‘It is a little eerie.’ Tree in ‘enchanted’ NC forest is growing in a knot. Why?


Hans Rohr photo

Mark Price
Thu, July 21, 2022 

A tree tied in a knot is growing in eastern North Carolina — and a state forester says it’s one of the most mystifying sights you can find in the “enchanted forest.”

It’s accessible only by foot in Bladen Lakes State Forest, about 45 miles southeast of Fort Bragg, and a photo shared on Facebook by the N.C. Forest Service shows its whimsical curves.

Bladen Lakes State Forest Supervisor Hans Rohr says it’s a very strange longleaf pine.

“It has been in this position for about as long as I can remember, just shy of 20 years,” he says. “It’s about 25 feet tall, but if you straightened it out, it would be about 50 to 60 feet tall.”

Social media reactions to the Facebook photo have included comparisons to “a huge snake.” Some have also suggested the state collect the seeds to see what may grow from them.

But seeing it in person is disconcerting, Rohr says.

“You just don’t expect that,” he says. “I’ve spent a lot of time in the woods and I have never seen a tree shaped like that. It is a little eerie looking.”

There are other trees in the same area that are similarly off-putting, he says, including one that appears to have a head and two arms raised in the air.

As for the knotted tree, Rohr has some theories.

“One theory could be that an older tree or something maybe fell on it, but didn’t break it. It just bent it in this manner and the tree was able to make this 360 (degree) ring around it. Another theory is there was some kind of damage, maybe insect damage, which made the top branch die and a side branch took over.”

Theory No. 1 unravels when considering there are no signs of an older tree that fell nearby, he says.

Longleaf pine can reach 110 feet in height and have been known to live more than 450 years, according to the Longleaf Alliance.

They are widespread in Bladen Lakes State Forest, a 33,500-acre “working forest” that funds itself with “sales of timber, pine straw and charcoal,” the state says.

The knotted tree is behind a gate in an area known as the Addie Barnes red-cockaded woodpecker area,

 home to the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker.

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Native Americans may have originated from China, says new study on 14,000-year-old human fossils



Jane Nam
Thu, July 21, 2022

A new study suggests that Native Americans may have originated from Southern China, based on the discovery and DNA analysis of 14,000-year-old human fossils.

The journal “Current Biology” published the study on July 14, which stated that the discovered fossils are thought to belong to an extinct maternal branch to which Native Americans are also possibly related.

Researchers compared the genome of the bones to people from around the world and came to the conclusion that they matched those of an individual deeply linked with East Asian ancestry.

Archaeologists had previously found fossils in China’s Yunnan Province three decades ago; however, it was not until 2018 that a team was able to extract DNA from the ancient skull and use genome sequencing to prove that the individual belonged to an extinct species of modern humans whose descendants were now in East Asia, the Indo-China peninsula and the Southeast Asian islands.

The same team proposed that some people from southern East Asia had traveled north along the coastline of present-day eastern China, went through Japan, reached up to Siberia and then crossed the Bering Strait between the continents of Asia and North America.

While a previously discovered infant’s remains from an archaeological site in Alaska in 2013 proved that modern Native Americans came from Asia, the recent findings narrow down from which parts of Asia they may have originated.

Bing Su from the Kunming Institute of Zoology explained, “Such data will not only help us paint a more complete picture of how our ancestors migrate but also contain important information about how humans change their physical appearance by adapting to local environments over time, such as the variations in skin color in response to changes in sunlight exposure.”

More from NextShark: Anti-Asian hate still a widespread problem in Canada, polls show

Featured Image via UW (University of Washington) (left) and Inside Edition (right)

More from NextShark: Anti-Asian hate incidents up by 47% in Canada, report reveals

U.S. launches probe of Houston illegal dumping over alleged discrimination

The Houston skyline is seen beyond a railroad yard by the

 Houston Ship Channel in Houston
Fri, July 22, 2022

By Valerie Volcovici and Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Justice Department on Friday opened an investigation into whether the city of Houston's response to illegal dumping discriminated against Black and Latino communities, citing environmental and health risks.

The Justice Department's civil rights division will lead the environmental justice investigation with support from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas. It will examine whether Houston's environmental enforcement and solid waste management operations, policies and practices resulted in discriminatory dumping in Black and Latino communities.

"Illegal dump sites not only attract rodents, mosquitoes and other vermin that pose health risks, but they can also contaminate surface water and impact proper drainage, making areas more susceptible to flooding," said Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the department’s civil rights division.

"No one in the United States should be exposed to risk of illness and other serious harm because of ineffective solid waste management or inadequate enforcement programs," Clarke added.

Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said the launch of the probe was disappointing. He described the investigation as "absurd, baseless, and without merit." He added the city will cooperate with the Justice Department and was confident the outcome would show no discrimination from Houston.

The investigation is part of a broader Biden administration effort to prioritize environmental justice in its policymaking. The Justice Department in May announced the launch of a new office to help low-income areas and communities of color battle the disproportionate impact of air and water pollution.

"This investigation exemplifies the department's commitment to alleviating disproportionate environmental burdens or an all too often by communities of color, low income communities and to tribal communities," said U.S. Attorney Jennifer Lowery in a press conference.

Clarke said the complaints of illegal dumping, including reports of dead bodies and animals, came from northeast Houston and extend back years. She said the investigation will examine citywide data and focus on disparities between the specific neighborhood and the rest of the city.

If the Justice Department finds violations of the Civil Rights Act, it will work with city officials to come up with a voluntary compliance plan for the city, Clarke said.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Jonathan Oatis, Matthew Lewis and Aurora Ellis)

Despite efforts to scapegoat Biden, Keystone XL Pipeline wouldn’t mean cheaper gas

Ted Williams

The Spectrum
Fri, July 22, 2022 

Pipeline used to carry crude oil is shown at the Superior, Wis., terminal of Enbridge Energy. The sponsor of the Keystone XL crude oil pipeline said last summer that it's pulling the plug on the contentious project, after Canadian officials failed to persuade the Biden administration to reverse its cancellation of the company's permit.

