that were in early stages of development.

The company received $4.9 million last October to help fund its Phase 1 trial. It also received $5 million in January from the next-generation manufacturing supercluster to help scale up its manufacturing of mRNA.

Canada currently doesn't make any of the vaccines it is using — Pfizer is being made in Europe and the United States, Canada's doses of Moderna are all coming from Europe, and Oxford-AstraZeneca is coming from the United States, India and South Korea.

The only Canadian-made vaccine among the seven procured by Canada for COVID-19 to date is Medicago's plant-based protein vaccine, which is now in a Phase 3 trial and could be ready for mass production before the end of the year.

Medicago received $173 million in October to push its vaccine forward as well as an undisclosed sum for a contract to provide Canada at least 20 million doses if it is approved. Some of it will be made in Canada, but production will also take place in the U.S.

A lack of domestic drug manufacturing hurt Canada's vaccination program, particularly early on, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the government is intent on fixing that ahead of the next global health crisis.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 13, 2021.

Mia Rabson, The Canadian Press

Canada’s new manufacturing era trades dusty factories for robotics, 3D printer

When Tony Chahine’s father developed dementia, he wanted to stay connected with him while monitoring his worsening health.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Yet despite the hyper-connectivity of the world at large, Chahine realized some of the most vulnerable people were being left behind.

The former CEO of Cotton Ginny, a serial entrepreneur who more recently ran a boutique investment and consulting firm, developed a line of clothing with built-in sensors to measure everything from heart rate and body temperature to posture and location. It's now undergoing trials in several hospitals.

“With textiles we have the ability to capture information continuously,” says Ilaria Varoli, executive vice-president of the textile computing startup Myant Inc., which Chahine founded in 2010.

"The innovation starts at the yarn level, for example with extruded yarn or metal yarn … with sensors and actuators embedded into the textiles," she says. "The idea is to make textiles the interface, but then it's processed through our innovative software platform."

Myant is at the forefront of Canada’s new manufacturing era, one that trades dusty factories and assembly lines for state-of-the-art facilities, technology and research and development.

It’s an emerging field that includes robotics, 3D printing, machine vision and automation, and is expected to create thousands of jobs over the next decade.

But advanced manufacturing has an image problem, says Jayson Myers, CEO of the industry group Next Generation Manufacturing Canada or NGen.

“We have an outdated idea of what manufacturing is all about,” he says. “There’s this impression that it’s manual, repetitive work on assembly lines.”

A recent survey conducted by NGen and Abacus Data reflected that way of thinking. The survey found that most people believed jobs in advanced manufacturing are repetitive, unsafe and unfulfilling.

Those preconceived ideas have made it unattractive to pursue careers in manufacturing, creating a workforce shortage, Myers says.

But there’s hope.

“When we talk with young people about working with new technologies to address some of the world's biggest problems like climate change, life-threatening diseases and food insecurity, they get excited about it,” says Myers, a former CEO of Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters.

“We need to do a better job explaining what advanced manufacturing is and the jobs available."

At Myant, for example, the company now has about 130 employees, including engineers, data scientists, fashion designers, technicians and programmers.

But when Chahine came up with the idea of creating smart clothing, becoming a manufacturer wasn’t part of the equation, Varoli says.

“We didn't really want to be in manufacturing — at least not to begin with,” she says. “But then we realized the supply chain would all be overseas.”

The company struggled to find suppliers that operated in a clean enough environment to produce Myant’s high-tech textiles, since they would ultimately serve as medical devices.

Outsourcing also means a slower turnaround of prototypes.

So the startup switched gears, importing 3D robotic knitting machines from Germany and Italy to its nearly 7,500-square-metre facility in Etobicoke, Ont.

“Instead of waiting a month for prototypes to come back from China or India, we could produce three prototypes in a day,” Varoli says.

The company’s in-house brand, SKIIN, is a line of smart clothing, including underwear, bras, base layers, socks, mattress covers and seat covers.

The garments collect information about a person through sensors knitted into the fabric, and a small electronic pod tucked into the band or edge of the garment sends that information to a mobile device, where it's tracked using an app.

Myant now has clinical trials with Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., Southlake Regional Health Centre in Newmarket, Ont., and SickKids in Toronto.

Yet the company has also run into challenges finding workers.

It recently partnered with Ryerson University, putting a machine at the school in the hopes of training students and developing a curriculum.

“We’re trying to democratize and standardize this new industry,” Varoli says. “Advanced manufacturing is going to be a huge component of our future.”

