Bitcoin’s new puzzle: How to ditch fossil fuels and go green

By AMY BETH HANSON

1 of 5

A crane is seen at the site of a building holding computer equipment used in cryptocurrency "mining" that relies on electricity from an adjacent coal-fired power plant, on April 20, 2022, in Hardin, Mont. Determining how much energy the industry uses is difficult because not all companies report their use. (AP Photo/Matthew Brown)


HELENA, Mont. (AP) — For the past year a company that “mines” cryptocurrency had what seemed the ideal location for its thousands of power-thirsty computers working around the clock to verify bitcoin transactions: the grounds of a coal-fired power plant in rural Montana.

But with the cryptocurrency industry under increasing pressure to rein in the environmental impact of its massive electricity consumption, Marathon Digital Holdings made the decision to pack up its computers, called miners, and relocate them to a wind farm in Texas.

“For us, it just came down to the fact that we don’t want to be operating on fossil fuels,” said company CEO Fred Thiel.

In the world of bitcoin mining, access to cheap and reliable electricity is everything. But many economists and environmentalists have warned that as the still widely misunderstood digital currency grows in price — and with it popularity — the process of mining that is central to its existence and value is becoming increasingly energy intensive and potentially unsustainable.

Bitcoin was was created in 2009 as a new way of paying for things that would not be subject to central banks or government oversight. While it has yet to widely catch on as a method of payment, it has seen its popularity as a speculative investment surge despite volatility that can cause its price to swing wildly. In March 2020, one bitcoin was worth just over $5,000. That surged to a record of more than $67,000 in November 2021 before falling to just over $35,000 in January.

Central to bitcoin’s technology is the process through which transactions are verified and then recorded on what’s known as the blockchain. Computers connected to the bitcoin network race to solve complex mathematical calculations that verify the transactions, with the winner earning newly minted bitcoins as a reward. Currently, when a machine solves the puzzle, its owner is rewarded with 6.25 bitcoins — worth about $260,000 total. The system is calibrated to release 6.25 bitcoins every 10 minutes.

When bitcoin was first invented it was possible to solve the puzzles using a regular home computer, but the technology was designed so problems become harder to solve as more miners work on them. Those mining today use specialized machines that have no monitors and look more like a high-tech fan than a traditional computer. The amount of energy used by computers to solve the puzzles grows as more computers join the effort and puzzles are made more difficult.

Marathon Digital, for example, currently has about 37,000 miners, but hopes to have 199,000 online by early next year, the company said.

Determining how much energy the industry uses is difficult because not all mining companies report their use and some operations are mobile, moving storage containers full of miners around the country chasing low-cost power.

The Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index estimates bitcoin mining used about 109 terrawatt hours of electricity over the past year — close to the amount used in Virginia in 2020, according to the U.S. Energy Information Center. The current usage rate would work out to 143 TWh over a full year, or about the amount used by Ohio or New York state in 2020.

Cambridge’s estimate does not include energy used to mine other cryptocurrencies.

A key moment in the debate over bitcoin’s energy use came last spring, when just weeks after Tesla Motors said it was buying $1.5 billion in bitcoin and would also accept the digital currency as payment for electric vehicles, CEO Elon Musk joined critics in calling out the industry’s energy use and said the company would no longer be taking it as payment.

Some want the government to step in with regulation.

In New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul is being pressured to declare a moratorium on the so-called proof-of-work mining method — the one bitcoin uses — and to deny an air quality permit for a project at a retrofitted coal-fired power plant that runs on natural gas.

A New York State judge recently ruled the project would not impact the air or water of nearby Seneca Lake.

“Repowering or expanding coal and gas plants to make fake money in the middle of a climate crisis is literally insane,” Yvonne Taylor, vice president of Seneca Lake Guardians, said in a statement.

Anne Hedges with the Montana Environmental Information Center said that before Marathon Digital showed up, environmental groups had expected the coal-fired power plant in Hardin, Montana, to close.

“It was a death watch,” Hedges said. “We were getting their quarterly reports. We were looking at how much they were operating. We were seeing it continue to decline year after year — and last year that totally changed. It would have gone out of existence but for bitcoin.”

The cryptocurrency industry “needs to find a way to reduce its energy demand,” and needs to be regulated, Hedges said. “That’s all there is to it. This is unsustainable.”

Some say the solution is to switch from proof-of-work verification to proof-of-stake verification, which is already used by some cryptocurrencies. With proof of stake, verification of digital currency transfers is assigned to computers, rather than having them compete. People or groups that stake more of their cryptocurrency are more likely to get the work — and the reward.

While the method uses far less electricity, some critics argue proof-of-stake blockchains are less secure.

Some companies in the industry acknowledge there is a problem and are committing to achieving net-zero emissions — adding no greenhouse gases to the atmosphere — from the electricity they use by 2030 by signing onto a Crypto Climate Accord, modeled after the Paris Climate Agreement.

“All crypto communities should work together, with urgency, to ensure crypto does not further exacerbate global warming, but instead becomes a net positive contributor to the vital transition to a low carbon global economy,” the accord states.

Marathon Digital is one of several companies pinning its hopes on tapping into excess renewable energy from solar and wind farms in Texas. Earlier this month the companies Blockstream Mining and Block, formerly Square, announced they were breaking ground in Texas on a small, off-the-grid mining facility using Tesla solar panels and batteries.

