We could be 16 years into a methane-fueled 'termination' event significant enough to end an ice age

Sascha Pare
Wed, August 16, 2023 

Layers of ice hanging off a glacier melt and drip water.

A dramatic spike in atmospheric methane over the past 16 years may be a sign that Earth's climate could flip within decades, scientists have warned.

Large amounts of methane wafting from tropical wetlands into Earth's atmosphere could trigger warming similar to the "termination" events that ended ice ages — replacing frosty expanses of tundra with tropical savanna, a new study finds. Researchers first detected a strange peak in methane emissions in 2006, but until now, it was unclear where the gas was leaking from and if it constituted a novel trend.

"A termination is a major reorganization of the Earth's climate system," study lead author Euan Nisbet, a professor emeritus of Earth sciences at Royal Holloway, University of London, told Live Science. "These repeated changes have taken the world from ice ages into the sort of interglacial we have now."


Ice age terminations typically occur in three phases, which are recorded in ice cores going back 800,000 years. The initial phase is characterized by a gradual rise in methane and CO2, leading to global warming over a few thousand years. This is followed by a sharp increase in temperatures fueled by a burst of methane, leveling off in a third phase lasting several thousand years.

Related: New map of methane 'super-emitters' shows some of the largest methane clouds ever seen

"Within the termination, which takes thousands of years, there's this abrupt phase, which only takes a few decades," Nisbet said. "During that abrupt phase, the methane soars up and it's probably driven by tropical wetlands."

Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas released both by human activities — including fossil-fuel burning, landfills and agriculture — and natural processes, such as decomposition in wetlands. Human emissions soared in the 1980s with the expansion of the natural gas industry and stabilized in the 1990s, Nisbet said.

An underwater picture of mangrove roots in a tropical wetland.

But in late 2006, something "very, very odd" happened, he said. Methane started rising again, but there was no dramatic shift in human activity to blame — and researchers were left scratching their heads. Then, in 2013, Nisbet and his colleagues realized this rise was accelerating. By 2020, methane was increasing at the fastest rate on record, he said.

"It looks as if there's a big, new methane source turning on," Nisbet said.

A flurry of studies since 2019 has linked the strange spike to soaring emissions from tropical wetlands, predominantly in Africa. A "significant change" in tropical weather ascribed to human-caused climate change has led wetlands to get bigger and more plants to grow there, thus leading to more decomposition — a process that produces methane, Nisbet said.

In the new study, published July 14 in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Nisbet and colleagues compared current trends in atmospheric methane to the abrupt phase of warming during ice age terminations.

"The closest analogy we have to what we think is happening today is these terminations," Nisbet said.

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While the evidence remains inconclusive, the scale of such a shift in climate is worth pondering, he added. In the past, terminations have flipped vast expanses of icy tundra in the Northern Hemisphere into tropical grasslands roamed by hippos, Nisbet said. There is no way to know what a termination could signify today, given that we are not in an ice age. "We're not saying we've got proof this is happening, but we're raising the question."

Regardless of whether termination-scale climate shifts are on the horizon, tackling methane emissions should be high on our list of priorities, Nisbet said. "We can do a great deal to bring down methane," he said, and this includes plugging gas leaks, and tackling emissions from manure, landfill and crop waste.

China to make steady progress in chip equipment self-sufficiency amid gradual market recovery, UBS survey finds

South China Morning Post
Wed, August 16, 2023 

China's chip equipment self-sufficiency rate will keep increasing in the next few years, especially in the less-advanced equipment sector, amid a gradual market recovery and ongoing geopolitical tensions, according to research by UBS Securities.

The semiconductor equipment self-sufficiency rate is expected to increase in less-advanced sectors which account for around 70 per cent of the total market, such as etching and cleaning machines, Jimmy Yu, a China technology analyst at UBS Securities, said at a media briefing in Shanghai on Wednesday.

"You cannot assume that domestic companies will take up 100 per cent of the [Chinese] market, but it is reasonable to make the assumption of a market share of around 60 per cent [in some sectors]," said Yu.

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Meanwhile, China still accounts for a relatively lower proportion of the global market for chip design, Yu said. But he added that nearly half of chip buyers in the country have signalled increasing willingness to raise their usage of domestically-developed chips.

According to the UBS survey, 11 per cent of the integrated circuit (IC) product purchasing managers said that they are "much more" actively considering using domestic chips compared with two years ago, while 39 per cent said they are "a little more" willing to do so.

"Looking forward to the next three years, the adoption rate of domestically-developed chips will gradually increase to between 30 and 50 per cent, which is quite high," said Yu.