”A report that the Biden administration is weighing greater imports of Canadian oil is putting a renewed focus on the canceled Keystone XL pipeline and whether it would have made any difference with today’s tight oil supply.” -- Energywire

Ever since boycotts started blocking Russian petroleum products, social media has been rife with memes that blame rising gasoline prices on “the cancellation of the Keystone Pipeline.”

Example: “Sooo, if shutting down Russia’s pipeline(s) will hurt their economy, wouldn’t shutting down ours hurt our economy? Asking for a buddy.”

Most of the criticism comes from people who recycle truthiness. Former vice president Mike Pence: “Gas prices have risen across the country because of this administration's war on energy — shutting down the Keystone Pipeline.” Republican Rep. Jim Jordan: “Biden shut off the Keystone Pipeline.”

Here’s what really happened: No one shut down, canceled, or shut off the Keystone Pipeline. It is fully operational, daily delivering 590,000 barrels of tar-sands oil in Canada to U.S. refineries.

What some pipeline advocates think is the “Keystone Pipeline” is a 1,700-mile “shortcut” called Keystone XL, or KXL. It would have sliced through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma to the Texas Gulf Coast, delivering 830,000 barrels of tar sands oil per day. Many residents of those states fought fiercely against the pipeline cutting through their land.

Now, “Build the Keystone Pipeline” has become a social-media mantra, as if the United States could so decree. It is the Canadian firm, TC Energy, formerly TransCanada, that officially terminated the project once President Biden withdrew its permits.

Even if construction on the pipeline began tomorrow, KXL could not be up and running in less than five years. The KXL pipeline was a project developed by a foreign company that would have delivered foreign oil products to mostly foreign markets.

When President Trump re-permitted KXL in 2017, his own State Department reported that it would not lower gasoline prices. The price of oil is set by the global market and certainly not by U.S. presidents. What’s more, the project was just about dead for a number of reasons, including litigation from aggrieved property owners whose land TC Energy seized by eminent domain.

We should also remember that rendering gasoline from tar-sands oil, the planet’s dirtiest petroleum, is far more polluting and energy-intensive than conventional refining. Some carbon content is burned off in a process that belches greenhouse gases and generates toxic waste called petcoke, which is dumped around the United States in piles six stories high. Petcoke billows through neighborhoods and infiltrates schools and houses even when windows are shut.

Bitumen, basically asphalt, continues to be strip-mined from what used to be Canada’s boreal forests in Alberta. Too thick to be piped, it’s spiked with volatile liquid condensate from natural gas and thus converted to a toxic tar-sands cocktail called ”dilbit,” short for diluted bitumen.

Dilbit, sent through the existing Keystone pipeline, contains chloride salts, sulfur, abrasive minerals and acids, and must be pumped under high pressure. It’s murder on pipes.

In addition to greenhouse gases and petcoke, tar-sands waste products include lakes, rivers, fish, wildlife and people. Between 1995 and 2006, when tar-sands extraction was accelerating, Alberta’s First Nations suffered a sudden 30 percent increase in cancer rates.

KXL, if built, also threatened the world’s largest aquifer — the Ogallala. Anyone who thinks Nebraska lacks water should visit Green Valley Township, where I encountered Ogallala water so close to the surface it flowed along dirt roads and ditches. Pintails, mallards, and widgeon billowed out of them. But parts of the aquifer are now depleted, and a major dilbit spill could finish those parts off.

In 2011 a pipeline representative named Shawn Howard assured me that ramming a dilbit pipe through the Ogallala aquifer would be risk free.

“Why,” he demanded, “would we invest $13 billion in a pipeline and put a product in it that was going to destroy it like these activists are trotting out? It makes absolutely no business sense.”

The existing Keystone pipeline has ruptured 22 times, including spills in 2017 and 2019 that fouled land and water with 404,000 gallons of dilbit. Business sense, as the oil industry consistently reminds us, is an attribute more often desired than possessed.

Ted Williams is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring conversation about the West. He writes about fish, wildlife and the environment for national publications.

This article originally appeared on St. George Spectrum & Daily News: Writers on the Range: 'Keystone Pipeline' wouldn't make gas cheaper

Mexican official seeks 'open, frank,' dialogue with U.S. and Canada in energy dispute


Deputy Economy Minister Luz Maria De la Mora

Fri, July 22, 2022
By Anthony Esposito

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's government will hold frank and open discussions to resolve a dispute with the United States and Canada over Mexican energy policies that they argue breaches a regional trade pact, a senior trade official said.

The U.S. and Canadian demands come after years of concern among those nations' private firms that Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's drive to tighten the state's grip on oil and electricity output treated them unfairly and was in violation of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

The U.S-led request for consultations with Mexico marks the most serious trade spat between Washington and Mexico City since the USMCA trade pact took effect two years ago. If unresolved, it could ultimately lead to costly U.S. tariffs.

Deputy Economy Minister Luz Maria De la Mora, who handles trade disputes for the Mexican government, said she hoped talks with U.S. officials would yield a breakthrough.

"We want to take advantage of this consultation phase ... to see how we can reach a mutually satisfactory solution through an open, frank and constructive dialogue, which will allow us to overcome these differences," she told Reuters in an interview.

Though De la Mora said Mexico would seek to argue that its energy policies are not in breach of the trade deal, her conciliatory tone contrasts with Lopez Obrador's defiant push back against the complaints.

A combative leftist, Lopez Obrador said on Friday "we will not yield" on the matter, promising to continue a robust defense of his nationalist energy vision.

Lopez Obrador has pledged to revive state oil producer Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) and power utility Comision Federal de Electricidad, which he argues his predecessors deliberately "destroyed" to cede Mexico's energy market to foreigners.

The U.S. Trade Representative says the moves to bolster the state-run firms have undermined American companies in Mexico.

De la Mora said Mexico would not use a separate dispute with Washington over the auto industry as a bargaining chip.

