Pathways Alliance to file for regulator approval on carbon capture project

CALGARY — A consortium of Canada's largest oilsands companies will submit an application before the end of the week for approval of its proposed $16.5-billion carbon capture pipeline project.

The application by the Pathways Alliance industry group, which a spokesperson said will be filed before the end of Friday with the Alberta Energy Regulator, is a significant milestone for what could become one of the largest carbon capture and storage projects in the world if constructed.

The oilsands group — whose membership consists of Suncor Energy Inc., Canadian Natural Resources Ltd., Cenovus Energy Inc., Imperial Oil Ltd., MEG Energy Corp. and ConocoPhillips Canada — has previously stated that it cannot make a final investment decision for its marquee project until it has the regulator's approval in hand.

Once underway, the regulatory process is expected to take at least a year.

But in an interview Thursday, Pathways president Kendall Dilling said the filing should be interpreted as a sign of commitment by the companies to the project.

"Anybody who understands what's required to prepare and submit a regulatory application like this, I think would understand that it is a serious milestone and a reflection of serious commitments and investment," Dilling said.

"It's been a couple of years and $100 million in investment to get to this stage where you could file an application. Yeah, that's not (a final investment decision), but it's also by no means trivial."

This week's development is much anticipated; it comes nearly three years after Canada's largest oilsands companies announced they would band together in a joint effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from oilsands production.

The companies are proposing to build a 400-kilometre line that would ultimately transport carbon dioxide emissions from 20 different oilsands production facilities in northern Alberta and embed them safely in an underground storage hub.

Pathways has said the project could help its member companies achieve a 32 per cent reduction from 2019 emissions levels by 2030.

It is the centrepiece of the oilsands industry's pledge to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, something the industry must do if Canada is to meet its international climate commitments.

But Pathways has been criticized for its perceived slowness in getting shovels in the ground. The consortium has spent much of the last three years lobbying for federal and provincial support for its project.

While the federal government has pledged an investment tax credit for carbon capture and storage projects, as well as promised a mechanism to backstop the price of carbon in order to give certainty to companies considering investing in emissions reducing technology, the details of both have yet to be hammered out.

"There's lots of tools that have been put on the table as part of the overall solution, but it's taken time — and frankly, a frustratingly long time, from all parties' perspectives — to actually translate the idea into something close to a term sheet that is the kind of thing you need to actually make a final investment decision," Dilling said.

"I think when you hear industry saying there's still a gap, or we're not there yet, what they're saying is, 'we still can't take these things to the bank.' "

As recently as this month, oilsands executives have publicly stated that the level of government support announced for carbon capture so far in Canada is not enough to make the Pathways project competitive.

At Cenovus' recent investor day, the company's chief sustainability officer Rhona DelFrari said Canada risks being left behind due to a lack of competitive fiscal incentives.

"With what we know today ... the government funding partnerships in Canada are not enough for large-scale (carbon capture) to proceed in the oilsands," DelFrari said at the company's recent investor day.

The Pathways project also faces a degree of uncertainty in the form of the federal government's proposed cap on emissions from the oil and gas sector, which industry leaders have warned could lead to companies having to shut in production.

Oilsands companies are also facing pushback from some Indigenous groups along the pipeline's route. At least seven Alberta First Nations have expressed concerns about the project and have formed a working group in search of answers as to how the project will affect safety and the environment.

But Dilling said he's still hopeful a final investment decision will be made before the end of 2025, with construction beginning in 2026.

"2026 is realistically the earliest that I would expect that we would be turning dirt, and I know that's a long way away. I mean, we all wish we could just start putting shovels in the ground tomorrow," he said.

"But there's just all kinds of steps that you can't shortcut, or things go really wrong."

In late February, federal Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson met with Pathways Alliance executives and urged them to work quickly to show progress on their decarbonization efforts.