China's domestic semiconductor production has been gradually picking up as the country's chip market slowly recovers from sluggish consumer demand and various economic headwinds.

In July, China's integrated circuit output rose 4.1 per cent to 29.2 billion units, marking the fourth consecutive month of positive growth. However, the IC output in the first seven months was still down 3.9 per cent from the same period of last year, reflecting that the world's largest semiconductor market continues to struggle with economic headwinds and escalating tech rivalry between Washington and Beijing.

Yu expected capital expenditure in the global semiconductor sector to decline by 15.1 per cent in 2023, with China having a larger drop than the global rate amid geopolitical risks including the export controls imposed by the US last October.

"But looking at next year, I believe China will have a higher level of recovery than the global market and remain as the world's most important regional market in capital expenditure," he added.

Yu said he expected global semiconductor companies to see their revenue return to growth between the second half of 2023 and first half of 2024, as demand for smartphones, PCs and servers "recover from a bottom". Smartphones are expected to see demand increase earlier as the sector clears up excess inventories, he added.

In 2023, global semiconductor sector revenue will decline by 14.3 per cent year on year to US$492 billion, while returning to growth of 22.8 per cent in 2024, according to estimates by UBS.

Copyright (c) 2023. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

China's Xi calls for patience as Communist Party tries to reverse economic slump

STATE CAPITALI$M IS STILL CAPITALI$M

JOE McDONALD
Updated Thu, August 17, 2023 

BEIJING (AP) — Chinese leader Xi Jinping has called for patience in a speech released as the ruling Communist Party tries to reverse a deepening economic slump and said Western countries are “increasingly in trouble” because of their materialism and “spiritual poverty.”

Xi’s speech was published by Qiushi, the party’s top theoretical journal, hours after data Tuesday showed consumer and factory activity weakened further in July despite official promises to support struggling entrepreneurs. The government skipped giving an update on a politically sensitive spike in unemployment among young people.

Xi, the country’s most powerful leader in decades, called for China to “build a socialist ideology with strong cohesion” and to focus on long-term goals of improving education, health care and food supplies for China’s 1.4 billion people instead of only pursuing short-term material wealth.

Since taking power in 2012, Xi has called for restoring the ruling party's role as an economic and social leader and has tightened control over business and society since taking power in 2012. Some changes come at a rising cost as successful Chinese companies are pressured to divert money into political initiatives including processor chip development. The party tightened control over tech industries by launching data security and anti-monopoly crackdowns that wiped out billions of dollars of their stock market value.

“We must maintain historic patience and insist on making steady, step-by-step progress,” Xi said in the speech. Qiushi said it was delivered in February in the southwestern city of Chongqing. It is common for Qiushi journal to publish speeches months after they are delivered.

Economic growth slid to 0.8% in the three months ending in June compared with the previous month, down from 2.2% in January-March. That is equivalent to a 3.2% annual rate, which would be among China’s weakest in decades.

A survey in June found unemployment among urban workers aged 16 to 24 spiked to a record 21.3%. The statistics bureau said this week it would withhold updates while it refined its measurement.

The government is trying to reassure uneasy homebuyers and investors about the deeply indebted real estate industry after one of China's biggest developers, Country Garden, failed to make a payment to bondholders and suspended trading of its bonds. A government spokesperson said Tuesday regulators are getting debt under control and risks are “expected to be gradually resolved.”

Beijing also has expanded anti-spying rules and tightened controls on information, leaving foreign and private companies uncertain about what activities might be allowed.

Xi stressed “common prosperity,” a 1950s party slogan he has revived. He called for narrowing China’s yawning wealth gap between a tiny elite and the poor majority and to “regulate the healthy development of capital” but announced no new initiatives.

“Common prosperity for all people” is an “essential feature of Chinese-style modernization and distinguishes it from Western modernization,” Xi said.

Western-style modernization “pursues the maximization of capital interests instead of serving the interests of the vast majority of people,” Xi said.

“Today, Western countries are increasingly in trouble,” Xi said. “They cannot curb the greedy nature of capital and cannot solve chronic diseases such as materialism and spiritual poverty."

People wait outside a restaurant in Beijing, Tuesday, Aug. 15, 2023. Chinese leader Xi Jinping has called for patience in a speech released as the ruling Communist Party tries to reverse a deepening economic slump and said Western countries are "increasingly in trouble" because of their materialism and "spiritual poverty." (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

Analysis-China's crackdowns rewrite investors' private sector playbook

 An electronic board shows stock indexes at the Lujiazui financial district in Shanghai

By Samuel Shen and Summer Zhen

Thu, August 17, 2023

SHANGHAI/HONGKONG (Reuters) - Buy the state, sell the capitalist - that's how global investors are trying to play China's latest anti-graft crackdowns as they see private enterprise increasingly sidelined in Beijing's quest for "common prosperity".