Another example of Canada's new-age manufacturers is A&K Robotics.

The Vancouver-based company has invented a system that can attach on to anything with wheels and turn it into a self-driving robot.

Its “mobile autonomous navigation platforms” are used in the janitorial industry, automating floor cleaners in commercial and public spaces like airports, malls and schools — a particularly helpful technology given the demand for increased cleaning during the pandemic.

“We’ve retrofitted floor scrubbing machines to turn them into self-driving robots,” says Jessica Yip, co-founder of A&K Robotics.

The value of having a robust manufacturing sector was made clear during the pandemic, Myers says.

“It’s shown the importance of having advanced manufacturing capabilities in Canada," he said, pointing to the production of vaccines, test kits and personal protective equipment.

NGen has developed a website, careersofthefuture.ca, to help students, parents and teachers learn more about advanced manufacturing.

It's also launching a contest called Manufacturing the Future that will award 10 bursaries valued at $10,000 each to Canadian residents between the ages of 15 and 18 based on a 500-word essay on advanced manufacturing.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 13, 2021.

Brett Bundale, The Canadian Press

Renewables evolution or revolution? 

Pace of tech investments will decide

© Reuters/PASCAL ROSSIGNOL FILE PHOTO: An aerial view shows power-generating windmill turbines in a wind farm in Graincourt-les-Havrincourt, France

By Divya Chowdhury


(Reuters) -

Global investment in energy transition technologies needs to more than double over the next few decades to significantly reduce the cost of renewables, which are set to provide around 60% of the world's energy needs by 2050, industry officials say.

A breakthrough in commercial technology to decarbonise projects could reduce both project time and costs, policy advisors and company executives told the Reuters Global Markets Forum, during sessions held last week.

"The 2020s have to be a decade of innovation and early deployment - of low-carbon hydrogen - to get costs down," said Tim Gould, head of division for energy supply outlooks and investment at the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie forecast that low and zero-carbon sources including renewables are set to provide 63% of world energy demand by 2050 (not 60% by 2030), if the Paris Agreement's most ambitious goal of limiting the rise in average global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius are met.

Scaling up and commercializing hydrogen produced from renewable energy for carbon capture and storage (CCS) will help many heavy industries such as green steel, fertiliser and cement, as well as heating, to decarbonise, said Wood Mackenzie's chairman and chief analyst Simon Flowers.

"The tech is oven-ready," he said.

However, attracting investments to fund this transition is a key issue.

Gauri Singh, deputy director-general at the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), said global investments in energy transition technologies need to more than double to $4 trillion annually until 2050, from $1.8 trillion in 2019, to achieve goals set under the Paris climate accord.

"The total energy investment required is $131 trillion... $98 trillion is already planned, but not aligned with the transition," she said.

David Holmes, chief technology officer-energy at Dell Technologies, said the world needs a broad range of technologies across the entire energy ecosystem to meet its aggressive climate goals.

"There is no silver bullet solution," he said, but the returns from investing in artificial intelligence (AI) - to help companies integrate disparate systems and interpret vast amounts of data - can "often be very fast."

John Markus Lervik, co-founder and chief executive at Cognite, said digital technologies can help new renewables projects reduce time-to-market and cut capital expenditure costs by 8%-12%.

Industrial businesses that are transitioning can save even more, Lervik said. "For existing assets, we readily see improvements of 15%-18%."

An IRENA analysis shows that annual capacity deployment of renewables needs to increase four-fold by 2030 from its current pace of around 200 gigawatts (GW) if the renewables industry is to be on track to meet 2050 Paris climate accord goals.

An acceleration is expected to begin showing in the next 24 months, said Assaad Razzouk, chief executive at Sindicatum Sustainable Resources.

POWERING THE FUTURE

COVID-19 has changed patterns of electricity consumption and e-commerce, and the recovery from the pandemic is likely to be "greener, exemplified by 'build back better'," said Philip Lowe, executive chair of the World Energy Council's Energy Trilemma initiative.

IRENA's Singh predicted electricity will become the main carrier of energy by 2050, with the share of renewables within it increasing to 90%, from around 25% currently.

As grids become increasingly powered by renewables, they will need to be modernised, made more secure and reliable.

For this to succeed, governments need to start setting up regulations and frameworks to deal with issues like frequency control, said Gero Farruggio, head of global renewables at Rystad Energy.

IRENA forecasts solar photovoltaic and wind power will dominate the future energy system with a combined 63% share by 2050, with an additional 6% coming from nuclear power.