"We hope this issue will be resolved before the end of the year and we are very optimistic that we have a very solid case and that we will have a favorable resolution for Mexico," said De la Mora, referring to the auto spat.

Canada said in January it would join Mexico in requesting a dispute settlement panel to iron out their differences with the United States over how to apply automotive sector content requirements under the treaty.

Asked if Lopez Obrador's energy policies were spooking investors, De la Mora pointed to recent announcements of investments in Mexico by U.S. energy company Sempra Energy and Canada's TC Energy.

She argued that the USMCA's dispute settlement mechanism gave investors certainty because if differences arise, like they have now, its use would help clear things up.

"The dispute resolution mechanism is a very solid mechanism, it is a mechanism that allows the investor to have greater certainty and this is very positive for the business climate," she said.

The U.S. requested consultations under the USMCA over Mexico's energy policies on July 20.

Under USMCA rules, the United States and Mexico would enter into consultations within 30 days of the U.S. request, unless the parties decide otherwise. If they do not resolve the matter through consultations within 75 days of the U.S. request, the United States may request the establishment of a dispute panel.

(Reporting by Anthony Esposito; Additional reporting by Dave Graham; Editing by Kim Coghill and Alistair Bell)

Mexico denies energy policies unfair after Canada joins U.S. demand


Mexico's President Lopez Obrador attends daily news conference

 at the National Palace

Thu, July 21, 2022 at 7:59 AM·2 min read

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Thursday denied his energy policies breached a regional trade agreement after Canada challenged them, and said that he had reached agreement with a host of American investors in the sector.

Speaking at a regular news conference, Lopez Obrador said Mexico would defend control of its oil as well as its power market policies, responding to news that Canada had joined a U.S. demand for dispute settlement talks over his energy agenda.

The demand was the culmination of years of concern among U.S. and Canadian companies that Lopez Obrador's drive to tighten state control of energy treated them unfairly and was in breach of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

Lopez Obrador said there had been "no violation" of the USMCA trade pact, and that his government had been successfully dealing with concerns among U.S. energy companies in Mexico.

"We have to make our sovereignty count," he said.

Canada's International Trade Minister Mary Ng on Thursday reiterated that Canada had "consistently raised its concerns regarding Mexico's change in energy policy".

"We agree with the United States that these policies are inconsistent with Mexico's USMCA obligations," Ng said in a statement.

Lopez Obrador said that about a month ago, he had spent two weeks meeting with 19 energy companies, and had reached agreement with 17 of them. He did not identify any of them.

Lopez Obrador also said the energy issue was "not discussed" when he met business executives in Washington last week.

However, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which helped to organize the talks, said executives had voiced "serious concern" over a worsening investment climate in Mexico and urged it to uphold its USMCA commitments, particularly on energy.

Among concerns raised at the meeting were policies that executives said unfairly favored Mexico's state-owned energy companies at the expense of private rivals, as well as delays in securing permits for companies, the Chamber said in a statement.

(Reporting by Dave Graham and Brendan O'Boyle; additional reporting by Steve Scherer in Ottawa; editing by Diane Craft and Marguerita Choy)

Mexico Is Seen Risking $30 Billion Hit in US-Canada Trade Spat

Nacha Cattan and Max de Haldevang
Thu, July 21, 2022 

(Bloomberg) -- Mexico could be hit with between $10 billion and $30 billion in tariffs if it loses a trade spat with the US and Canada, according to two former officials who negotiated the pact under which the dispute was brought.

The US and Canada have requested dispute settlement talks under the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement, known as USMCA, arguing that Mexico is violating the North American free trade deal with its moves to prioritize energy from its state utility over private renewables companies. They argue the policies of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, known as AMLO, have led to denials and revocations of US firms’ abilities to operate in Mexico’s energy sector.

If there is no resolution and Mexico loses the dispute, then in the summer of 2023, the US and Canada can slap tariffs equal to the losses their companies have faced, Kenneth Smith Ramos, who was Mexico’s chief USMCA negotiator through 2019, said in an interview. Former Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo, now an opposition lawmaker, said the same in an interview with Mexican journalist Carmen Aristegui.

US officials have already quoted losses of anywhere between $10 billion and $30 billion, which Canada would only add to, and BloombergNEF has calculated at least $22 billion in all private investment is at risk.

“This looks very difficult to be resolved during the consultation period because the violations are so precise, specific,” said Ramos, who saw this as one of the most potentially expensive trade spats since USMCA’s predecessor took effect in 1994.

 “Mexico would need to completely overhaul two pieces of legislation that are essential to AMLO.”

The fight could have a wide-ranging impact beyond Mexico’s energy sector, hitting automakers and farmers, Guajardo added.

Ultimately, the battle could hurt Mexico and North America’s attractiveness to investors just as the region is expected to see a boom in trade.

Amid disrupted global shipping networks, the re-routing of supply chains from Asia could boost exports by billions of dollars for Latin America’s No. 2 economy, but the trade dispute puts some of that at risk, Luis de la Calle, Guajardo’s former deputy, said in an interview. A report by the Inter-American Development Bank estimates the annual value to Mexico of over $35.3 billion.

China and Europe’s economic problems have made North America the “most competitive region in the world” at the moment, De la Calle said. If the three countries fail to come to an agreement, “the main cost is the opportunity cost for Mexico and North America to not take advantage of the international context that tremendously favors North America.”

Under the trade accord’s rules, such a request would give Mexico up to 30 days to agree to schedule consultations. If after 75 days no agreement is reached, the US could request that a formal panel hear arguments from the two nations. While that process focuses on getting Mexico to agree to corrective actions, dragged-out conflicts can ultimately lead to the US imposing punitive tariffs on imports from Mexico under the two-year-old trade pact.

Lopez Obrador, known as AMLO, defended his policies Thursday, saying the oil sector was excluded from the trade pact, an argument Smith and other trade experts dispute. At a daily press conference Wednesday after the US announced its complaint, he played a song titled “Oh, so scary,” seeming to downplay his concerns. He also said he was protecting the country against “voracious companies” and added that by starting the dispute, the Biden administration risked looking like it was supporting “corrupt” firms.