China's recent sweep of the medical sector came as a shock to many investors who had thought the end of Beijing's three-year regulatory purge of the property and tech sectors meant there would be no more industry-wide crackdowns as policymakers prioritised economic recovery.

Several government bodies in July launched a year-long anti-corruption campaign into the medical system, making clear that China's drive to deliver affordable housing, education and healthcare to its masses was more important.

That forced many investors to quickly draw parallels with last year's crusade against private tutoring and a long-running one against tycoon Jack Ma's consumer finance firm Ant Group.

The one unanimous conclusion they came to was that Beijing wants a greater state presence in these sectors.

"The underlying principle is that healthcare is kind of like a social service that should principally be in state hands," said Arthur Kroeber, partner and head of research at Gavekal in New York. Kroeber says the crackdowns are about "defining what the state does, what the private sector does, and creating a more limited sandbox for the private sector to play in."

"This links to the idea of common prosperity because it's the state's job to guarantee a level of provision of basic services, whether it's education or healthcare, so it's important for the state to have a role," he said.

That has left investors now picking the state over the private sector.

While the CSI Medical Services Index is down 4.4% this month and 20% so far this year, investors have snapped up shares of state-owned medicine producers such as Beijing Tongrentang Co, which is up 14% this month.

Similarly, the expectation that state-backed property firms will gain better access to funding and bigger market share has seen investors dump private developers' stocks and rush into state-owned developers such as Yuexiu Property and Poly Developments.

Zhang Kexing, general manager of Beijing Gelei Asset Management, expects healthcare companies with strong branding will benefit, as will firms in traditional Chinese medicine, which has political support, such as Beijing Tongrentang.

NATIONAL SERVICE

While President Xi Jinping has made graft busting a priority since 2012, the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) two-year-old "common prosperity" campaign that targets financial services, private education and healthcare has accelerated that push.

The CCP's July Politburo meeting reinforced the message, with the top policymaking body pledging to put a floor under the property sector, help indebted local governments heal and boost consumer demand.

Investors now believe Xi will be relentless in his social and economic agenda, much of which draws on Mao Zedong's Marxist and socialist thinking.

Thomas Masi, a partner and equity portfolio manager at Boston-based GW&K Investment Management, spoke to heads of several Chinese firms that he reckoned were at the fore of innovation in healthcare.

"Basically the message they were getting from the government was that they should be doing some of this innovation for national service, as opposed to for profitability only. That was a lightbulb for us," said Masi, who was once bullish on healthcare.

"We basically understood...we were not necessarily going to be paid as shareholders."

Xi himself has often said that private companies should be "rich and loving," be "patriotic" and share the fruits of their growth with employees more equitably.

Nuno Fernandes, also a partner and portfolio manager at GW&K, says it is important for investors in China to recognise the power of the state to override private interests, which means companies will need to "make a profit out of whatever circumstances and situation they are given."

That is why Fernandes has slashed his portfolio holdings in Chinese drugmakers.

Huang Yan, general manager of private fund manager Shanghai QiuYang Capital Co, said Beijing will crack down on any sector seen as increasing people's economic burden.

"Whether it's healthcare or tutoring, a crackdown will befall any sector as long as the campaign benefits the majority of people at the cost of the minority," Huang said.

Huang points to inflated liquor prices as an example.

"Using pricey spirit to lubricate business at the banquet increases companies' cost which could be used in better ways. It's possible for this sector to be targeted," he says.

But Beijing may ignore other sectors such as infrastructure, where such excess is less visible, he said.

Kumar Pandit, portfolio manager at Somerset Capital Management's Emerging Markets Dividend Growth Fund in London, is not cutting his China exposure but has an "added layer of scrutiny" around sectors Beijing deems important to common prosperity.

While the probability of wider crackdowns is low, he said making decisions remains challenging.

"It is difficult to say with certainty whether the crackdown will spill into other sectors," Pandit said.

(Additional reporting by Jason Xue in Shanghai and Ankur Banerjee in Singapore; Writing by Vidya Ranganathan; Editing by Sam Holmes)

Exclusive-Tyson Foods plans to sell China poultry business -sources

Kane Wu and Abigail Summerville
Wed, August 16, 2023 


HONG KONG/NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. meat and processed food maker Tyson Foods plans to sell its China poultry business, three people with knowledge of the matter said, in the latest case of a multinational firm looking to divest from the country in recent years.