Along with a negative public perception, nuclear energy is seen as less economical and slower to reverse carbon emissions, even as existing fossil-fueled plants continue to emit CO2 while awaiting substitution.

"Nuclear has to be part of the solution... it's super-dependable and (has) zero emissions," Wood Mackenzie's Flowers said. He predicted a 10% share for nuclear within the renewables pie despite social and political opposition.

Nuclear energy has a role to play, but it won't be "leading the charge in the near term," IEA's Gould said, adding that investments in nuclear energy by advanced economies had reduced considerably, with China being the only major growth area.

Farruggio said the power mix of the future will be clean. "What we don't know is whether this transition will be a soft evolution – or indeed a revolution over the next five to 10 years."

(These interviews were conducted in the Reuters Global Markets Forum, a chat room hosted on the Refinitiv Messenger platform. Sign up here to join GMF: https://refini.tv/33uoFoQ)

(Reporting by Divya Chowdhury in Mumbai and Lisa Pauline Mattackal in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Aaron Saldanha and Supriya Rangarajan in Bengaluru; Editing by Susan Fenton)

JPMorgan debuts carbon reduction goals for clients

By Elizabeth Dilts Marshall 

© Reuters/BRENDAN MCDERMID A sign outside JP Morgan Chase & Co. offices is seen in New York

NEW YORK (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co on Thursday set out mid-term, carbon reduction goals for clients, as banks face pressure to align their financing activities with their climate change commitments.


The U.S. bank is asking clients in the electric power and auto industries to meet carbon intensity reduction goals and for oil and gas clients to meet operational and end-use carbon intensity reduction goals by 2030.

"We are taking steps to address the emissions of the clients we finance," Marisa Buchanan, JPMorgan's global head of sustainability, told Reuters.

She said the targets signal the bank's expectations that its clients operate responsibly and take the steps necessary to invest in a lower carbon future.

JPMorgan is asking electric power and automakers to reduce their direct carbon emissions, such as those produced from their buildings, plus emissions from companies that provide energy or other services necessary for these businesses to operate.

The bank is asking oil and gas clients to reduce the intensity of direct and indirect emissions, plus emissions from the combustion of oil and natural gas.

Banks face growing pressure to disclose more about emissions from activities they finance.

JPMorgan along with the wider financial services industry has long been a target of climate activists which say the industry's backing for carbon-heavy projects run contrary to support of the 2015 Paris agreement on climate change.

Last month, JPMorgan said it aims to lend, invest and provide other financial services for up to $2.5 trillion of banking business to be done for companies and projects tackling climate change and social inequality over the next decade.

The bank's new carbon reduction goals for clients were welcomed by at least two environmental groups, EDF and CERES.

"We welcome the move to interim targets," said Ben Ratner, senior director at EDF. "We see JPM is starting the journey from pledges to progress."

(Reporting By Elizabeth Dilts Marshall; additional reporting by Ross Kerber. Editing by Jane Merriman)

Bitcoin’s fossil fuel use criticized. But some Canadian companies hoping to turn it green

Katie Dangerfield 
©

 Photo by LARS HAGBERG/AFP via Getty Images A technician inspects the backside of bitcoin mining at Bitfarms in Saint Hyacinthe, Quebec on March 19, 2018.

Bitcoin has an enormous appetite for energy, and the cryptocurrency's record-breaking surge this year has made it even more hungry.

On Wednesday, Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla, said his company will no longer accept Bitcoin for car purchases, citing environmental concerns, in a swift reversal of its position on the currency after criticism by some investors.

However, there are growing attempts to turn bitcoin green and mitigate the environmental harm of mining -- and this is happening in Canada.

Projects in Canada are looking to wean bitcoin mining away from fossil fuels, such as using hydroelectricity, solar and wind.

Read more: Musk dumps Bitcoin over climate concerns. Is it bad for the environment?

"Green power is getting cheaper and cheaper," said Cale Moodie, CEO of Neptune Digital Assets, a cryptocurrency mining company based in Vancouver, B.C. "But there has to be a push for more renewable energy sources for Bitcoin mining."

Last month, his company teamed up with Link Global Technologies, another Canadian cryptocurrency mining company, to create a project for "clean energy Bitcoin."

The new initiative, called "Pure Digital Power" will be based in Alberta and use solar, wind and some natural gas to mine Bitcoin.

The business is in the early stage, but Moodie said the mining operation will rely on around 90 per cent of solar energy, and the rest on wind and natural gas.

"So you build out your solar around the natural facility, and natural gas acts as your back up ... and then if you put wind turbines as well ... you can pick up some of that downtime associated with solar at night," he explained.