“This is a step to proving our thesis that bitcoin mining can fund zero-emission power infrastructure,” said Adam Back, CEO and co-founder of Blockstream.

Companies argue that cryptocurrency mining can provide an economic incentive to build more renewable energy projects and help stabilize power grids. Miners give renewable energy generators a guaranteed customer, making it easier for the projects to get financing and generate power at their full capacity.

The mining companies are able to contract for lower-priced energy because “all the energy they use can be shut off and given back to the grid at a moment’s notice,” said Thiel.

In Pennsylvania, Stronghold Digital is cleaning up hundreds of years of coal waste by burning it to create what the state classifies as renewable energy that can be sent to the grid or used in bitcoin mining, depending on power demands.

Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection is a partner in the work, which uses relatively new technology to burn the waste coal more efficiently and with fewer emissions. Left alone, piles of waste coal can catch fire and burn for years, releasing greenhouse gases. When wet, the waste coal leaches acid into area waterways.

After using the coal waste to generate electricity, what’s left is “toxicity-free fly ash,” which is registered by the state as a clean fertilizer, Stronghold Digital spokesperson Naomi Harrington said.

As Marathon Digital gradually moves its 30,000 miners out of Montana, it’s leaving behind tens of millions of dollars in mining infrastructure behind.

Just because Marathon doesn’t want to use coal-fired power anymore doesn’t mean there won’t be another bitcoin miner to take its place. Thiel said he assumes the power plant owners will find a company to do just that.

“No reason not to,” he said.

Scholar uses trash as treasure to study life in North Korea

By HYUNG-JIN KIM

1 of 6

Kang Dong Wan, 48, a professor at South Korea's Dong-A University, speaks with trash from North Korea during an interview in Seoul, South Korea on April 4, 2022. Kang has turned to a different way of collecting information about secretive North Korea as pandemic restrictions make it harder for outsiders to find out what's life like for North Koreans. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — When the waves wash trash onto the beaches of front-line South Korean islands, Kang Dong Wan can often be found hunting for what he calls his “treasure” — rubbish from North Korea that provides a peek into a place that’s shut down to most outsiders.

“This can be very important material because we can learn what products are manufactured in North Korea and what goods people use there,” Kang, 48, a professor at South Korea’s Dong-A University, told The Associated Press in a recent interview.

He was forced to turn to the delicate information-gathering method because COVID-19 has made it much harder for outsiders to find out what’s going on inside North Korea, one of the world’s most cloistered nations even without pandemic border closures.

The variety, amount and increasing sophistication of the trash, he believes, confirms North Korean state media reports that leader Kim Jong Un is pushing for the production of various kinds of consumer goods and a bigger industrial design sector to meet the demands of his people and improve their livelihoods.

Kim, despite his authoritarian rule, cannot ignore the tastes of consumers who now buy products at capitalist-style markets because the country’s socialist public rationing system is broken and its economic woes have worsened during the pandemic.

“Current North Korean residents are a generation of people who’ve come to realize what the market and economy are. Kim can’t win their support if he only suppresses and controls them while sticking to a nuclear development program,” Kang said. “He needs to show there are some changes in his era.”

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Kang regularly visited Chinese border towns to meet North Koreans staying there. He also bought North Korean products and photographed North Korean villages across the river border. He can’t go there anymore, however, because China’s anti-virus restrictions limit foreign travelers.

Since September 2020, Kang has visited five South Korean border islands off the country’s west coast and collected about 2,000 pieces of North Korean trash including snack bags, juice pouches, candy wrappers and drink bottles.

Kang said he was amazed to see dozens of different kinds of colorful packaging materials, each for certain products like seasonings, ice cream bars, snack cakes and milk and yogurt products. Many carry a variety of graphic elements, cartoon characters and lettering fonts. Some still can seem out of date by Western standards and are apparent copycats of South Korean and Japanese designs.

Kang recently published a book based on his work titled “Picking up North Korean Trash on the Five West Sea Islands.” He said he’s now also started to scour eastern South Korean front-line beaches.

Other experts study the diversity of goods and packaging designs in North Korea through state media broadcasts and publications, but Kang’s trash collection allows a more thorough analysis, said Ahn Kyung-su, head of DPRKHEALTH.ORG, a website focusing on health issues in North Korea.

Kang’s work also opens up a fascinating window into North Korea.

Ingredient information on some juice pouches, for instance, shows North Korea uses tree leaves as a sugar substitute. Kang suspects that’s because of a lack of sugar and sugar-processing equipment.

He said the discovery of more than 30 kinds of artificial flavor enhancer packets could mean that North Korean households cannot afford more expensive natural ingredients like meat and fish to cook Korean soups and stews. Many South Koreans have stopped using them at home over health concerns.

Plastic bags for detergents have phrases like “the friend of housewives” or “accommodating women.” Because the assumption is that only women do such work, it could be a reflection of the low status of women in male-dominated North Korean society.

Some wrappers display extremely exaggerated claims. One says that a walnut-flavored snack cake is a better source of protein than meat. Another says that collagen ice cream makes children grow taller and enhances skin elasticity. And yet another claims that a snack cake made with a certain kind of microalgae prevents diabetes, heart disease and aging.

Kang has been unable to verify the quality of former contents inside his trash.