The company has hired Goldman Sachs to advise on the sale and sent preliminary information to potential buyers including a number of private equity firms, said two of the people, adding the sale process was at an early stage.

While it was not immediately clear what valuation Tyson Foods is seeking for the China poultry business, it has annual sales of about $1.1 billion, one of the people said.

Springdale, Arkansas-based Tyson Foods and Goldman Sachs declined to comment. The sources, who did not say why Tyson was planning to sell the business, declined to be identified because the information was confidential.

Calls to Tyson Foods' China headquarters in Shanghai went unanswered.

Tyson said this month it was evaluating all operations and closing four more U.S. chicken plants in the latest bid to reduce costs after its third-quarter revenue and profit missed Wall Street expectations.

China's meat market has become increasingly challenging, with livestock farm margins squeezed in the last two years due to weak demand during the COVID-19 pandemic and increased feed prices because of the Russia-Ukraine war, analysts have said.

A string of multinational firms have divested their China businesses or pared their holdings in the last few years as some found it hard to reap desired profits amid the country's slower economic growth, strong local competition or geopolitical headwinds, according to bankers.

Foreign companies have divested a combined $8.4 billion of Chinese assets across all sectors so far this year, following $13.5 billion of disposals in 2022, Dealogic data showed.

In the food industry, U.S. agricultural giant Cargill struck a deal in May to sell its China poultry business to private equity firm DCP Capital for an undisclosed price.

British consumer goods maker Reckitt Benckiser Group in 2021 sold its China infant formula and child nutrition business to investment firm Primavera Capital Group for an enterprise value of $2.2 billion.

Dutch dairy cooperative FrieslandCampina kicked off the sale of its Friso infant nutrition brand in December 2021 but has yet to find a buyer. It sold an infant-formula factory in China to local peer Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group in July 2022.

Major Chinese feed and meat producer New Hope Liuhe last month told investors it was reviewing its businesses and considering bringing strategic investors in its poultry and food businesses, in a bid to lower its debt-to-asset ratio.

Tyson Foods opened its first factory in China in 2001 and now has four research and development centres, several processing plants and dozens of breeding farms in the country, according to its website for China operations.

It operates throughout the industry chain in China, from breeding and slaughtering to processing and distribution, providing chicken, beef, pork and processed foods.

The company in June launched a new factory focusing on processed foods such as cooked chicken and pre-made Chinese cuisine in the eastern Chinese city of Nantong and another that focuses on frozen and heat-processed foods in the central Chinese city of Xiaogan, the website showed.

Tyson Foods reported $39.5 billion in total sales for the nine months ended July 1, of which $1.9 billion was from the international and other business segment that includes its China operations.

(Reporting by Kane Wu in Hong Kong, Abigail Summerville in New York and Roxanne Liu in Beijing; Additional reporting by Tom Polansek in Chicago; Editing by Jamie Freed)

Armenia and Azerbaijan clash over plight of 120,000 people in Nagorno-Karabakh facing food crisis

EDITH M. LEDERER
Wed, August 16, 2023 

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Armenia and Azerbaijan clashed at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council Wednesday over the plight of the 120,000 people in the Nagorno-Karabakh region that Armenia says are blockaded by Azerbaijan and facing a humanitarian crisis.

Armenia asked for the meeting saying Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor, the only road connecting mainly Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia since July 15, had left its people with dwindling food, medicine and electricity.

Nagorno-Karabakh is part of Azerbaijan, but the region and substantial territory around it came under the control of ethnic Armenian forces who were backed by the Armenian military in separatist fighting that ended in 1994. Azerbaijan regained control of the surrounding territory in a six-week war with Armenia in 2020, and the Russian-brokered armistice left the Lachin Corridor as Nagorno-Karabakh’s only connection to Armenia.

At the council meeting, many countries urged Azerbaijan to immediately reopen the road, pointing to orders from the International Court of Justice, the U.N.’s highest tribunal, and all 15 nations urged Armenia and Azerbaijan to find a diplomatic solution to their nearly 30-year conflict.

The Security Council did not issue any statement but U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, who chaired the meeting, told the Associated Press afterward that “there were strong statements in the council from everyone that the Lachin Corridor needed to be reopened.” That was “the main accomplishment,” she said.

U.N. humanitarian coordinator Edem Wasornu told the council the International Committee of the Red Cross, the only international humanitarian body with access to the area, reported on July 25 that it had been unable to transport food through the Lachin Corridor since June 14 and medicine since July 7.