In an emailed statement Thursday, Wilkinson's press secretary Carolyn Svonkin acknowledged the regulatory application is a "step forward." But she pointed out Pathways had previously stated its intent to bring forward its regulatory submission in the fall of 2023.

"Minister Wilkinson expects and looks forward to Pathways taking other necessary steps to move expeditiously to complete their flagship project, including achieving their stated goal of placing first purchase orders for pipe in early 2024," Svonkin said.

Dilling said the Pathways project is so critical to Canada's and the oilsands industry's climate goals that it will be built, one way or another.

But he acknowledged that to achieve the group's originally stated goal of cutting 22 million tonnes of oilsands emissions by 2030, time is running out.

"It is still absolutely doable ... but we basically need everything to go according to plan from here to hit 2030," he said.

"Even in a worst-case scenario where some of it is delayed, I still think we'll have CO2 going in the ground by 2030. It would be more of a question of whether it's the full complement, or if it's an initial tranche and we continue to ramp up from there."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 21, 2024.

Amanda Stephenson, The Canadian Press

Canada ranked last in access to primary health care in a survey of 10 high-income countries released by the Canadian Institute for Health Information on Thursday.



Eighty-six per cent of Canadians aged 18 and older said they had a doctor or a place they usually go for medical care in the 2023 survey by the Commonwealth Fund.

That's down from 93 per cent of those surveyed in 2016 — and means that an estimated four million Canadian adults did not have access to primary care last year, the study said.

The percentage of people who had access to primary care was lower than in any of the other countries surveyed, which included Australia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The average among all 10 countries was 93 per cent.

The Netherlands had the best ranking, with 99 per cent of adults living there reporting they had access to primary care in 2023.

The United States performed only slightly better than Canada, with 87 per cent of American adults saying they had primary care access.

Canada also ranked last in ability to get a same or next-day appointment to see a doctor or nurse.

Only 26 per cent of Canadian adults were able to get medical attention that quickly, down from 46 per cent in 2016.

Related video: Health Matters: Economic worries taking mental toll, CIHI survey shows (Global News)  Duration 2:24  View on Watch

The survey also revealed that Canadians with lower household incomes were less likely to have a primary care provider than those with higher incomes.

It also found that 39 per cent of Canadians without primary care had at least one chronic health condition and 29 per cent were taking one or more prescription medications.

The 2023 Commonwealth Fund also surveyed participants about their mental health.

It found the COVID-19 pandemic, together with economic stressors, was taking a toll on Canadians, with 29 per cent of adults reporting depression, anxiety or another mental health condition in 2023.

The Commonwealth Fund is a U.S.-based non-profit foundation that funds surveys of patients and health-care providers in multiple countries. CIHI is the Canadian partner.

Researchers conducted interviews between March and August 2023. In Canada, 4,820 people were interviewed.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 21, 2024.

Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.

The Canadian Press

US must speed permits to spur renewable energy growth, execs say

Story by Reuters • 1d • 1

FILE PHOTO: Solar panels are set up in the solar farm at the University of California, Merced, in Merced, California, U.S. August 17, 2022. REUTERS/Nathan Frandino/File Photo© Thomson Reuters

HOUSTON (Reuters) -The U.S. government needs to streamline permitting for renewable energy projects, including development of power transmission infrastructure and grid connectivity, to support needed growth, executives said on Thursday at a conference in Houston.

"It's a tremendous issue," said NRG interim CEO Larry Coben, pointing to difficulties around interconnection, the rules that new electricity generators must follow to connect to the grid.

It can take up to four years to move a project through the interconnection process, according to the American Clean Power Association.

Coben lamented that it is much harder to move through permitting processes in places like California than Texas.

States with fewer regulatory restrictions are going to be the big winners in attracting renewable investment and growth, said Andrés Gluski, CEO of utility firm AES Corporation.

Hurdles around permitting have been discussed frequently among executives attending the annual CERAWeek energy conference in Houston Texas. Earlier in the week, U.S. Senator Joe Manchin told participants that permitting reform "will get done."