North Korean snacks and cookies have generally become much softer and tastier in recent years, though their quality still lags behind that of South Korea’s internationally competitive products, according to Jeon Young-sun, a research professor at Seoul’s Konkuk University.

Noh Hyun-jeong, a North Korean defector, said she was “ecstatic” about the South Korean bread and cakes that she ate after her arrival here in 2007. She said the confectionaries and candies she had in the North were often bitter and “as hard as a rock.”

Kang Mi-Jin, another defector who runs a company analyzing North Korea’s economy, said that when she had South Koreans try new North Korean cookies and candies in blind taste tests, they thought they were South Korean. But Ahn, the website head, said the North Korean cookie he obtained in 2019 was “tasteless.”

Kang said his trash collection is an attempt to better understand the North Korean people and study how to bridge the gap between the divided Koreas in the event of future unification.

In 2019, Kang said he was denied entry at Shanghai’s airport, apparently because of his earlier, mostly unauthorized work along the China-North Korea border. During a previous period of inter-Korean detente that ended in 2008, Kang said he visited North Korea more than 10 times but could only buy limited goods that didn’t help him understand the country.

Picking up trash on the islands, about 4-20 kilometers (2.5-12 miles) from North Korean territory, is a tough job. He most often visits Yeonpyeong, an island shelled by North Korea in an attack that killed four South Koreans in 2010.

On some trips, South Korean marines quizzed Kang because residents who saw him collecting trash thought he was doing something suspicious. He was sometimes stranded when ferry services were canceled because of bad weather. Kang said he occasionally cried in frustration on the beach when he failed to find North Korean trash or received calls from acquaintances jeering or doubting his work.

“But I was heartened after collecting more and more trash ... and I determined that I must find out how many goods are in a country where we can’t go and what we can find from that trash,” Kang said. “When the wind blew and the waves ran high, something always washed ashore and I was so happy because I could find something new.”

#FREEGRINER

2 months after Griner’s arrest, mystery surrounds her case
By ERIC TUCKER

Phoenix Mercury center Brittney Griner sits during the first half of Game 2 of basketball's WNBA Finals against the Chicago Sky, Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2021, in Phoenix. Griner is easily the most prominent American citizen known to be jailed by a foreign government. Yet as a crucial hearing approaches next month, the case against her remains shrouded in mystery, with little clarity from the Russian prosecutors. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri, File)


WASHINGTON (AP) — For another person in another country at another time, the case might have been a minor matter: An American citizen detained at an airport for allegedly possessing a cannabis derivative legal in much of the world.

But the circumstances for Brittney Griner couldn’t have been worse.

Griner, a WNBA All-Star and two-time Olympic gold medalist, was arrested in Russia, where the offense can mean years in prison, and at a moment when tensions with the U.S. were rising to their highest point in decades. She is a prominent gay, Black woman facing trial in a country where authorities have been hostile to the LGBTQ community and the country’s nationalist zeal has raised concerns about how she will be treated.

“There are many countries around the world where you do not want to get in trouble, and Russia is one of them,” said Clarence Lusane, a Howard University political science professor who specializes in criminal justice and drug policy.

As extraordinary as her circumstances are, the details surrounding Griner’s case remain a mystery as a crucial court date approaches next month. Russian prosecutors have offered little clarity and the U.S. government has made only measured statements. Griner’s legal team has declined to speak out about the case as it works behind the scenes.

Griner is easily the most prominent American citizen known to be jailed by a foreign government, but in many ways, her case isn’t unusual. Americans are frequently arrested overseas on drug and other charges and U.S. authorities are limited about what they can say or the help they can offer. The State Department generally can’t do much to help beyond consular visits and helping the American get an attorney. It also can’t say much unless the person arrested waives privacy rights, which Griner hasn’t fully done.

In some cases, U.S. officials do speak out loudly when they’re convinced an American has been wrongly detained. But Griner’s case is barely two months old and officials have yet to make that determination. A State Department office that works to free American hostages and unjust detainees is not known to be involved.

The Phoenix Mercury star was detained at a Moscow airport in mid-February after Russian authorities said a search of her luggage revealed vape cartridges that allegedly contained oil derived from cannabis — accusations that could carry up to 10 years in prison, though some experts predict she’d get much less if convicted. She was returning to the country after the Russian League, in which she also plays, was taking a break for the FIBA World Cup qualifying tournament.

U.S. officials have said they are tracking the case but have not spoken extensively about it, in part because Griner has not signed a full Privacy Act Waiver. The statements so far have been careful and restrained, focused on ensuring she has access to U.S. consular affairs officials — she had a meeting last month — rather than explicitly demanding her immediate release.

There’s little the U.S. government can do diplomatically to end a criminal prosecution in another country, particularly in the early days of a case. Any deal that would require concessions by the U.S. would seem a nonstarter, especially with Russia at war with Ukraine and the U.S. coordinating actions involving Russia with Western allies.

“It’s a trial lawyer’s nightmare since you have to conduct a trial when the larger political environment is negative,” said William Butler, a Russian law expert and professor at Penn State Dickinson Law.

The State Department has been “doing everything we can to support Brittney Griner to support her family, and to work with them to do everything we can, to see that she is treated appropriately and to seek her release,” spokesman Ned Price said last month. Last week, he said the U.S. was in frequent contact with her legal team and “broader network.”