Wasornu said international humanitarian law requires all parties to facilitate rapid delivery of aid to all people in need, and “it is therefore critical that the ICRC’s delivery of humanitarian relief be allowed to resume through any available routes.”

Armenia’s Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan told the council that as a result of the blockade, there is no economic activity in Nagorno-Karabakh, thousands of people are unemployed, stores are empty and women, children and the elderly stand in long lines to be able to buy bread, fruit and vegetables. In addition, he said, Azerbaijan has disrupted the supply of electricity through the only high voltage line between Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh since Jan. 9.

Mirzoyan quoted a report from Luis Moreno Ocampo, the former chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, saying “there is a reasonable basis to believe that a genocide is being committed” as a result of the blockade.

“Starvation is the invisible genocide weapon,” he said, warning that “without immediate dramatic change this group of Armenians will be destroyed in a few weeks.”

Mirzoyan said preventing such a catastrophe is a duty of the Security Council, which is charged with ensuring international peace and security. “I do believe that this distinguished body, despite geopolitical differences, has capacity to act as genocide prevention body, and not as genocide commemoration when it might be too late,” he said.

Azerbaijan’s U.N. Ambassador Yashar Aliyev responded by “categorically rejecting all the unfounded and groundless allegations on (a) blockade or humanitarian crisis propagated by Armenia against my country.”

He accused Armenia of engaging in a “provocative and irresponsible political campaign” to undermine Azerbaijan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, which includes Nagorno-Karabakh and the Lachin Corridor.

Aliyev said Azerbaijan installed a border checkpoint on the road to safeguard its sovereignty and security and prevent Armenia from using the route “for illegal military and other activities” including rotating its 10,000 military personnel “illegally stationed” in Azerbaijani territory, and transferring weapons and munitions as well as unlawfully extracted natural resources.

He called the genocide allegations false, saying prominent British human rights lawyer, Rodney Dixon, in a preliminary report said there is no foundation for Ocampo’s claim, citing Azerbaijan’s offer to supply good via the town of Aghdam.

Aliyev also held up what he said were photos from social media of people in Nagorno-Karabakh celebrating weddings and birthdays, saying they refute allegations about starvation and a humanitarian crisis.

Aliyev and Mirzoyan blamed each other for so-far failed diplomatic efforts.

The European Union’s deputy U.N. ambassador, Silvio Gonzato, told the council “humanitarian access must not be politicized by any actors,” and the Lachin Corridor must be reopened immediately.

“Azerbaijani authorities bear the responsibility to guarantee safety and freedom of movement along the Lachin Corridor, and to ensure the crisis does not escalate further,” he said.

VODOU MILITIA

Haiti gang leader vows to fight any foreign armed force if it commits abuses

EVENS SANON
Updated Wed, August 16, 2023 



Haiti Gang Leader Jimmy Cherizier, the leader of the "G9 et Famille" gang, speaks to a gaggle of journalists in Delmas 6, a district of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2023. Cherizier, an ex-police officer considered to be Haiti's most powerful gang leader, warns he will fight any international armed force deployed to the Caribbean country if it commits any abuses.

(AP Photo/Odelyn Joseph)

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — An ex-police officer considered by many to be Haiti’s most powerful gang leader warned Wednesday that he would fight any international armed force deployed to the Caribbean country if it committed any abuses.

Jimmy Chérizier, best known as “Barbecue,” also urged Haitians to mobilize against the government. “We are asking the population to rise up,” he said at a news conference.

Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who has led Haiti since the July 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse, has been pushing for the deployment of a foreign armed force since October to help fight powerful gangs that are estimated to now control 80% of the capital of Port-au-Prince.

In late July, the African nation of Kenya offered to lead a multinational force, and the U.S. said earlier this month that it would put forward a resolution in the U.N. Security Council to authorize a non-U.N. multinational mission.

Chérizier said he would welcome a foreign force if it were to arrest the prime minister and people he described as corrupt politicians and local police allegedly selling ammunitions and guns in Haiti’s slums.

“If the foreign force comes to help and provide security for life to start over again, we will also applaud,” he said.

But he said Haitians would rise up if any international force repeated the actions of previous U.N. peacekeepers, including committing sexual abuses and inadvertently introducing cholera into water sources.

“We will fight against them until our last breath,” he said. “It will be a fight of the Haitian people to save the dignity of our country.”

The United Nations had no comment, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.