Lopez Obrador has worked to return Mexico to energy independence by supporting state-owned oil and gas producer Petroleos Mexicanos, known as Pemex, and state power company CFE. The government has refused to hand out permits to several all-but-finished foreign energy projects.

“We are watching a potential train crash between the US, Mexico and Canada,” Smith Ramos said.

Mexico’s president taunts Biden over energy policy trade fight: ‘Ooooh, I’m so scared’

Will Daniel

Thu, July 21, 2022 

There's a brewing trade dispute between the U.S. and Mexico on energy policy, and it’s getting ugly fast.

“Ooooh, I’m so scared,” Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) said at a Wednesday press conference, referencing a popular Mexican song and taunting the Biden administration by ordering his staff to play it.

When reporters asked him how he proposes to solve the policy spat, AMLO was defiant: “Nothing will happen.”

What is going on here?

It started early on Wednesday, when U.S. officials argued that AMLO’s energy policies favor Mexico's state-run electrical utility and oil companies and undermine American business.

The U.S. said it was seeking “dispute settlement consultations” under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USCMA), a trade agreement meant to ensure balanced, reciprocal trading between North American nations. It was a first step in a process that could lead to tariffs on some Mexican products.

The news comes just over a week after Biden and AMLO put out a joint statement reaffirming their commitment to the USMCA.

Mexico’s president laughed off the White House’s rhetoric, saying that Biden has always respected Mexican sovereignty and the trade fight was merely a result of corrupt right-wing lobbying, the Wall Street Journal first reported.

Mexico has been attempting to prop up its state-run electrical utility, the Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE), and its national oil and gas company, Petróleos Mexicanos (PEMEX), with policies that U.S. trade ambassador Katerine Tai argues “prioritize the distribution” of energy from these firms, disincentivizing market competition and clean-energy production in the country.

“We have tried to work constructively with the Mexican government to address these concerns, but, unfortunately, U.S. companies continue to face unfair treatment in Mexico,” Tai said in a statement on Wednesday.

Canada's trade ministry is also launching energy consultations with Mexico, with officials telling Reuters they are "supporting the U.S. in their challenge."

The Alliance for Trade Enforcement, a trade group made up of various U.S. industry associations, also stood by the Biden administration’s trade fight.

“The Alliance for Trade Enforcement applauds USTR’s request for consultations with Mexico. President López Obrador’s efforts to nationalize the country’s energy sector directly violate the USMCA, obstruct clean energy initiatives in the region, and threaten America’s economic prosperity,” they wrote in a Wednesday statement.

Republican senators applauded the move by the Biden administration as well, but argued it should have been done sooner.

“Under the USMCA, Mexico agreed to level the playing field and [to] allow American companies to compete with Mexican companies to meet Mexico’s energy needs. But the government of Mexico has been violating this agreement. It was well past time for the United States to respond, and it was right for the U.S. Trade Representative to finally act,” U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R.-Texas) said in a Wednesday statement.

Mexico's economy ministry responded to U.S. and Canadian requests for consultation late on Wednesday night, with officials saying that they are hoping to reach a "mutually satisfactory solution" to the energy dispute. President López Obrador remained defiant on Thursday, however, arguing that Mexico has not violated the USMCA trade agreement.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

EXPLAINER: US energy sector dispute with Mexico


Thu, July 21, 2022 

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The U.S. government has forced Mexico into negotiations over what Washington considers unfair practices that are effectively excluding U.S. and other foreign companies from the Mexican energy sector in violation of the free trade agreement they signed with Canada. Mexico says it has received a similar notice from Canada related to its electricity law.

WHAT IS THE U.S. GOVERNMENT COMPLAINING ABOUT?

The U.S. government says a change to Mexican law last year gives an unfair advantage to Mexico’s state-owned Federal Electricity Commission and puts energy sold by private companies, including cleaner energy from solar or wind, at a disadvantage.

The U.S. also says a 2019 regulation gives only state oil and gas company Petroleos Mexicanos extra time to comply with tougher environmental standards limiting the sulfur allowed in automotive diesel fuel.

Mexico has also delayed, rejected or failed to act on private companies’ applications for permits to operate in the energy business and has revoked or suspended existing permits, according to the U.S. government.

HOW DID WE GET HERE?

Private companies, mainly from Spain and the United States, invested billions of dollars in Mexico to build wind, solar and gas-fired electricity plants under the terms of a 2013 reform opening the energy sector during the administration that preceded the current one under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

Before that overhaul, Mexico faced several problems: high electricity rates, scarce generating capacity and dirty power plants that often burned fuel oil to produce electricity. So the government built pipelines to import cleaner U.S. natural gas, allowed companies to buy electricity from independent generators and gave foreign and private firms incentives to install cleaner wind-power turbines or gas-fired plants.

Mexico may have given private and foreign firms too many incentives. They received preferential treatment in pricing and purchasing, and didn’t have to pay the Federal Electricity Commission fees for distributing power through government-owned transmission lines. The state-owned utility lost market share and income, but still had to maintain transmission lines.

WHAT IS MEXICO'S POSITION?

The energy sector is a point of national pride for Mexico's president, who frequently speaks fondly of large state-owned entities.

López Obrador has made propping up Mexico’s deeply indebted state oil company a top priority, and he has railed against foreign companies that flooded the electricity sector when it was opened to competition.

López Obrador doesn’t want the Federal Electricity Commission to go bankrupt or lose more market share. Last year, his allies in Mexico’s congress made legal changes that give preference to the state power utility, requiring it to buy power from its own plants first, while often cleaner energy from private generators would be last in line.

The president tried to enshrine some of those changes in the constitution, but those failed to get the required two-thirds majority in congress earlier this year.

Mexican law had required free competition in the power industry. And the U.S.-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement prohibits member nations from favoring domestic producers or state-owned firms.