That’s a more restrained posture than the Biden administration has taken with two other Americans jailed in Russia — Paul Whelan, a corporate security executive from Michigan sentenced to 16 years in prison on espionage-related charges his family says are bogus, and Trevor Reed, a Marine veteran sentenced to nine years on charges that he assaulted a police officer in Moscow as he was being driven to a police station after a night of heavy drinking.

The State Department has pressed Russia for their release. In contrast to Griner’s case, it has described both as unjustly detained.

Race and gender issues are front and center in the Griner case.

Lusane, the Howard University professor, said under Putin “there’s been a hyper nationalism in Russia, so basically anyone who’s not considered Slavic is considered an outsider and a potential threat.”

He added, “She fits into that category.”

On the other hand, he said, there could also be an opening for Putin to build “an inroad into the African American community” by ordering her released as a humanitarian gesture.

Some Griner supporters, including Democratic Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri, have maintained that her case would be getting more attention if she weren’t a Black woman.

The president of the WNBA players’ association, Nneka Ogwumike, said in a “Good Morning America” interview that Griner was in Russia because WNBA players don’t earn enough in the U.S.

“She’s over there because of a gender issue, pay inequity,” Ogwumike said.

Many of Griner’s fellow WNBA players have remained circumspect for fear of antagonizing the situation, though her coach and some of her teammates have made clear in interviews that the 6-foot-9 center is on their minds.

“I spent 10 years there, so I know the way things work,” Phoenix guard Diana Taurasi said of Russia. “It’s delicate.”

Griner recently had her detention extended to May 19. More information about her case may emerge then. But regardless of the factual allegations against her in court, it’s impossible to divorce the legal case from the broader political implications.

“Russians are great chess players,” said Peter Maggs, a research professor and expert in Russian law at the University of Illinois College of Law. “The more pawns you have, the greater your chance of eventual victory. And since things are not going their way, obviously, in Ukraine, any pawns they have they want to hold on to.”

___

AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee contributed to this report.

More Cubans immigrating to the US by crossing from Mexico

By GISELA SALOMON

1 of 4

The mother of two, right, helps her children with their homework at their home Tuesday, April 19, 2022, in Tampa, Fla. More immigrants from Cuba are coming to the U.S. by making their way to Mexico and crossing the border illegally. It’s a very different reality from years ago, when Cubans enjoyed special protections that other immigrants did not have. 

(AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)


MIAMI (AP) — For years after leaving Cuba, the mother of two tried to get her children and parents into the U.S. through legal channels.

Finally, she decided she wouldn’t wait any longer: She paid more than $40,000 dollars to someone to help them sneak in through Mexico.

“I said to myself, `Enough. I am going to risk everything,’” said the 30-year-old woman, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals from U.S. authorities.

Her family’s story is an example of what tens of thousands of Cuban immigrants looking to escape political and economic troubles are going through as more risk their lives and arrive illegally in the United States. It’s a very different reality from years ago, when Cubans enjoyed special protections that other immigrants did not have.

Her children and parents undertook a 20-day journey, starting with a plane ride from Havana to Managua, Nicaragua. From there, they took buses, vans and taxis across Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico, until they arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“I saw that other people were coming through the border and they were happy, and I, who had done things legally, was still waiting for my children,” the woman said.

___

CUBA AND NICARAGUA

U.S. border authorities encountered Cubans almost 32,400 times in March, according to figures released Monday. That was roughly double the number in February and five times the number in October.

The increase coincided with Nicaragua’s decision starting in November to stop requiring visas for Cubans to promote tourism after other countries, such as Panama and the Dominican Republic, began mandating them.

After flying to Nicaragua, Cubans travel by land to remote stretches of the U.S. border with Mexico – mainly in Yuma, Arizona, and Del Rio, Texas – and generally turn themselves in to Border Patrol agents.

The Biden administration has been leaning on other governments to do more to stop migrants from reaching the U.S., most recently during a visit this week to Panama by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas. The actions of Nicaragua, a U.S. adversary, complicates that effort.

Cuban and U.S. officials will meet Thursday in Washington for immigration talks — the first in four years.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection stopped Cubans more than 79,800 times from October through March — more than double all of 2021 and five times more than all of 2020. Overall, the Border Patrol stopped migrants of all nationalities more than 209,000 times in March, the highest monthly mark in 22 years.

Cubans who cross the U.S. border illegally face little risk of being deported or expelled under a public health law that has been used to deny asylum to thousands of migrants of other nationalities on the grounds of slowing the spread of COVID-19.

Barely 500 Cubans stopped in March, or about 2%, were subject to Title 42 authority, named after a public health law. The Biden administration plans to end Title 42 authority on May 23.

Jorge Duany, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University, and other experts estimate the number of Cubans leaving could exceed other mass migrations from the island, including the Mariel boatlift of 1980, when more than 124,700 Cubans came to the U.S.

“There are several intertwined factors that have produced a perfect storm for the intensification of the Cuban exodus,” Duany said.

For one, Cuba is experiencing its worst economic crisis in decades due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the tightening of U.S. sanctions.

Massive street protests on July 11, 2021, and the government’s response also have played a role. Nongovernmental organizations have reported more than 1,400 arrests and 500 people sentenced to up to 30 years in prison for vandalism or sedition.