Chérizier, who has been accused by authorities of masterminding several massacres in recent years and of organizing a fuel blockade last year that paralyzed Haiti for nearly two months, said the group he leads, G9 Family and Allies, is no longer warring with another group known as G-Pep.

“We became one,” he said. “We love life a lot.”

Chérizier is the only Haitian under U.N. sanctions, with the Security Council saying he “has engaged in acts that threaten the peace, security, and stability of Haiti and has planned, directed, or committed acts that constitute serious human rights abuses.”

He called on the Ministry of Education to reopen schools in Cite Soleil and other slums that have been closed because warring gangs who are raping and killing people. The violence has displaced nearly 200,000 Haitians whose homes have been torched by the gangs.

Chérizier spoke to nearly two dozen journalists at an outdoors construction site in Port-au-Prince. He wore sandals, white pants and an orange hoodie emblazoned with a religious symbol used in Vodou.

He was surrounded by several G9 members carrying small handguns visible under their clothes, unlike his previous media appearances at which they openly held assault rifles.

U$A

‘Politicians have too much power’: Sen. Tommy Tuberville just disclosed $250K in futures trading in corn, wheat, soy and cattle — all while influencing agricultural policies

Bethan Moorcraft
Wed, August 16, 2023 

United States Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) has just disclosed $250,000 in futures trading in wheat, corn, soy and cattle.

On August 14, Tuberville — who sits on the Senate Committee for Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry — reported multiple agricultural trades through June and July, all in the range of $1,000 to $15,000.

The former college football coach’s trades caught the attention of Unusual Whales, a data hub leading the crusade to expose insider trading and conflicts of interest among U.S. politicians.

“He literally influences agricultural futures via legislation and is trading it actively,” Unusual Whales wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter — before pointing out Tuberville has “previously, scored some big gains on futures in wheat, corn and soy.”

The U.S. public have had enough

This isn’t the first time Coach Tuberville, as his constituents call him, has been a target over his trades. In 2021, he violated federal transparency laws when he failed to properly disclose trades worth more than $1 million on time. His trades included the sale of stock options in the Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba around the same time that President Joe Biden issued an executive order targeting U.S. investments in Chinese companies.

“It is not only him. Members of Congress have inside knowledge of transpiring trends in the stock market,” one X user wrote in response to the Unusual Whales post.

Many high profile politicians — including Rep.Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE) — have been accused of using their connections, influence and insider information to score winning deals.

Those alleged conflicts of interest have riled up the U.S. public, where there’s growing support for a total ban on stock trading among members of Congress, according to a recent survey by the University of Maryland’s Program for Public Consultation.

“Any politician who uses their position of power to influence for personal and/or financial gain should immediately be removed from office and prosecuted,” one X user replied to Unusual Whales. “These positions are elected and/or paid for by the people. Federal politicians have too much power as is.”

Attempts to ban congressional stock trading

Some lawmakers are trying to tackle this problem. A new bipartisan law was proposed in late July, which would ban members of Congress and the federal executive branch — including the president — from owning or trading stocks, even in blind trusts.

However, two other bills on this matter — the TRUST in Congress Act and the PELOSI Act — have failed to move the needle this year, and it’s unclear if or when the new proposal will be debated and voted on.

What does Georgia's just-opened nuclear reactor say about the industry's future in the U.S.?

Nuclear fission doesn't release greenhouse gases, but skeptics say renewables like wind and solar are a better bet.

Alexander Nazaryan
·Senior White House Correspondent
Thu, August 17, 2023 

Plant Vogtle near Waynesboro, Ga., on July 31. 

(Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP) (AP)


The opening of a new nuclear power plant reactor near Savannah, Ga., on July 31 was indicative of the challenges the industry has faced in recent years — and of the changes boosters say are being made to ensure that nuclear power can serve as a key component of a 21st century energy portfolio.

Amid the rapid growth of renewables like wind and solar, nuclear power may seem like a source of electricity from the past. But wind and solar are intermittent sources, which aren’t produced when the wind doesn’t blow or the sun doesn’t shine, meaning dirty old coal and natural gas are still widely used to provide a reliable, steady supply of power.

That reality has led experts and policymakers such as Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm to advocate for building up the nation’s nuclear energy portfolio as a cleaner source of base load power until renewables can meet a greater share of the demand.

Read more on Yahoo News: U.S. Support for Nuclear Power Soars, via Gizmodo

A tempting but expensive bet

A worker walks past steam pipes at Plant Vogtle on Jan. 20. (John Bazemore/AP)

Nuclear fission can produce vast amounts of energy without emitting greenhouse gases or other forms of air pollution. But after the Three Mile Island accident in central Pennsylvania in 1979, where a reactor partially melted down and prompted the evacuation of 140,000 people, and the deadly Chernobyl disaster in Soviet Ukraine in 1986, desire for new nuclear plants plummeted — and never really recovered.