WHAT DO THE SIDES SAY ABOUT THEIR DISPUTE?

In announcing the formal U.S. complaint Wednesday, the office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in a statement: “Mexico’s policies have largely cut off U.S. and other investment in the country’s clean energy infrastructure, including significant steps to roll back reforms Mexico previously made to meet its climate goals under the Paris Agreement. Mexico’s policy changes threaten to push private sector innovation out of the Mexican energy market.”

López Obrador downplayed the dispute Wednesday, framing it as fairly routine in relations between the two countries. He noted that no complaint was mentioned to him when he visited President Joe Biden in Washington earlier this month.

On Thursday, López Obrador said the issue is “about the interests dedicated to plundering Mexico.” He said he doesn’t believe it is the companies that are complaining, but rather that this is a “political issue.”

“We have many elements to respond (with),” López Obrador said. “We are going to defend ourselves.”

Mexico’s Economy Ministry said Wednesday, “The government of Mexico expresses its willingness to reach a mutually satisfactory solution during the consultation phase.”

Mexico announced later Wednesday that it had received a similar notice from Canada related to its electricity law.

WHAT HAPPENS NOW?

The consultation phase between the sides is supposed to start within 30 days.

If the two countries cannot reach an agreement after 75 days of talks, the U.S. can request intervention by a dispute resolution panel under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement that could result in sanctions against Mexico if the United States prevails.

The pact, negotiated by President Donald Trump, replaced the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement.

NY's fossil fuel use soared after Indian Point plant closure. Officials sound the alarm

Thomas C. Zambito,

 New York State Team

Lohud | The Journal News
Fri, July 22, 2022 

The 2021 shutdown of the Indian Point nuclear power plant led to near-total dependence on fossil fuels to produce electricity in New York's energy-hungry downstate region, and surging amounts of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the air.

A report issued last month by the New York Independent System Operator, which runs the state’s electric grid, shows that in 2021, 89% of downstate energy came from natural gas and oil, up from 77% the previous year when both of Indian Point’s two reactors were still running.

The newly released figures demonstrate in stark detail just how much work the state will need to do in the coming years if it's to achieve its ambitious climate-related goals − reducing carbon-producing emissions to zero while clearing the way for renewables like wind and solar power to make a larger contribution to the electric grid.

And they have pro-nuclear advocates urging the state to clear a path to allow nuclear power play a larger role in the state's energy future.

“If we’re serious about dealing with climate change, then we’re going to need all the tools in the toolbox, which includes nuclear, not just now but in the future,” said Keith Schue, an electrical engineer and a leader of Nuclear New York, a pro-nuclear group allied with James Hansen, a leading climate scientist. “We do believe that closing Indian Point was a mistake. But are we going to continue making mistakes or can we learn from them?”

Work on the equipment hatch enlarging project, proceeds on the containment dome for Indian Point 2 at the Indian Point Energy Center in Buchanan, Jan. 12, 2022. Holtec International is in the process of decommissioning the property.

The shift to greater fossil fuel reliance comes as little surprise.

A 2017 NYISO study predicted the 2,000 megawatts of power lost when Indian Point closed would be picked up by three new natural gas plants – in Dover Plains, Wawayanda and Bayonne, N.J. One megawatt powers between 800 and 1,000 homes.

And Indian Point’s former owner, Louisiana-based Entergy, noted that the year after its Vermont Yankee plant shut down in 2014, natural gas-fired generation jumped 12 percent, just as it has since the Buchanan plant closed. The first of Indian Point’s two working reactors shut down in April 2020, followed by the second in April 2021.

With Indian Point eliminated from the energy mix, it has become even harder to wean a downstate region that includes New York City off fossil fuels.

Upstate:  Oswego rescued a nuclear power plant and thrived. A downstate village may not be as lucky.

Why did the plant close?

Drone photo of Indian Point Power Center in Buchanan on Tuesday, April 28, 2020.

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo's administration brokered the 2017 deal with Entergy that led to Indian Point’s shutdown, with Cuomo citing fears of a nuclear mishap at a power plant located some 35 miles from New York City. He chose to keep open three upstate nuclear plants – two on Lake Ontario and another near Rochester − by arranging for some $7.6 billion in subsidies over 12 years.

But the agreement that shuttered Indian Point came when natural gas was cheap. Entergy cited competition from natural gas in the energy market as the prime mover behind its decision to close a plant that had generated electricity for Westchester County and New York City for six decades.

Today, with natural gas prices surging, electricity is not so cheap.

“We got used to having historically cheap natural gas in the United States,” said Madison Hilly, the founder and executive director of the Campaign for a Green Nuclear Deal in Chicago. “So places that shut down their nuclear plants, even if they were replaced with gas, consumers really didn't feel that in their pocketbooks. Now the era of nonprofit natural gas − as I call it − seems to be over. It's really expensive.”

Lawsuit: Riverkeeper pledges legal action against efforts to replace Indian Point energy with gas

The push to reconsider nuclear power

In 2021, the average wholesale price of electricity in New York was $47.59 per megawatt hour last year, nearly double what it was the previous year. NYISO’s independent monitor credited the increase in wholesale electric prices to the Indian Point shutdown, the NYISO report said.

California, which is pursuing a slate of clean energy goals like New York’s, appears to be rethinking its decision to do away with nuclear power.

In May, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said he would support keeping the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant open beyond its planned 2025 closure to ensure the reliability of the state’s electric grid. Researchers from Stanford University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have concluded keeping the plant open for another ten years could limit carbon emissions and save the state $2.6 billion in power costs.

Hilly has teamed with Nuclear New York, a coalition of scientists, engineers and labor and management from the nuclear industry, to urge the state to give nuclear power a larger role in the state’s energy mix. In April, Hansen, a former NASA scientist who was among the first to identify the consequences from climate change, appeared at an Albany press conference to urge the state to include nuclear in a plan being drafted for the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act.