Video: Dogecoin: How the joke cryptocurrency became no laughing matter

The push for green cryptocurrency mining isn't just happening in Canada, but all over the world.

In April, a non-profit coalition launched the Crypto Climate Accord, a global industry-backed initiative urging cryptocurrency enterprises to switch to using renewable energy.

"We want to help the crypto industry decarbonize," Jesse Morris, chief commercial officer of the Energy Web Foundation, told Reuters.

The idea is to get the industry to net-zero carbon emissions -- offsetting any emissions it cannot cut itself -- by 2040.

Other nations have also looked at green mining for the coin.

Iceland, Sweden and Norway have mining locations using geothermal, hydro and wind power.

And in Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, bitcoin miners use cheap, clean energy produced by an EU-funded hydroelectric plan.

Bitcoins are mined by computers in warehouses as big as airport hangars. The process of complex algorithms makes electricity one of the key inputs, consuming as much power as thousands of households.

Video: Harnessing the green power of blockchain (Global News)

And as the price of the coin rises, more people put in orders to purchase and run mining hardware, causing an increase in energy consumption.

Read more: Elon Musk says Tesla will no longer accept Bitcoin, cites environmental concerns

In March 2021, the University of Cambridge’s Centre for Alternative Finance estimated that bitcoin miners use what would amount to more than 130 TWh per year. That’s as much energy as Sweden uses every year.

A 2019 study by the Technical University of Munich estimated that bitcoin causes around 22 megatons in CO2 emissions annually, which is comparable to larger cities like Las Vegas, and even countries such as Jordan and Sri Lanka.

Countries like China, Iran and Kazakhstan are major players in the bitcoin mining market, and mainly use fossil fuels like coal, according to Alex de Vries, a data consultant and creator of the Bitcoin Energy Consumption Index.

"And those three countries alone are hosting 70 to 80 per cent of the entire bitcoin network," he said.

There are mining operations in Nordic nations that use renewable energy, but he said they are not making up a major part of their network.

"There are small areas where miners may have access to some level of renewables, but that's an extremely small part of the network and is not helping in greening the network," de Vries argued. "A large majority of these miners are still running on fossil fuels."

However, there is a large bitcoin mining operation in south China that uses hydropower in the summer months -- which helps green the industry. But the businesses head north for the winter and use coal, as it's less costly during the colder months, he said.

Moodie believes Bitcoin has received a bad reputation due to the coal mining in China, but argued the future for cryptocurrency will be green as renewable energy becomes less costly.

He noted that although Musk said Telsa will not use bitcoin due to climate concerns, the mining of the cryptocurrency depends on where people plugin on the grid (just like electric cars).

For example, if you plug in your electric car or mining computer in British Columbia, you will be using green energy, such as hydropower. But if you plug in the U.S. or China, then you could be using fossil fuels, he said.

"(Fossil fuels) is an obvious problem. So you have the unregulated countries that are really jumping on board with this because they can get cheap fossil fuel-based power," Moodie said. "And I think that sort of given Bitcoin a bad name."

But he believes companies that are more ethically and socially responsible can lead the way in the cryptocurrency mining industry, and in doing so, force others to follow suit.

Bitfarms, one of the largest cryptocurrency mining firms in Canada, operates five of its warehouses in Quebec. Like dozens of other cryptocurrency mining companies in the province, it uses hydroelectricity.

As Bitcoin goes more mainstream, Hydro-Québec has seen a massive surge in cryptocurrency mining over the last two years, according to spokesperson Jonathan Côté.

"There are around 90 companies operating in this sector in Quebec. The blockchain industry has carved out an important place in Quebec in recent years. It now reaches an available power of around 400 megawatts," Côté said.

Cryptocurrency mining consumption for December 2020 was 100 GWh (gigawatt hours), which is the average consumption of about 65,000 Quebec homes for a month, he added.

By comparison, other data centres in Quebec use about 200 megawatts of power per year.

There are benefits for miners using hydroelectricity in the province, Côté said. Not only does it bring in revenue for the province, but it also is a more environmentally-friendly way to mine the coin, rather than using natural gas or coal.

Read more: Bitcoin’s carbon footprint could be offset by blockchain’s green applications, experts say

"So if these companies are going to be mining using renewable energy here instead of mining in China, which uses mostly coal, we can decarbonize part of that industry by having some of it here," he said.

"But we can't just have a limited supply for these mining companies, we have to be responsible."