There are only 93 nuclear reactors operating across the country, making the United States 11th globally in the share of power it produces from nuclear energy per capita.

Two new reactors at Plant Vogtle — where two reactors had originally opened in the late 1980s — were supposed to usher in a new era of nuclear energy. But the Vogtle project, along with another one in South Carolina known as V.C. Summer, faced cost overruns, construction delays and safety concerns.

V.C. Summer was eventually canceled, while Vogtle dragged on. Originally projected to cost $14 billion, the Georgia project wound up costing $31 billion and was completed seven years behind schedule.

So when Unit 3 of Plant Vogtle finally began sending electricity to customers in Georgia several weeks ago, it was a landmark moment — and a warning. Unit 3 (with Unit 4 soon to follow) was the first new nuclear reactor to come online in the United States in nearly a half-century, during which time fears of a Three Mile Island-style catastrophe have been replaced by concerns about the disastrous effects of continuing to burn fossil fuels.

According to Georgia Power, a fully operational Unit 3 can supply 1,100 megawatts, powering “500,000 homes and businesses.” But because the reactor was so lavishly expensive, ratepayers will have to foot some of the excess cost, with customers seeing their energy bills increasing by $14 per month in the near future.

Read more on Yahoo News: Does nuclear power have a place in a green-energy future?

Better technology is coming, boosters promise

A closer look at the cooling towers for Units 3 and 4 at Plant Vogtle. 

(Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP)

Nuclear supporters insist that renewables, which now constitute around a fifth of all the energy produced in the United States, are simply not ready to power a nation of 335 million people — and that the challenges that plagued Plant Vogtle need not define the entire nuclear energy industry.

The third Vogtle reactor is an AP1000 model built by Westinghouse. Approved by regulators for construction in 2005, the AP1000 proved difficult to build, and the cost overruns at Vogtle and V.C. Summer, the never-completed South Carolina plant, led Westinghouse to declare bankruptcy in 2017.

The company has since emerged from financial calamity and recently introduced the AP300, a small reactor that supplies less electricity than the AP1000 but will also be easier to build. The market for these smaller “modular” reactors is expected to grow energetically in the next several years, as the need to phase out fossil fuels becomes ever more urgent.

Westinghouse is hoping to build the first AP300 reactors for commercial use in Slovakia and the United Kingdom.

Read more on Yahoo News: Small modular nuclear reactors: The race is on to actually build them, via Canary Media

Some remain unconvinced

The New Safe Confinement structure over the old sarcophagus covering the damaged fourth reactor at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine in 2021. 

(Gleb Garanich/Reuters)

Yet the new AP300 models have their critics too. Those critics are unconvinced that the new reactor is much of an upgrade over the AP1000 model. So even as the Tennessee Valley Authority is planning to build as many as 20 small reactors, known as BWRX-300, that are similar to the AP300, some are wondering if it wouldn’t just be safer to use the older AP1000 model.

“Why are y’all building four 300-megawatt reactors that haven’t been built anywhere instead of an AP1000?” one regulator wondered.

Others simply believe that the risks of nuclear energy are too great — and that the resources being devoted to building new reactors would be better spent on developing renewable sources.

And though nuclear power doesn’t emit greenhouse gases or other atmospheric pollutants, it leaves behind radioactive waste that most communities want nothing to do with.

This past spring, Germany shut down its final three reactors, a transition it began after the massive 2011 meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan.

“It is not simply ideological speculation. There is a very real danger that is posed by this power plant and by all nuclear power plants around the world,” one antinuclear German activist said. “And that’s why I think it’s so particularly important that we in Germany manage to phase out nuclear power. Because if we manage to do that, then maybe the other countries will think about what they could do better.”

Read more on Yahoo News: Nuclear energy backers say it’s vital for the fight against global warming. Don’t be so sure, via Los Angeles Times

SCOTLAND
Junior doctors accept record pay offer averting strike fears


Steph Brawn
Wed, 16 August 2023 

British Medical Association (BMAs) members have agreed to the offer from the Scottish Government (Image: NQ Staff)

JUNIOR doctors and dentists from a major union in Scotland have accepted a record 12.4% pay increase averting fears of strike action.

British Medical Association (BMA) Scotland members have agreed to the offer from the Scottish Government which the union says sets the country apart "from what is happening elsewhere in the UK".