The call for faster permitting comes as renewable deployment is forecast to grow by as much as 17% to 42 gigawatts this year, representing about a quarter of electricity generation, consultancy Deloitte said in a report, citing U.S. government figures.

"We've got to get infrastructure built, transmission lines built. We’ve got to work through these kind of political forums that are being used to stonewall and stop progress,” said Chris Womack, chief executive at utility firm Southern Company.

(Reporting by Liz Hampton in Houston; Editing by David Gregorio)

'Work until you drop dead': House GOP plan takes axe to Social Security, healthcare and civil rights

Story by David Badash 

 ALTERNET

House Mike Johnson in Las Vegas on October 28, 2023

 (Gage Skidmore)© provided by AlterNet

The Republican Study Committee has released its proposed 2025 budget which would take an ax to major elements of the social safety net, healthcare system, and civil rights, while affecting nearly every American, either now or in the future.

Calling it “Fiscal Sanity to Save America,” the budget proposal from the far-right MAGA-affiliated group of about 170 House Republicans would effectively create a national abortion ban and ban on in-vitro fertilization procedures (IVF) by creating legal protections for human embryos starting at “the moment of fertilization.” It mentions the word “abortion” 77 times.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is a member and former chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

“The House GOP Study Committee (largest House GOP bloc) released a budget endorsing the Life at Conception Act, which would provide 14th amendment legal protections at every stage of life,” explained Joseph Zeballos-Roig, Semafor’s domestic policy and politics reporter. “Amounts to near-total ban on abortions with no IVF exceptions.”

U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) blasted the Republican Study Committee’s budget.

READ MORE: Speaker Johnson Using Ban on LGBTQ Pride Flags to Sell Critical Funding Bill

“Wow today a group comprising 80% of republicans in Congress explicitly endorsed a far-right bill that would impose a national abortion ban and outlaw birth control and in vitro fertilization IVF,” he wrote on X.

“Just now 80% of republicans in Congress called for raising the retirement age and tying social security to life expectancy. Republicans want you to work until you drop dead,” he added minutes later.

Related video: 'I'll oppose any cuts to Social Security or Medicare': GOP Lawmaker rejects party's budget changes (MSNBC)  Duration 8:53   View on Watch

“The new budget also calls for converting Medicare to a ‘premium support model,’ echoing a proposal that Republican former Speaker Paul Ryan had rallied support for,” NBC News reports. “Under the new RSC plan, traditional Medicare would compete with private plans and beneficiaries would be given subsidies to shop for the policies of their choice. The size of the subsidies could be pegged to the ‘average premium’ or ‘second lowest price’ in a particular market, the budget says.”

“The plan became a flashpoint in the 2012 election, when Ryan was GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s running mate, and President Barack Obama charged that it would ‘end Medicare as we know it.’ Ryan defended it as a way to put Medicare on better financial footing, and most of his party stood by him.”

Award-winning journalist Laurie Garrett observes the Republican Study Committee’s budget “cuts $1.5 trillion from Social Security,” “raises Medicare costs & cuts caps on pharma fees,” “cuts Medicaid, ACA/Obamacare & the Children’s Health Insurance Prog by $4.5 trillion over 10 years,” “creates $5.5 trillion in tax cuts for the rich and corporations,” “eliminates all clean energy tax incentives,” and “raises Social Security Retirement age to 69.”

READ MORE:‘This Is a Show’: Democrat Demands Comer Hold ‘Fake Faux’ Biden Impeachment Vote

U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) wrote: “Social Security is NOT an entitlement. Americans pay into the program with each and every paycheck. Raising the Social Security retirement age is yet another way the extremists in the GOP are trying to take away your hard-earned money.”

The House Democratic Whip, U.S. Rep. Katherine Clark (D-MA) summed it up this way:

“The MAGA GOP’s three-point plan:

– Raise the retirement age.