In order to accommodate a surge of companies looking to mine Bitcoin in Quebec (without having to build more infrastructure), in January the province put through new rules for this industry.

Because Hydro-Québec's peak season for energy is in the winter, the province asked bitcoin miners to lower their energy consumption by 95 per cent in the winter months for up to 300 hours.

"So basically, they have to stop mining for a few hours during those peak demand periods," he explained. "By doing this, we're able to have these companies operating here without having such a big impact on the peak demand in the winter."

-- With files from Reuters

ExxonMobil Wants You to Take Responsibility for Climate Change, Study Says

Justin Worlan

ExxonMobil is one of the world’s largest publicly traded oil and gas companies—and it wants you to take responsibility for climate change.

© Michael Loccisano/Getty Images An Exxon gas station sign shows current gas prices last year in Clark, New Jersey.

A new analysis from researchers at Harvard University released Thursday found that the company’s public-facing messaging on climate change since the mid-2000s consistently emphasizes “consumers,” “energy demand” and individual “needs” as the cause of climate change, as well as the avenue for potentially addressing it. Outwardly focusing on consumers’ personal responsibility is one part of the company’s nuanced messaging to deflect the blame for climate change without denying the science behind it, the researchers say.


At the same time, in internal documents, the company pays personal responsibility little credence, focusing instead on the roots of the issue: “fossil fuel use,” “fossil fuel combustion” and the “source” of emissions.

“Fossil fuel industry discourse has encouraged this dangerous acceleration in individualization of responsibility,” says Geoffrey Supran, a researcher at the department of the history of science at Harvard University. “It grooms us to see ourselves as consumers first and citizens second.”

For decades, Exxon devised strategies to question the science of climate change and in turn slow progress on policy initiatives that sought to reduce carbon emissions and threatened to reduce demand for their core products. A series of in-depth journalistic investigations have documented how in the 1980s and 1990s Exxon, which had not yet merged with Mobil, conducted groundbreaking research on climate change but continued in public to question the scientific basis of the phenomenon. In the mid-2000s, the researchers’ new analysis shows, the company shifted tactics, moving away “from explicit doubt to implicit acknowledgment.”

At the same time, Supran and his co-author Harvard professor Naomi Oreskes found that the company has used several rhetorical strategies to deflect blame from the industry in recent years. The results, published in the journal One Earth, come from an evaluation of more than 200 internal and external ExxonMobil documents that researchers used in a statistical analysis to determine which words and phrases were overrepresented externally and which were overrepresented internally.

ExxonMobil did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In addition to shifting the responsibility individuals, one of the firm’s recent key strategies has been to emphasize what researchers call “climate risk” framing. Instead of using the term “climate change” in public communications, the company often refers to “climate risk,” along with related phrases like “potential risks” and “long-term risk.” The risk phrasing suggests there is uncertainty about if and how climate change will play out, without explicitly questioning the science. Researchers found this framing prevalent externally but not internally.

“By shifting the conversation from the semantics of reality to the semantics of risk,” the researchers say in the study, the company injects “uncertainty into the climate narrative, even while superficially appearing not to.”

All of these language choices may seem small, but they can have significant implications for how the public understands the causes of climate change and the potential solutions. Scientists say that tackling emissions and limiting temperature rise will require systemic changes from government and big economic players—including oil companies and other major corporations. Yet the notion that the burden of tackling climate change rests with individuals has become a pervasive belief in the U.S., as some corporations have worked to deflect responsibility for climate change and other social ills. “The word that I would probably use—in addition to subtle—is insidious,” says Supran. “That’s how I would characterize this shifting form of propaganda.”

The new research comes as ExxonMobil and other oil giants are under increased scrutiny for both their emissions and their climate messaging. Activists have taken to the street in protest while cities and states have sued the industry’s largest players with a range of allegations. Just a few weeks ago, New York City sued ExxonMobil, BP and Shell, alleging that the companies “systematically and intentionally misled consumers” into thinking their product is cleaner than it is.

ExxonMobil is far from the only major energy company rethinking the way it talks about climate change. As the science of climate change has become impossible to deny—both in courtrooms and in the court of public opinion—oil giants have cautiously indicated that they accept the science. From there, practices have diverged. Many of the European oil majors, such as Shell and BP, have promised to be part of the solution by spending billions to shift their portfolios toward clean energy. And while analysts agree that the European firms are leagues ahead of their American counterparts in grappling with the realities of climate change, much rides on if and how they follow through on those commitments.