“We're trying to prevent the situation from getting that bad – that reality that forces politicians to eat crow,” Hilly said. “Eventually, if we keep going down this path, ratepayers and voters are not going to tolerate it and politicians will quickly have to get on board or get out.”

A spokesman for Gov. Kathy Hochul said the state is forging ahead with its twin goals of having 70% of the state’s electric demand met by renewables by 2030 and 100% zero emissions by 2040.

“These goals, which are being met through solar, wind, and hydroelectricity along with the continued use of the state’s three existing upstate nuclear plants, were developed to reduce emissions from fossil fuels, combat the dangerous impacts of climate change and benefit New Yorkers by reducing volatility in electricity pricing,” spokesman Leo Rosales said. “Planning for these goals took into account the necessary closure of Indian Point following dozens of safety and operational hazards and in no way jeopardizes New York’s clean energy goals or the reliability of the state’s electric grid."

Transmission: Power lines will bring wind and solar energy from upstate but will it be enough to help NY achieve green energy goals?

NY's electric grid under siege

NY Transco's New York Energy Solution project in Claverack is set to bring clean energy from upstate into the Hudson Valley.

Increased energy costs are only part of the problem.

NYISO’s June "Power Trends" report offers a sobering assessment of grid reliability in the years ahead.

The amount of energy resources the state can access each day is decreasing, and that trend is expected to worsen in the years to come as the demand for electricity surges. Electricity needed to charge cars and heat buildings will shift peak usage to the winter instead of summer, which typically sees the highest energy usage as air conditioners run around the clock.

Adding to the problem are environmental regulations that will impact the output of the state’s peaker plants, fossil-fuel generated plants that take their name from delivering energy at times of peak demand. Roughly half of the 3,300 megawatts these plants generate in the lower Hudson Valley, Long Island and New York City will be unavailable during the summer of 2025, NYISO notes.

“The margins that we see on our system are shrinking,” NYISO president and chief executive officer Rich Dewey told reporters at a media briefing last month.

The grid is in perhaps the most transformative moment in its history.

Older generating plants are being shut down while the state introduces a slate of renewable energy projects – offshore wind on Long Island, wind power upstate, batteries to store solar energy.

A network of transmission lines stretching from western New York to New York City is currently under construction, part of an effort to remove a bottleneck that kept clean energy stuck north of Albany. Upstate’s energy mix is decidedly cleaner than downstate’s. Upstate, three nuclear power plants and hydropower from the Robert Moses Niagara Hydroelectric Power Station contribute to a 91% carbon-free energy grid.

There are also plans to deliver hydropower to New York City from Canada by way of 340 miles of underground cable that will run in the Hudson River. Another 174-mile transmission line will bring upstate wind down to Queens along upstate rights-of-way.

But it will be years before these projects are up and running.

The NYISO report anticipates a 10% gap in the amount of renewable power that will be available on an as-needed basis in the winter of 2040.

“We've identified there is a need for dispatchable, emissions-free resources,” Dewey said. “That technology does not yet exist and there's a gap that needs to be closed. We're only going to get so far with wind, solar and storage, due to the intermittent nature of those resources.”

And by next year, a heatwave with an average temperate of 95 degrees may result in thin margins and “significant deficiencies,” NYISO says.

A 98-degree heatwave would test the system’s limits today and exceed grid capabilities next year, the report adds.

“We're taking on a little bit more risk in our ability to manage unplanned, unforeseen events on the power system, or potentially severe weather events,” Dewey added.

NYISO isn’t alone in its concerns about grid reliability. The state’s utilities have been raising their concerns.

A group representing most of the state’s major utilities recently studied energy production for the month of January, an especially cold month and the first winter when Indian Point wasn’t producing power. The plant’s Unit 2 shut down in 2020 and Unit 3 the following year.

Wind and other renewables contributed 5% of total generation. There was less wind and less solar generation due to shorter daylight hours and heavy cloud cover.

“Today’s renewable resources are emissions-free, but their output is weather-dependent,” the Utility Consultation Group analysis says. “This intermittency and the need for electric supply to meet customer energy demand every hour of the day may result in reliability issues if not proactively addressed.”

The group represents Central Hudson, ConEdison, Rochester, Niagara Mohawk, NYSEG and Orange and Rockland utilities.

'Closing Indian Point was a mistake'

Older electricity transmission towers like the one at far right will be replaced across New York with modern steel poles like the ones at left. The Indian Point power plant can be seen in the background in this view from Tomkins Cove on July 27, 2021.

Critics of the deal that led to Indian Point’s closure question why the plant couldn’t remain open while the state pursued a renewable buildout.

“Maybe someday renewables could be a big factor in the energy market,” said Theresa Knickerbocker, the mayor of the lower Hudson Valley village of Buchanan, home to Indian Point. “But, right now, two gas plants were opened up to compensate for the loss of Indian Point, which has zero carbon emissions. It’s kind of hypocritical, right?”

Buchanan faces the loss of some $3.5 million in property taxes that Entergy paid the village while the reactors were still operating.

Business groups fear the thinner energy surplus could impact a factory’s ability to deliver goods on time, while driving away companies that are considering relocating.

“The renewable buildout is a multi-decade process,” said Ken Pokalsky, the vice president of the Business Council of New York. “It's probably going slower than we would like. Every one of these project is complicated…It would be safe to say it's moving forward. But fast enough is a subjective evaluation.”

Nuclear New York wants the state to work with the federal government to encourage and develop new nuclear reactors, which don't produce the nuclear waste that older generation reactors do.

This week, Entergy announced it was partnering with Holtec, the New Jersey company that is tearing down Indian Point, in a deal to build small nuclear reactors. Their plan envisions building one of the first reactors at Oyster Creek, a shutdown nuclear power plant in New Jersey.

And the nuclear group wants New York to continue the subsidies that have allowed the three upstate nuclear power plants to continue beyond 2029.

Schue said other nations have been adopting the next generation of nuclear energy generation into the mix. "We'd like to change that," Schue said. "We'd like to see New York step up to the plate. We've got the skills. We've got the spirit of innovation, we have the manpower."