– Cut Social Security.

– Line the pockets of billionaires.

Democrats are going to stop them.”

Frank Stronach: Is technology accelerating the great divide in income?

Opinion by Frank Stronach • FP

The OpenAI logo is seen displayed on a cell phone with an image on a computer monitor generated by ChatGPT's Dall-E text-to-image model, Dec. 8, 2023, in Boston. 

Back in the 1980s, when artificial intelligence (AI) was still the stuff of science fiction and computers and automation were changing the way we worked, a number of futurists and economists predicted “the end of work” and rising living standards.

Some of them claimed that by the year 2030, most people would no longer need to work, as robots and automation would perform virtually all of the jobs we used to do.

Not only would we not need to work, according to these experts, but incomes and living standards would rise due to the wealth these new technologies generated.

Clearly, it hasn’t quite turned out that way — at least not for the majority of Canadians. If anything, most people who have jobs are working longer than ever and seeing their incomes stagnate or decline. And most of the wealth generated by these new technologies has not trickled down to the average citizen.

When I was CEO of Magna International back in the late 1980s — the time when robotics first began appearing on automotive production and assembly lines — I publicly raised the issue of who would be the chief beneficiaries of these new technologies and what would happen to the assembly line jobs being replaced by robots.

It’s hardly mentioned anymore nowadays, in part because most of our manufacturing has either been shuttered or offshored to countries where workers are still cheaper than robots.

Related video: How Artificial Intelligence is Helping Farmers (Underknown)

Duration 2:02 View on Watch

DW Using the AI boom to your advantage

2:05

Money Talks News16 Current and Fictitious Jobs That May Be in Your Future

2:28

But without a doubt, many jobs will disappear in the years ahead because of technological advances. Robotics and automation are moving outside the factories where they were first adopted and into every facet of our work and our lives, displacing a growing number of workers in the process.

In the decade ahead, everything from self-driving transport trucks and taxi cabs to elder care robots will cause the loss of millions of jobs around the world. And that’s not counting the job losses that will happen once AI becomes deeply rooted in the offices and workplaces of our country.

A report published last week by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that AI — the most transformational new technology to emerge in our lifetimes — has the potential to increase incomes for high-income earners while also accelerating income inequality.

On the other hand, the IMF report also warned that AI could displace a large number of high-income workers performing white-collar jobs in finance, communications, and law — individuals who were previously immune to job losses caused by robotics and automation.

But even if AI ends up wiping out a large number of jobs, we can’t blame a technology for our society’s growing income inequality. That’s the fault of our system.

The fact remains, Canada’s economic fundamentals are unsound and are not conducive to fostering economic growth. AI is focused on the digital economy and the information that underpins it — whether that be financial data or words.

Unfortunately, in Canada we’ve increasingly abandoned the real economy — the economy where we make tangible products such as cars, phones, machines and furniture.

If we want to insulate ourselves from the coming wave of job losses that AI will inevitably unleash, then we need to once again start making things. We need to stop exporting our abundant raw materials and importing finished goods made elsewhere. We need to start turning our natural resources into value-added goods that the rest of the world wants to buy.

And we need to unchain our entrepreneurs and small business owners so they can create the innovative new products that will generate added wealth and increase the size of our economy.

Politics as usual won’t fix our economy. And neither will big business — or what’s left of it in Canada.

If we created the right conditions for startups and small businesses to thrive — by removing business income tax, for example — then we could spark an economic boom that would add hundreds of thousands of new jobs.

But small businesses across Canada have to unite and make their voice heard, because right now no one is listening to their needs, and unless they band together and become a force to be reckoned with, nothing will change.

Small businesses can revive our manufacturing sector — if we dismantle the red tape and create the right environment for them to grow and prosper.

That would be a guaranteed solution to raising the incomes and living standards of millions of Canadians, regardless of what AI or any other disruptive technology has in store in the years to come.