In the U.S., many oil giants, including ExxonMobil and Chevron, have told investors they plan to stay the course with oil and gas even as they nuance their messaging around it. Critics see these U.S. firms’ public embrace of climate science and flexible measures like the Paris Agreement as a strategic shift to avoid stringent regulation, rather than anything that will lead to a significant reduction in emissions. “We have the same story,” says Dylan Tanner, the executive director of InfluenceMap, a think tank that tracks how businesses are engaging on climate. “Just replace substantive climate denial with climate delay

Exxon uses Big Tobacco's playbook to downplay the climate crisis, Harvard study finds

By Matt Egan, CNN Business 7 hrs ago

For decades, ExxonMobil has deployed Big Tobacco-like propaganda to downplay the gravity of the climate crisis, shift blame onto consumers and protect its own interests, according to a Harvard University study published Thursday

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People watch as a cargo ship carrying a furnace travels to the Port of Corpus Christi in Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S., on Sunday, Dec. 27, 2020. The multi-story furnace will be used for a $10 billion petrochemical plant being built by Gulf Coast Growth Ventures, a joint project by ExxonMobil and SABIC. 

Photographer: Eddie Seal/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The peer-reviewed study found that Exxon publicly equates demand for energy to an indefinite need for fossil fuels, casting the company as merely a passive supplier working to meet that demand.

"This is a potentially dangerous technique," Geoffrey Supran, a Harvard research associate and one of the study's authors, told CNN Business. "It narrows our environmental imagination. It makes us see ourselves as consumers first and citizens later -- in a way that protects the status quo, fossil fuels society."

The study used machine learning and algorithms to uncover trends in more than 200 public and internal Exxon documents between 1972 and 2019.

"These patterns mimic the tobacco industry's documented strategy of shifting responsibility away from corporations — which knowingly sold a deadly product while denying its harms — and onto consumers," the study concludes. "ExxonMobil has used language to subtly yet systematically frame public discourse."

The authors say this is the first quantitative, academically peer-reviewed analysis of how Exxon uses language to shape public opinion.

There's an irony in the funding of the study, which comes from Harvard University Faculty Development Funds and the Rockefeller Family Fund. The latter was created by the scions of Standard Oil founder John D. Rockefeller. The company was the precursor of what is now Exxon. In 2016, the Rockefeller Family Fund pledged to divest from fossil fuels, including its stake in Exxon.

Exxon told CNN Business in a statement that "ExxonMobil supports the Paris climate agreement, and is working to reduce company emissions and helping customers reduce their emissions while working on new lower-emission technologies and advocating for effective policies."

The Harvard study, Exxon added, is "clearly part of a litigation strategy against ExxonMobil and other energy companies." The company clalimed that Naomi Oreskes, one of the main authors of the study, is on retainer with a law firm that is leading lawsuits against Exxon and others in the industry. Exxon called this a "blatant conflict of interest."

Oreskes said she was paid for three and a half hours of work to review the historical accuracy of material for a legal brief by the law firm at issue and is not on retainer. In the past, she has written briefs on climate cases on a pro bono basis.


'More insidious'

The new research builds on a 2017 study by the same authors that alleged Exxon "misled the public" on climate change for nearly 40 years. At the time, Exxon dismissed those claims as "inaccurate and preposterous" and argued the research was "paid for, written and published by activists."

Exxon has "gone from denialism to delayism," said Supran, who is also director of climate accountability communication at the Climate Social Science Network, which researches political conflict over climate change. "The tactics have evolved over time, but the end goal remains the same: inaction and protecting business as usual. This is by nature more subtle and more insidious than the fossil fuel industry's history of outright climate denial."

The research comes as President Joe Biden begins to execute an ambitious climate agenda aimed at slashing carbon emissions and weaning America off its addiction to fossil fuels. John Kerry, the former US senator and secretary of state, who is now the president's special envoy for climate, has warned the leaders of Big Oil to embrace clean energy or get left behind.

"You don't want to be sitting there with a lot of stranded assets. You're gonna wind up on the wrong side of this battle," Kerry said at an energy conference in March.


Carbon taxes and carbon capture

Under increasing societal pressure, the oil industry has taken steps aimed at showing that it is addressing the climate crisis.

In March, the American Petroleum Institute, the industry's most powerful lobbying group, for the first time supported setting a price on carbon — at least under certain circumstances. The API also called for direct regulation of methane and expanded emissions transparency.

"The is broad recognition that obviously the country has to do something on climate change," API CEO Mike Sommers told CNN Business at the time.

The moves appeared designed to shape Washington's climate agenda and help protect the industry from an even tougher response.