Havana has not said how many Cubans have left and has accused the United States of manipulating the situation and offering perks that encourage departure.

“What hurts? That there are young people who find that their future plans can’t develop in the country and have to emigrate,” Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said early this month. “There are people who want to prove themselves in another world, who want to show they aren’t breaking with their country, that their aspiration is also to improve a little and later return.”

THE CUBAN FAMILY TIRED OF WAITING

The 30-year-old woman who tried to bring her family to the U.S. through legal avenues had arrived in Florida in a raft in 2016. Under the “wet foot, dry foot” policy, Cubans could stay if they made it to U.S. land, but they were sent back if apprehended at sea.

Former President Barack Obama ended that policy in 2017, and she petitioned for immigration for her children the next year.

Every month, she sent her family $500 for medicine and food, along with boxes of clothes and other items, she said from her home in Tampa, Florida.

Finally, she decided to pay $11,000 to smugglers for each relative -- her two children, ages 8 and 10, and her mother and father.

Her parents sold everything, including their house and furniture, before embarking on the journey with both children, explained the single mother.

In Managua, they met 200 other migrants -- Cubans, Haitians, Venezuelans and Nicaraguans -- at a hotel.

“That same day they start a caravan by car, truck, or any kind of vehicle. In one night, they got into more than 10 different cars,” the woman said.

After 20 days, they arrived in Mexicali, Mexico, crossed the Colorado River at night and surrendered to Border Patrol agents in Yuma, Arizona.

They were separated. The grandparents, 45 and 62 years-old, were released in two days; their grandchildren were detained 11 days, the woman said.

THE CUBAN MAN WHO FEARED FOR HIS LIFE

Other Cubans say they left because they felt persecuted.

Ariel, 24, worked doing blood tests at a laboratory in a hospital in Cienfuegos, on Cuba’s south coast. During the pandemic, he led a protest demanding masks, gowns and disinfectants and criticized the government on Facebook for the lack of medical supplies.

He told the AP in a phone interview that he decided to leave in November after receiving threats and being beaten. He requested that only his middle name be used because his mother and 14-year-old sister in Cuba could face reprisals.

His whole trip “was a nightmare,” Ariel recalled, but he said that he was “willing to do whatever it took” lo leave Cuba.

He made his way to Mexicali, with help from an aunt in Florida, and paid a smuggler $300 to take him across the Colorado River.

He joined about 100 migrants, 90 of them Cubans, who boarded a truck at midnight, he said.

The river was calm, but deep. Water covered his waist. He helped a Cuban mom by carrying her child on his shoulders.

The smuggler gave them directions to a place where Border Patrol agents would pick them up.

They waited two days at a migrant camp with 1,000 other people, eating bread and canned food. Border Patrol agents picked them up in groups of 12 and took them to a center in Yuma that Ariel said “seemed like a prison.”

After his release, he called his aunt to let her know that he was ready to fly to St. Petersburg, Florida.

LIVING IN THE U.S.

Many Cubans who crossed illegally say they now feel like they are in limbo.

“The most difficult situation is going to be here, not when crossing (the border),” said Dr. Raúl González, a Cuban American who owns a clinic that helps new arrivals with paperwork to receive assistance for a few months. “They are like stranded here.”

It can take some time for asylum seekers to obtain a work permit.

At Gonzalez’s clinic, Cubans lined up to secure one of the 20 appointments available each day.

“It is sad what they are going through,” said the doctor. “Many tell me, ‘Don’t give me food stamps, I would prefer that they let me work.’”

——-

AP journalist Andrea Rodríguez contributed to this report from Havana.

PUTIN THE PIG
German wildlife park renames 'Putin' the boar

A Bavarian animal park has renamed a wild boar previously named for Russian leader Vladimir Putin. After the war in Ukraine, things became awkward.


A Bavarian animal park opted to change the name of one of its wild boars, previously named after Russian President Vladimir Putin, holding a ceremony Tuesday complete with a baptism, of sorts, in a popular water stock cube mixture that the animal enjoys.

The Mehlmeisel wildlife park in Bavaria had been mulling a name change for a few weeks.

After an online vote that also saw famous Ukrainian names floated like Zelenskyy and Klitschko, after the boxing brothers Vitali and Wladimir, "Eberhofer" was chosen as an apolitical alternative to the current predicament.

Putin an awkward name to call among guests

The animal park's operator Eckard Mickisch said he named the boar for Putin three years ago when it arrived given that it was a purebred Russian hog weighing nearly 200 kilograms (440 pounds), around three times more than wild boar typically found in Germany.

Mickisch said it became uncomfortable calling the hog's name after war broke out.

He also had concerns about Ukrainian visitors, hundreds of thousands of whom have arrived in Germany following Russia's war of aggression. Ukrainian refugees are granted free admission at Mehlmeisel.

According to keeper Mickisch, boar Eberhofer was baptised in water infused with Maggi stock cubes, which he's 'mad for'

From world leader to fictional policeman as namesake

Out of love and pity, the animal park announced on social media a contest for a new name.

After 2,700 suggestions, Mehlmeisel animal park opted for Eberhofer, the name of the policeman in a popular book series set in Bavaria by Rita Falk. Mickisch also quipped that the park had invited Franz Eberhofer to attend the baptism but had not heard back.