Climate:Hudson Valley to get hearing for New York state's climate change plan

This article originally appeared on New York State Team: NY's fossil fuel use soared after Indian Point nuclear plant closure

Hundreds protest in Baghdad after deadly attack on tourist resort

Funeral ceremony of a victim who was killed in an attack on a mountain resort, in Baghdad

Thu, July 21, 2022 

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Hundreds of people protested in Baghdad on Thursday after an attack in northern Iraq killed nine people including a newly wed husband and a 1-year-old, a strike that Iraq blamed on Turkish forces but which Ankara denied carrying out.

The incident took place on Wednesday at a summer resort near the northern Iraqi town of Zakho close to the border with Turkey, in a region where Turkish forces have waged a campaign against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants.

Iraq accused Turkey of responsibility for the deaths, but has not provided evidence. Ankara said it had not carried out any attacks aimed at civilians in the area and said it was ready to hold talks with Iraq to uncover the facts.

“All signals indicate that Turkey is responsible for the assault and its denial is a 'dark joke,'” the Iraqi Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

“There is a possibility that Iraq will resort to the economic card,” the ministry said, without further explanation.

In Baghdad, around 500 people gathered near a building belonging to the Turkish Embassy and scuffles briefly broke out between police and protesters.

"We demand a real reaction from the Iraqi government," protester Haider al-Tamimi said, accusing politicians in federal Iraq and the autonomous Kurdish-led region where the attack took place of a weak response to the bloodshed.

Iraq has summoned Ankara's ambassador to Baghdad over the attack and its state agency said the government will recall its charge d'affaires in Ankara.

The bodies of the victims were flown to Baghdad on Thursday, with ceremonies marking their transfer to the capital attended by senior Iraqi government officials including Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi.

Kadhimi's office described the victims as "martyrs from the brutal Turkish attack which targeted civilians".

Turkey's foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, said on Thursday that Turkish military operations in Iraq have always been against the PKK, which is designated a terrorist organisation by the United States and the European Union. He said the attack was carried out by what he called terrorists.

"MARRIED FOR JUST FIVE DAYS"

One victim of the attack was 24-year-old Baghdad resident Abbas Alaa, who was studying to become a civil engineer..

"He was married for five days. He went for his honeymoon," Alaa's cousin Mohammed Kadhim told Reuters, as he joined relatives for the funeral. Alaa's wife suffered minor injuries, he said.

Others caught up in the violence were enjoying a break in the mountains from the oppressive summer heat.

"The children were playing in the water. ... After half an hour, they hit us. And after a minute. We did not know where to go any more," said Kifah Ali Najem, who said he lost his sister and niece.

"Our family scattered, the women were dispersed, the men were dispersed," he said. "We are upset, we want our bodies."

Turkey regularly carries out air strikes in northern Iraq and has sent commandos to support its offensives as part of a long-running campaign against militants of the Kurdish PKK, which took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984.

More than 40,000 people have been killed in the conflict, which in the past was mainly focused in southeast Turkey, where the PKK sought to create an ethnic homeland.

"The whole world knows we would never carry out an attack on civilians," Turkey's Cavusoglu said.

(Reporting by Amina Ismail in Erbil, Kawa Omar in Dohuk, Tuvan Gumrukcu in Ankara, Thaier Al-Sudani, Haider Kadhim, Seba Kareem and Charlotte Bruneau in Baghdad; Writing by Dominic Evans; Editing by William Maclean and Leslie Adler)

Iraqi foreign minister visits site

of Dohuk attack

Thu, July 21, 2022 

STORY: Iraq's government said it will call back the Iraqi charge d'affaires in Turkey for consultation after accusing Ankara of carrying out the strike in Zakho, a city on the border between Iraq's Kurdistan region and Turkey, state news agency INA reported.

Turkey has refuted these claims saying the attack was a terror act.

Speaking at the scene of the attack, Fuad Hussein said all Iraqi representatives held a "unified position regarding this tragedy".

"We have big problems in Iraq, political problems. But there is a unified position among all the representatives of the Iraqi people," he said.

"Until now, the information we've received is that there was a bombing of this safe touristic site, artillery. And this calm, beautiful touristic village was hit."

VIDEO: Iraqi foreign minister visits site of Dohuk attack (yahoo.com)

Angry Iraqis clash with police over attack blamed on Turkey

ALI ABD AL-HASAN and SAMYA KULLAB
Thu, July 21, 2022

BAGHDAD (AP) — Hundreds of ngry Iraqis took to the streets late Thursday to decry deadly strikes on an Iraqi tourist resort the previous day that the government has blamed on Turkey. The protests erupted just hours after the families of those killed in the shelling buried their loved ones.

Turkey's foreign minister rejected accusations that his country's military carried out Wednesday's attack on the district of Zakho in Iraq's semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region. At least eight Iraqis were killed, including a child, and 20 were wounded.

Turkey frequently carries out airstrikes and attacks into northern Iraq and has sent commandos to support its offensives targeting the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK. The insurgents, who have for decades battled the government in Ankara, have bases in the mountainous Iraqi region. And though civilians, mostly local villagers, have been killed in the past, Wednesday’s attack marked the first time that tourists visiting the north from elsewhere in Iraq were killed.

Speaking with Turkish state broadcaster TRT, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Turkey was willing to cooperate with Iraqi authorities to shed light on the “treacherous attack.” He offered to bring the wounded to Turkey for medical treatment.

The protests outside what was formerly the Turkish Embassy in Baghdad’s neighborhood of Waziriah started peacefully but later escalated. Some in the crowd carried signs that read: “Turkey’s attacks on civilians is a crime against humanity.”

Others threw stones at the riot police and burned tires. At one point, clashes erupted when some demonstrators tried to storm in to replace the Turkish flag that was still flying over the building with an Iraqi one.

Several protesters were hurt when the police threw back some of the stones hurled at them. The Turkish Embassy, which had relocated to the heavily fortified Green Zone last year, cancelled visa appointments for the day.