Exxon, the world's most valuable public company as recently as 2013, has lost nearly $200 billion in market value from its peak. The company was the longest-ever component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average — its precursor, Standard Oil, was added to the index in 1928 — until being kicked out of the Dow last summer.

Facing pressure from angry shareholders, Exxon recently outlined investments in lower-carbon technologies such as carbon capture, hydrogen and advanced biofuels. The company argues that demand for lower-emission technologies could create multi-trillion dollar markets by 2040.

"We are uniquely placed to help society meet its net zero ambitions," Exxon CEO Darren Woods said in an investor presentation last month.


'Gaslighting the public'

The Harvard study described "propaganda tactics of the fossil fuels industry" aimed at downplaying the climate crisis.

For example, the authors said that after the 1999 merger of Exxon and Mobil, the companies began saying in public documents such as paid "advertorials" that "climate change was a 'risk,' rather than a reality." Prior to the merger, "risk" of climate change was only mentioned once in Exxon's public communications, the study said. From 2000 and beyond, it appeared 46 times, the study found, adding that no other term was more associated with climate change in the company's public statements.

The study notes that "this scientific hedging strategy" was repeatedly used by the tobacco industry in the 1990s.

Moreover, the study found that Exxon has framed the debate around consumer energy "demand" to build a "fossil fuel savior" framework that "downplays the reality and seriousness of climate change, normalizes fossil fuel lock-in and individualizes responsibility."

Supran told CNN Business this strategy is "effectively gaslighting the public into thinking there is no alternative, making the blame pill that Exxon is feeding the public easier to swallow."


Don't we still need fossil fuels?

Of course, the recent shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline, one of America's most important pieces of energy infrastructure, underscores just how much the modern economy still relies on fossil fuels.

The six-day shutdown, which ended Wednesday, was sparked by a ransomware attack that caused panic-buying of gasoline and drove widespread fuel outages in the Southeast. The entire federal government was mobilized to get the 5,500-mile pipeline back in service.

Supran said it's "certainly true" that modern society continues to rely mostly on fossil fuels, but added that Exxon's decades-long "disinformation" campaign is a central reason why it still does.

"We are passively guilty, born into a fossil fuel society," he said. "But companies like Exxon are actively guilty for working to keep society the way it is."

CO2 at Mauna Loa exceeds 420 ppm for the first time in human history

Scott Sutherland 

 The Weather Network

CO2 levels just reached highest in human history

Duration: 00:52 

Carbon dioxide levels measured in one of the most remote places in the world have reached a new peak, setting a record for the highest level measured in human history.

On April 30, 2021, instruments at NOAA's Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawai'i recorded hour-by-hour measurements of carbon dioxide (CO2) in excess of 420 parts per million — the longest stretch of measurements above this threshold to date. At end-of-day, the site tabulated these records and logged an official daily average value for carbon dioxide of 420.29 parts per million (ppm).

© Provided by The Weather Network

The 'monthly ending May 9' graph of the Keeling Curve shows the daily average carbon dioxide value on April 30 exceeded 420 parts per million (ppm). Grey dots indicate hourly records, small black dots are the daily averages computed from those records, and larger black dots are weekly averages. Red line at 420 ppm and text noting April 30 peak added by author. Credit: Scripps Institution of Oceanography/Scott Sutherland

This value is the highest recorded carbon dioxide concentration measured at Mauna Loa this year and the highest seen at the site since it was established in 1958 (when CO2 was at around 315 ppm). Based on extensive research into carbon dioxide levels throughout the planet's geological history, this is also the highest CO2 concentration Earth has seen in millions of years.

According to NOAA, "The atmospheric burden of CO2 is now comparable to where it was during the Mid-Pliocene Warm Period around 3.6 million years ago, when concentrations of carbon dioxide ranged from about 380 to 450 parts per million. During that time sea level was about 78 feet higher [24 m] than today, the average temperature was 7 degrees Fahrenheit [3.8°C] higher than in pre-industrial times, and studies indicate large forests occupied areas of the Arctic that are now tundra."

© Provided by The Weather Network

This two-year plot of carbon dioxide measured at Mauna Loa shows the yearly 'saw tooth' pattern that carbon dioxide levels follow due to seasonal changes. In 2019, CO2 peaked at 415 ppm, in 2020, daily averages reached 418 ppm, and in 2021 so far, 420 ppm is the new record. Credit: Scripps Institution of Oceanography/Scott Sutherland

A total of 420 molecules of carbon dioxide for every million air molecules may not seem like much. However, Earth's climate is extremely sensitive to the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

WHY IS CARBON DIOXIDE SO IMPORTANT?