On Tuesday, the beast formerly known as Putin received its new name in a ceremony marked by a marzipan and biscuit cake decorated with five happy hogs.

However, with the seizure of everything from yachts to property belonging to Russian oligarchs following the invasion of Ukraine, baptizing the boar formerly known as Putin under a new name at Mehlmeisel presented a minor nod to the good old days of oligarch excess, with the park promising, "a grandiose boar banquet for him and his whole pack."

ar/msh (dpa, Reuters)

Study: Climate change, agriculture cut insect populations in half in some areas


A study published Wednesday found that populations of insects, like this brown argus butterfly, have been cut by as much as half in some areas due to agriculture and climate change.

 Photo by krzysztofniewolny/Pixabay


April 20 (UPI) -- Climate change and agriculture are threatening insect biodiversity, and in some areas have cut insect populations by half, according to a study published Wednesday.

The study, which appeared in the scientific journal Nature, found that rising temperatures and changes in the way land is used are linked to widespread drops in insect populations around the world.

A team from the University College London's Centre for Biodiversity and Environment Research analyzed nearly 20,000 insect species around the world.

They discovered that in regions with high-intensity agriculture and significantly warming climates, the number of insects was 49% lower than in habitats with no recorded climate change.

Impacted areas also experienced worsening biodiversity -- the number of insect species in those places were 29% lower than habitats with recorded climate change.

Insect populations in tropical ecosystems were hit the hardest by human influences, researchers found.

"Losing insect populations could be harmful not only to the natural environment, where insects often play key roles in local ecosystems, but it could also harm human health and food security, particularly with losses of pollinators," Dr. Charlie Outhwaite, the study's lead author and a research associate at UCL, told Science Daily.

"Our findings may only represent the tip of the iceberg as there is limited evidence in some areas, particularly in the tropics, which we found have quite high reductions in insect biodiversity in the most impacted areas."

In areas with low-intensity agriculture -- especially those with plenty of surrounding natural habitat -- losses to insect populations were much lower, researchers found.

Even in areas with rising temperatures, having at least three-fourths of the land occupied by natural habitat significantly buffered insect population decline.

In those areas, the number of insects dropped by only 7%, compared to a nearly two-thirds reduction in comparable areas with only one-fourth of natural habitat cover.

"The environmental harms of high-intensity agriculture present a tricky challenge as we try to keep up with food demands of a growing population," Dr. Tim Newbold, senior author and principal research fellow, told Science Daily.

He added that insect pollinators are especially vulnerable to agricultural expansion.

"Careful management of agricultural areas, such as preserving natural habitats near farmland, may help to ensure that vital insects can still thrive," Newbold said.

Glass windows kill billions of birds a year. Scientists are working to change that

Conservationists are trying to convince governments and building owners around the world to introduce changes to stop birds from flying into reflective glass. Experts say the solutions are surprisingly simple.


Glass buildings stop many migrating birds dead in their tracks

Divya Anantharaman points her flashlight under the wooden benches surrounding an office tower near Wall Street. At this time, the streets of New York are still the exclusive domain of early risers. But starting her weekly search and rescue mission at this ungodly hour is essential, she says.

She's looking for the victims of notorious bird killers: glass skyscrapers. When daylight breaks, doormen will sweep the sidewalks clean, and evidence of the dead will be lost.

Anantharaman volunteers for NYC Audubon, an urban conservation group that monitors bird deaths from window collisions. She inspects every dark corner on her route, looking through planters, careful not to miss a collision victim she could rescue. At the end of her round, she finds a dead bird beneath a gleaming glass overpass connecting two buildings.

It's an American woodcock, she thinks, a relatively common migrating bird with a long beak. Every spring, woodcocks pass through New York after spending the cold months in Alabama and other Gulf coast states. This bird is stiff, which means it recently died, Anantharaman says. "The eyes are still so clear — this may have happened minutes ago." She snaps photos, takes a solemn moment to close the eyelids with her thumb and puts the corpse into her pink backpack.

A casualty of a window collision in New York City

A billion birds and counting

Every year, 90,000 to 230,000 birds crash into New York buildings, NYC Audubon estimates. The city's concentration of illuminated buildings is a dangerous obstacle for winged travelers, especially during the spring and fall migration seasons.

New York sits on a migration route to South America, where many birds spend the winter. Since birds navigate using stars, artificial nighttime light attracts and disorients them. Believing they are flying toward starlight, the birds detour and land in the middle of an unfamiliar metropolis.

"The biggest problem is reflective glass," NYC Audubon biologist Kaitlyn Parkins says. "Birds don't see a reflection of a tree. To them, it's a tree. They fly at it, can accelerate very quickly and often die immediately."

In the US, where most of the research into bird collisions has been done, buildings are responsible for the deaths of up to 1 billion birds every year, the pioneering ornithologist Daniel Klem calculated in the 1990s. But glass windows are deathtraps all over the world.

"Birds are vulnerable to glass wherever birds and glass are found together. They don't see the bloody stuff," Klem says. He adds that it's not skyscrapers but rather low- and midrise buildings that pose the biggest threat.

Klem, now a professor at Muhlenberg College in Pennsylvania, considers window collisions a fundamental issue for the conservation of birds. "As a threat, I would put collision right after habitat destruction," he says. "What's so insidious is that windows kill indiscriminately. They also take the fittest in the population. We can't afford to lose any individual, let alone good breeders."