National Post

fstronachpost@gmail.com

Frank Stronach is the founder of Magna International Inc., one of Canada’s largest global companies, and the Stronach Foundation for Economic Rights (www.economiccharter.ca).

STRONACH HAS MOVED TO AUSTRIA WHERE HE FORMED HIS OWN CONSERVATIVE PARTY

Squad member Jamaal Bowman demands rents are capped to fight 'plantation capitalism' as he helps AOC announce her Green New Deal for housing he calls a 'form of reparations'

Story by Morgan Phillips, Congress Reporter On Capitol Hill For Dailymail.Com

The proposal would invest up to $234 billion over 10 years in public housing and repeal the Faircloth Amendment which limits public housing units
'It is plantation capitalism, to have someone paying 40, 50, 60 percent of their salary towards rent,' said Bowman

Progressives led by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are re-launching a 'Green New Deal' for public housing to address 'environmental injustices' in low-income housing.

The proposal would invest up to $234 billion over 10 years in public housing and repeal the Faircloth Amendment.

The Faircloth Amendment prevents any net increase in public housing units beyond 1999 levels - 1.8 million.

The proposal 'would bring public housing down to zero carbon emissions while creating 280,000 jobs. In the era of government neglected demolition and privatization of our public housing stocks,' according to Ocasio-Cortez.

'Broken policy is relying solely on the market and solely on billionaires in order to produce and extort everyday people of every dime that they have in charging the highest rent,' the congresswoman added in a news conference Thursday. 'A different world is not only possible, a different world is arriving today.'


Progressives led by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are re-launching a 'Green New Deal' for public housing to address 'environmental injustices' in low-income housing© Provided by Daily Mail


'We're gonna stand up and transform our energy system and create sustainable housing not based on fossil fuel,' said Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.© Provided by Daily Mail

'Housing is a human right. The rent is too damn high, y'all,' said Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., who grew up in public housing in New York City.

'It is plantation capitalism, to have someone paying 40, 50, 60 percent of their salary towards rent,' said Bowman. 'That is plantation capitalism.'

'Rent should be capped at 20 percent of [salary],' he then said. 'The Green New Deal for public housing is a form of reparations for marginalized communities.'

Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vt., blamed investors for snatching up home inventory

'You know who's buying up all the homes in suburban neighborhoods? Hedge funds, yeah, they're not living there.'

Democrats have already launched an effort to ban hedge funds from buying homes.


Squad member Jamaal Bowman demands rents are capped to fight 'plantation capitalism' as he helps AOC announce her Green New Deal for housing he calls a 'form of reparations'© Provided by Daily Mail


'Housing is a human right. The rent is too damn high, y'all,' said Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., who grew up in public housing in New York City© Provided by Daily Mail

A recent report from the Urban Institute, a left-leaning think tank, found some 574,000 single family homes nationwide were owned by large institutional investors that own at least 100 properties as of June 2022.

But another group, the National Rental Home Council, says the numbers need more context. They note that of the 145 million housing units nationwide, such investors only own 0.4 percent.

Related video: AOC Announces 'Green New Deal for Public Housing' (Newsweek)

Duration 0:51  View on Watch

'We're gonna stand up and transform our energy system and create sustainable housing not based on fossil fuel,' said Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. 'We all going to provide decent quality affordable housing for millions of Americans. And at the same time, we're going to create good-paying, union jobs.'

The bill's latest version allocates more money to address a public housing backlog and for clean energy home improvements.

The bill does not address skyrocketing housing costs for those that do not qualify for public housing - or those that aspire to own their own homes. It will go down in almost-certain defeat in any sort of divided Congress.

But the progressives hope to move the Overton window - at least with what is accepted within their own party.

'I want to send this message very clearly, not just to all of Congress, but including the leadership of the Democratic Party,' said Ocasio-Cortez. 'There's a lot of different things to address, social housing mortgages, interest rates, but any true housing policy must include a commitment to public housing point blank, period.'