Carbon dioxide is considered to be the 'global climate thermostat' for planet Earth. That means the abundance of this one gas in the Earth's atmosphere is the primary controller of the planet's surface temperature and thus its climate.

Most of Earth's atmosphere — the 99.9 per cent made up of oxygen, nitrogen, and argon — is 'transparent' to both solar radiation and the infrared radiation emitted by Earth. If these were the only gases in the atmosphere, Earth would be substantially colder due to the heat the surface absorbed during the day radiating directly into space each night. None of that heat would stick around in the atmosphere to keep the planet warm, and we would likely have a 'snowball' Earth.

Carbon dioxide is transparent to incoming sunlight as well, but it absorbs outgoing infrared radiation. With just a trace amount in the atmosphere (around 0.04 per cent), enough of that heat is trapped that the planet stays warm enough for life to take hold and for human civilization to flourish. Adding more CO2 to the air, incidentally, causes more heat to be trapped than normal, which is why we are seeing a fairly steady rise in temperatures since the Industrial Revolution.

Watch below: NASA climate scientist Bill Putman explains the yearly waxing and waning of carbon dioxide throughout a year
Duration 3:10
NASA - A Year in the Life of Earth's CO2

The other major greenhouse gases that contribute to Earth's surface temperature are water vapour, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone. None of these control Earth's climate as effectively as CO2, though. There's one straightforward reason for this: Carbon dioxide is the most abundant temperature-independent greenhouse gas in Earth's atmosphere.

Methane, ozone, and nitrous oxide are more potent greenhouse gases than CO2. However, carbon dioxide is far more abundant in the atmosphere than these gases. Thus it still has a more significant contribution to global warming.

Water vapour is a special case. It is not only a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, it is also more abundant. However, water vapour's presence in the atmosphere and its contribution as a greenhouse gas are entirely dependent on the temperature. Lower the temperature by a certain amount, and water vapour condenses into liquid water, forming clouds and precipitation. Lower the temperature even further, and it freezes solid.

© Provided by The Weather Network

NOAA's Mauna Loa Observatory, high atop the volcano in Hawai'i, is a remote enough location from sources to give us an excellent idea of the carbon dioxide concentrations in the northern hemisphere of Earth. Credit: NOAA

Carbon dioxide, on the other hand, is temperature-independent. No matter how you vary the temperature on the planet, CO2 remains in gaseous form and retains its full potency as a greenhouse gas.

The very reason we have large quantities of water vapour in Earth's atmosphere in the first place is due to the temperature-independence of carbon dioxide. If the amount of CO2 in the air decreases, the planet cools, which causes more water vapour to condense and eventually freeze. This is how most glacial periods in Earth's history started, as CO2 was absorbed from the air by various forms of life and became locked up or buried away in large quantities. When carbon dioxide levels rose again due to extreme volcanic events or mass die-offs, temperatures increased, and the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere also increased.

© Provided by The Weather Network

By measuring gases trapped in ice cores, scientists have shown what carbon dioxide levels were like in the atmosphere, going back 10,000 years. Credit: Scripps Institution of Oceanography

In the roughly 10,000 years before the industrial revolution, when CO2 levels were reasonably uniform at around 265 ppm, Earth's climate remained relatively stable. The greenhouse gases in the air absorbed just enough of the heat Earth radiated out towards space to keep the planet's average temperature reasonably steady.

As shown in the graph below, due to carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel burning, the global average temperature has risen by roughly 1.5°C since the early 1900s.

© Provided by The Weather Network

Credit: NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Sciences

Seeing this kind of temperature increase in a small region, over a short period of time, such as in the local forecast for your city over a few days, is not much of a concern. It represents only a small amount of energy, and the temperature will eventually go down by that much, as well.

The entire planet warming up by over one degree, however, and in such a way that the temperature will not go down again by that amount for the foreseeable future, represents an immense amount of energy being invested into our weather and climate systems.

This is of great concern to us when it comes to extreme weather events and their potential impact on human civilization. It is going to be even worse, going forward, as greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, and the temperature continues to rise along with them.

DROUGHT

Soil conditions worsen across Saskatchewan as spring seeding continues

Duration: 01:32 

As spring seeding continues across Saskatchewan, dry conditions across the province continue to be a growing concern. This week's crop report shows over half of the province's cropland has less than adequate topsoil moisture.

Global News

Video: Severe drought conditions in Morden, Man. (cbc.ca)