Volunteer Divya Anantharaman picks up a dead woodcock on the streets of New York

An international problem

In recent years, conservation groups and scientists have taken up the cause. Binbin Li leads one of two groups monitoring window strikes in China. She is an assistant professor of environmental sciences at Duke Kunshan University and earned a PhD at Duke in the US. There she met the leading researcher of the university's bird collision project.

"First, I thought this was only a problem at Duke, or in the States — I could not imagine seeing it here in China," she says. But, after her return, she got reports of three dead birds on campus within a month.

With a group of students, she now counts birds killed in flight on campus in Suzhou. Many of the victims, she notes, are found under glass corridors, just like the woodcock Anantharaman found in New York.

Li started a national survey to get a clearer picture of the problem. Three major migration pathways cut through China, but data on fatalities along these routes is still limited. "We realized that bird collision is not well-known in China, not even in academia," Li says.

'Just change the glass and turn off the lights'

In Costa Rica, Rose Marie Menacho had to convince her professors to let her investigate bird collisions as a PhD student eight years ago. "They didn't know much about this subject, didn't know it was a real problem," she recalls. "Even I was a bit shy saying I was studying this. I was a little ashamed because I thought it was not so big."

To understand the scale of the problem in the tropics, she now works with about 500 volunteers. Some store feathered corpses in their freezers, others send her reports and photos. "Not only migrating species collide," she says. Her volunteers recovered vibrantly colored quetzals and toucans with flamboyant oversize beaks. Both are local species.

A dead woodcock found on the streets of New York City

"Collision kills many birds who already have to deal with habitat loss, climate change, pesticides, et cetera," says Parkins, the biologist. "And it's so easy to solve — just change the glass and turn off the lights."

With the data they gather, Parkins and her team are trying to convince the owners of glass buildings to act. Usually, they don't need to replace any glass. Special foil can make it less reflective — and saves energy for heating and cooling. Markings on the windows can help birds see the structure. In one example, after a bird-friendly renovation of the Javits Convention Center, volunteers have found about 90% fewer dead birds around the building.

New York City adopted legislation in January to require public buildings to turn off lights at night during migration seasons. Since last year, architects must also use bird-friendly designs for all new buildings such as ultraviolet coating on glass, which is visible to birds but not to humans.

New regulations are a good start

On the sidewalk in front of Brookfield Place, an enormous office and shopping center on the southern tip of Manhattan, Rob Coover inspects a small bird. Daylight is still scarce, but he has already searched for dead birds for half an hour.

He checks carefully behind the piles of chairs the workers of a coffee shop will soon use on their terrace. Twice already he has bent over a tiny, stiff corpse to take photos. Now he again takes rubber gloves and plastic sandwich bags out of his backpack to pick up and preserve a body.

Rob Coover snaps photos of a victim of a window collision

Coover once found 27 birds in a single morning. A fellow volunteer made international headlines when she picked up 226 lifeless birds around One World Trade Center in a single hour last September.

"It's quite depressing, all these dead bodies," Coover says. Sometimes he finds a survivor and takes the wounded animal to a bird sanctuary. Dead bodies usually go into his freezer until he has time to take them to the headquarters of the conservation group, where they are collected and some are distributed to museums. "Before the pandemic, I went to work after my rounds and put them in the office freezer." No one ever noticed, he adds.

In the United States and Canada, volunteers are active in several communities, and the list of local governments enacting legislation to protect birds from buildings is growing. According to the nonprofit American Bird Conservancy, New York's law is one of the most effective additions. After studying bird collisions for almost half a century Daniel Klem is delighted. He finally sees the growing awareness he has been hoping for.

"Climate change is also a very serious issue — nobody is interested in distracting from that. But it's very complex, and it is going to take us a while to figure things out and convince people to do things responsibly," he says. "Bird collisions, that's something we could solve tomorrow. It's not complex; we just have to have the will."

Edited by: Ruby Russell

NYC doormen's union, residential owners agree to avert first strike in 31 years

By Ashley Williams

Residential apartment buildings are seen on the lower east side of New York City. The expected strike on Thursday would have been the first for residential building workers in the city in more than three decades. 

File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

April 20 (UPI) -- A strike that would have seen thousands of residential doormen in New York City walk off the job this week appears to have been averted by a tentative agreement on a new contract, union and realty officials said.

The deal was reached by the local 32BJ Service Employees International Union and the city's Realty Advisory Board on Tuesday. About 32,000 residential building workers voted for the strike over concerns about their contract, which expires Wednesday. The strike would have occurred Thursday.

The workers said they weren't seeking a large pay increase, but rather they wanted recognition for their roles as front-line workers.

As part of the tentative deal, workers at more than 3,000 buildings in New York City -- superintendents, doormen, handymen and porters -- will receive a 12.6% wage increase over four years, the Realty Advisory Board on Labor Relations said.

"We got a deal done that protects healthcare, with no premium sharing. We got a deal done that protects paid time off. We got a deal done that provides the economic security our members need in a time of rising inflation," 32BJ President Kyle Bragg said in a statement.

"We got a deal done that our members have earned and deserved. This contract honors the indispensable contributions that 32BJ members made throughout the [COVID-19] pandemic and includes pay bonuses -- a powerful recognition of our members' sacrifice."