The agreement means Scotland remains the only UK nation to have avoided strikes in the NHS.

Together with the pay raise of 4.5% awarded in 2022–23, it amounts to a total increase of 17.5% over two years.

READ MORE: Scottish independence poll: Five things we learned

The deal also includes a commitment to future year's pay, contract and pay bargaining modernisation and it brings to an end the threat of industrial action.

Scottish Health Secretary Michael Matheson (below) said: “I am very pleased that BMA members have overwhelmingly voted to accept this record pay deal for Junior Doctors.

"This is the single biggest investment in Junior Doctor pay since devolution and maintains our commitment to make Scotland the best place in the UK for Junior Doctors to work and train.

“Due to the meaningful engagement we have had with trade unions, we have avoided any industrial action in Scotland - the only part of the UK to avoid NHS strikes.

“We will now implement this pay uplift, and will work with BMA to take forward the other aspects of the deal including contract and pay bargaining reform.”

The National: Health Secretary Michael Matheson at the Golden Jubilee Hospital in Clydebank

The news of BMA members accepting the deal comes after some 67.5% of members in the HCSA Scotland ballot backed it with a turnout of just over 74%.

The Scottish Government say the pay deal represents a £61.3 million investment in junior doctor pay – the largest in the last 20 years and the best offer in the UK.

It means a doctor at the beginning of their career would receive a salary increase of £3429 in 2023–24. For those at the end of their training, the rise would be £7111 over the same period.

Former nurse and SNP MSP Emma Harper added: “Once again Scotland has shown that a better, more constructive way is possible – as the only nation in the UK to have averted NHS strikes.

"That is not an accident. It is testament to the fact that Scottish Government ministers worked constructively to produce an acceptable offer befitting of the vital work junior doctors do, whilst the Tories have done nothing but level outrageous attacks on our NHS staff and unions."

Dr Chris Smith, chairman of the BMA’s Scottish Junior Doctor Committee (SJDC), said: “This offer moves us from a position where pay restoration was a strongly-held conviction within our profession to a shared goal that the Scottish Government has publicly committed to working with us to complete.

“Earlier this year, junior doctors in Scotland said enough is enough – they were clear that they will no longer stand aside and accept any more sub-inflationary pay awards year after year.

“The strong mandate for striking – with 97% of those who turned out in our ballot voting in favour of industrial action – speaks for itself.

“Key to this offer, that sets it apart from what is happening elsewhere in the UK, is that the Scottish Government recognises this reality and has agreed to ongoing negotiations towards full pay restoration to 2008 levels, with an unprecedented commitment to set inflation as the floor of the pay offer at each round of negotiation.

“This structure will maintain the momentum of our campaign in Scotland for full pay restoration over the next few months and into next year.”

SCOTLAND

School staff in 10 council areas set strike date amid pay dispute with Cosla

Abbi Garton-Crosbie

The National
Thu, 17 August 2023 

GMB Scotland said members had set a strike date (Image: Unknown)

SCHOOL staff in 10 council areas have set a strike date in September in a dispute with Cosla over pay, a union has said.

GMB Scotland said Aberdeen, Clackmannanshire, the Western Isles, Dundee, East Dunbartonshire, Falkirk, Glasgow, Orkney, Renfrewshire and South Ayrshire will be affected.

Staff in schools and early years working across catering, cleaning, pupil support, administration and janitorial services will walk out next month on September 13 and 14.

READ MORE: Pete Wishart: Every General Election should be a de facto referendum

The action comes after GMB Scotland’s members rejected the 5.5% offer from council umbrella body Cosla in April, branding it unacceptable amid surging inflation and the cost-of-living crisis.

Members of the Unite union working in education and early years services have also voted for industrial action but have not yet announced dates.

Schools could be forced to close if the strikes go ahead.

Keir Greenaway, GMB Scotland senior organiser for public services, said that a meeting on Friday August 25 will be the final opportunity for Cosla to avert disruptive strikes.

The National: School could be closed by strikes

“The latest figures show that, despite rising wages, pay is still being outstripped by inflation,” he said.

“The pay offer to council workers does not come close to matching the surging cost of living and one that is worth less with every month that passes.

“Scotland stands on the shoulders of our local authority workers and the value of their work must be reflected in their salaries.

READ MORE: Steve Barclay's former aide calls for NHS 'full privatisation'

“Cosla has refused to seriously engage with our members during what has been a protracted, frustrating process.

“If they had, parents and pupils would not now be facing disruption. Cosla and Scottish ministers need to engage now or risk turning a crisis into a calamity.”