Earlier Thursday, Iraq's government summoned Turkey's ambassador in protest and caskets carrying the bodies of victims were flown from the semi-autonomous Kurdish-run northern region to Baghdad for burial.

Before the flight, the Iraqi Kurdish region’s president, Nechirvan Barzani, laid a wreath on one of the caskets and helped carry it onto a military plane.

At the Baghdad airport, Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi received the dead and met with the families of those killed, offering his condolences. He promised the wounded would be taken care of.

There remained a discrepancy over how many were killed in Wednesday's attack. Iraq's military said eight people died but nine caskets were loaded onto the military plane Thursday.

Cavusoglu, Turkey's top diplomat, claimed the attack was a “smokescreen" aimed “at preventing Turkish military operations in the region."

“We did not conduct any attack against civilians,” he said and insisted that Turkey's “fight in Iraq has always been against" the PKK.

Meanwhile, mourners carried the coffin of Abbas Abdul Hussein, a 30-year-old Iraqi killed in Zakho. Hussein had just gotten married five days earlier, his cousin Said Alawadi said, demanding the government “initiate deterrent measures against Turkey," even cut all political and economic ties.

The attack catapulted into the spotlight Turkey's ongoing military operations against Turkey's Kurdish insurgents in northern Iraq — an issue that has long divided Iraqi officials. With deep economic ties between the two countries, many hesitate to damage relations with Ankara.

Baghdad and Ankara are also divided on other issues, including the Kurdish region's independent oil sector and water-sharing. But in the aftermath of the attack, anger against Turkey is mounting on the Iraqi street.

In April, Turkey launched its latest offensive in northern Iraq, part of a series of cross-border operations that started in 2019 to combat the PKK.

The Iraqi government condemned Wednesday's attack as a “flagrant violation of Iraq's sovereignty,” convened an emergency national security meeting and ordered a pause in dispatching Iraq's new ambassador to Ankara.

Iraq's Parliament was also to convene on Saturday to discuss the Turkish attack. Al-Kadhimi accused Turkey of ignoring “Iraq’s continuous demands to refrain from military violations against Iraqi territory and the lives of its people.”

The PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, has led an insurgency in southeastern Turkey since 1984 that has killed tens of thousands of people.

Ankara has pressed Baghdad to root out the PKK from the Kurdish region. Iraq, in turn, has said Turkey’s ongoing attacks are a breach of its sovereignty.

___

Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.

The coffin carrying Abbas Abdul Hussein, a 30-year-old victim of an artillery strike, is carried to his family home in Baghdad, to later lay him to rest in Najaf city, Thursday, July 21, 2022, in Baghdad, Iraq. Hussein was on his honeymoon, five days after his wedding, when at least four artillery shells struck the resort area of Barakh in the Zakho district in the Iraqi semi-autonomous Kurdish-run region, killing nine people. (AP Photo/Ali Jabar)

'Weird bear scenario': TikTok video shows two black bears fighting on British Columbia mountain

Asymina Kantorowicz

·Writer

Fri, July 22, 2022 

The TikTok video captured in Whistler, BC has already surpassed 364K views. (Photo via TikTok/@_sro)

A British Columbia man says he sees black bears every day at his job, but he says an encounter he saw last week caused him to whip out his phone so that he could capture it on camera.

Chris Sroka was on a chairlift at the Whistler Mountain Bike Park when he saw two black bears acting strangely.

In the video, Sroka captures a large black bear chasing another black bear before one flies over the edge of a dirt bike path. The bears fight for a few more seconds before finally taking a breather.

"I don't know how to describe it. It was just a weird bear scenario when you've seen them so much," he says.

The video, which was posted to Sroka’s TikTok account @_sro, has reached over 366K views and nearly 19K likes. He says he also posted it to Instagram and those views are "climbing like crazy" with nearly a million views by Tuesday afternoon.

"It's funny. It's just most people [...] no one's really seen that type of footage, especially in the open in Whistler," he says. "I think that's why people are like 'wow it's pretty interesting to see that.'"

Bears are “pretty common to see” on B.C. mountain

Sroka works as a marketing manager at Whistler Blackcomb and says he comes across black bears so frequently at his workplace that he rarely films them anymore.

“They just kind of do their own thing and as long as you don't get in between them and their cubs, there's not really a real danger,” he adds.

Sroka says he typically sees a mom and cubs or a lone bear, but never two adult bears together like in the video.

"We see bears all the time. I've just never seen them fight or run after each other," he says. “They just bolted, both just sprinted and I've never seen a bear sprint before. As soon as that happened I was like oh, something's gonna happen," he explains during his interview with Yahoo Canada.

An animal expert speculates the bears were possibly having a conflict, but says it's "hard to know definitively."

"Bears, like many other animals, have conflicts with each other and may challenge each other over use of space, or it could be a female protecting her offspring," Vanessa Isnardy, project manager with WildSafeBC, says in an email.

TikTok video garners a lot of reaction

Thousands of people are reacting to the video on TikTok, many applauding Sroka for his timing.

“Never seen that before,” one person writes.

“What a video. Great timing,” writes another.

“Unreal footage,” one comment reads.

Others are taking a more humoured approach.

“Man the locals are wild,” one person writes.

“He could bear-ly handle that landing,” another one reads.

The municipality of Whistler website says it's not uncommon to see black bears while you're exploring the trails. (Photo via Getty Images)

Whistler is home to various species of bears

Whistler and Blackcomb Mountains are home to up to 60 black bears and cubs that have adapted to living within ski area habitats.

"The habitat under the chairlift is ideal for bears with many sources of food and berry-producing bushes," Isnardy notes. "Viewing bears from the chairlift is one of the safest ways to view bears."

The municipality of Whistler website says it's not uncommon to see black bears while you're exploring the trails. It also lists tips on how to be bear safe in case a bear is nearby.

If you're interested in seeing black bears, Whistler also offers bear viewing tours where you travel in a 4X4 vehicle with experienced guides.