The raise, which includes a onetime $3,000 bonus to counterbalance inflation impacts, will be the largest that 32BJ members have ever received, Bragg noted.

Union membership still must approve the agreement, which would run through April 20, 2026.

The deal also provides protected paid sick leave and vacation time and 100% employer-paid healthcare. Wages will rise by an average of $62,000 annually for doormen by the end of the contract.

The Realty Advisory Board negotiates collective bargaining agreements on behalf of building owners with unions that represent their maintenance and operating employees.

Board President Howard Rothschild called the agreement a show of the industry's "respect for our essential workers."

"The agreement builds on the important work [we] and 32BJ accomplished together throughout the pandemic, protecting jobs and maintaining solid health benefits," Rothschild said according to WABC-TV.

The city's residential workers carrying an increased workload during the pandemic was a key consideration of the negotiation process, both sides said.

"As people were contracting the virus rapidly at a maddening pace, our members continued to go to work every day to make sure the homes that they work in, the apartment buildings they work in, that the tenants that lived there were both safe and secure," Bragg said according to Spectrum News.


The deal covers workers in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island who serve roughly 1.5 million residents.

The strike on Thursday would have been the first for residential building service workers in the city since a 12-day walkout in 1991.

Germany: Left party leader Hennig-Wellsow steps down

A little over a year after taking over the leadership of the Left party, Susanne Hennig-Wellsow is stepping down, citing private reasons and a need for party renewal. She also criticized the party's handling of sexism.

Susanne Hennig-Wellsow is stepping down after leading the Left party for a little over a year

The co-leader of Germany's socialist Left party, Susanne Hennig-Wellsow, has announced that she is resigning "with immediate effect."

In a statement published online, the 44-year-old politician said there were a number of reasons behind her decision, including the "handling of sexism" in the party's ranks and the need for "new faces" to drive the Left's renewal.

Hennig-Wellsow also cited her young son, saying her "private situation" did not allow her to commit the necessary time and energy to the party.

"The Left also needs a chairwoman who is there for the party, with everything she has," the statement said.

 
Reports of sexual violence

Hennig-Wellsow criticized the Left's handling of sexism accusations, saying it exposed "glaring deficits" in the party.

"I apologize to those affected and support all efforts to make the Left a party in which sexism has no place," she said.

Last week, a report in German news magazine Der Spiegel detailed allegations of sexual violence in the Left party in the state of Hesse over a number of years. According to the report, the former partner of Janine Wissler, who is Hennig-Wellsow's fellow co-leader, was among those accused. In one alleged instance, a woman said she was filmed having sex when she was underage.

The party's federal executive board is expected to discuss the matter later on Wednesday

Watch video  25:49 Interview with Janine Wissler from the Left Party

Poor performance

Hennig-Wellsow also lamented the party's poor results in last year's federal election, which saw the Left suffer their worst showing since their official formation in 2007.

"A truly fresh start has failed to materialize," Hennig-Wellsow's statement said. "We were unable to deliver on the promise of being part of a forward-looking policy change because of our own weakness."

"Too few people believed that we were willing and able to actively shape this country for the better," she said.

Hennig-Wellsow led the Left party alongside Janine Wissler after taking over from former co-leaders Katja Kipping and Bernd Riexinger in February 2021.

nm/fb (AFP, dpa)

India: Court halts demolition of Muslim properties in Delhi

Government critics accuse the ruling Hindu nationalist BJP of using so-called demolition drives to intimidate the country's Muslim minority. But authorities say they are only targeting illegal structures.

A number of shops were destroyed in the Jahangirpuri demolition operation

India's Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered authorities in New Delhi to stop tearing down Muslim-owned shops and other structures near the site of recent communal clashes.

The order came after paramilitary forces and bulldozers moved into Jahangirpuri ⁠— a low-income, predominantly Muslim neighborhood in the capital's northwest ⁠— and razed several shops as well as the walls around a mosque.

The demolition followed clashes between Muslims and Hindus in the area over the weekend, leading to at least 20 arrests.

Authorities have responded to recent outbreaks of violence in other parts of the country with similar demolition drives.

A man weeds through what is left of his shop after it was razed by bulldozers

'A demolition of constitutional values'

Critics allege these operations are an attempt by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to intimidate India's Muslim minority, which makes up around 14% of the population.

Rahul Gandhi, a leader of the opposition Congress party, called the drive "a demolition of India's constitutional values'' and "state-sponsored targeting" of low-income groups and minorities.

BJP leaders and hard-line Hindu groups affiliated with the party, however, say they are not targeting any particular religious group but are only enforcing the law.

Raja Iqbal Singh, mayor of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation, which is ruled by the BJP, said there was no connection between the demolitions and the weekend clashes. Authorities were just tearing down "illegal buildings that have encroached onto the roads,'' he said.

The Supreme Court's decision followed a petition accusing municipal authorities of not giving local residents or shopkeepers advance warning.

The stay on the demolition will remain in force until a hearing scheduled for Thursday.

India has seen a spike in small-scale confrontations between Hindus and Muslims at religious processions in recent weeks.

Earlier this month, a number of homes and shops were torn down in the central state of Madhya Pradesh and western Gujarat state in the aftermath of communal violence there. Both states are ruled by the BJP.