AOC and progressives slam spending bill that halts funding for UNRWA as ‘unconscionable’

Story by Eric Garcia and Katie Hawkinson • The Independent

The Independent
Chuck Schumer says Netanyahu's government 'no longer fits the needs of Israel'
View on Watch   Duration 1:16

Progressives slammed the bipartisan spending bill that would keep the government open for the rest of the year for its proposal to halt direct US funding for the primary humanitarian agency operating in Gaza until 2025.

The leaders of the Appropriations Committees on the House and Senate released the text for six spending bills to keep the government open for the rest of the fiscal year which ends on 30 September. But progressives immediately criticised the bills for cutting off aid to Palestinians amid a humanitarian crisis.

Progressive Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told The Independent that further halting direct funding to the organization would be “unconscionable.”

“It’s also not sound, not grounded in sound facts,” she said. “We have intelligence assessments that speak to this.”

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has been the main provider of food, water and shelter in Gaza since the war began on 7 October, when Hamas militants launched an attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking another 250 people hostage. Since then, attacks by the Israel Defense Forces on Gaza have killed more than 30,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

Now, a new spending bill that could pass Congress in the coming days would stop US funds from going towards a “contribution, grant, or other payment” to UNRWA until March 2025.

UNRWA fell under heavy scrutiny after Israeli officials alleged that some staffers in Gaza participated in the 7 October attack by Hamas militants. Earlier this month, Israel claimed some 450 UNRWA employees were members of Gaza militant groups but provided no evidence, the Associated Press reports.

Due to these reports, in January President Joe Biden put a temporary pause on US funding to UNRWA pending the outcome of a United Nations (UN) investigation. That pause is ongoing.

Several countries declared they would halt funding in response, but many have already reversed their decision, including Australia, Sweden and Canada. The European Union also pledged to pay $54m to UNRWA earlier this month after the agency agreed to allow EU-appointed experts to audit the way it screens staff to identify extremists.

Fellow progressive Ro Khanna echoed Ms Ocasio-Cortez’s same concerns.

“It restricts funding for kids who are dying in Gaza. It’s unconscionable,” the congressman told The Independent.

Representative Delia Ramirez of Illinois told The Independent she would be briefed on the legislation but she worried about the consequences of restricting aid to UNRWRA.

“We should not be restricting, we should be restoring, I've been saying that on public record,” she said. “The idea that people are literally starving to death and we are contributing to that as a problem.”

On top of supporting those in Gaza, UNRWA also supports millions of Palestinian refugees across the Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the West Bank.

An UNRWA worker prepares to distribute aid

 (Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)

Democrats like Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia oppose the provision on the grounds that UNRWA provides essential support outside of Gaza.

“Set aside Gaza for a second: UNRWA does really important work in Jordan and other countries where we don’t necessarily have others, so that in my view is a real weakness of the bill,” Mr Kaine told The Independent.

Others expressed concerns that no one could fill the gap that UNRWA would leave in Gaza.

“I don’t know that there’s another organization that can step in and do the job,” Democratic Senator Dick Durbin told The Independent.

Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, who supports a ceasefire, has in the past defended UNRWA and criticised the provision on Thursday.

“I'm very disappointed in a time when UNRWA is the primary system for delivering aid to starving people that funding would be turned off,” he told The Independent.

However, Republican leadership has hailed the provision as positive. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson praised the move, echoing Israel’s claims.

“Importantly, it halts funding for the UN agency which employed terrorists who participated in the October 7 attacks against Israel,” Mr Johnson said in a statement.


Mike Johnson and other members of the GOP have long supported halting funding to UNRWA

But even pro-Israel Democrats worry about cutting off spending for UNRWA. Senator Ben Cardin--the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who is a major supporter of Israel--said it was “a mistake type of prohibition.”

“So I think we obviously have suspension in regards to Gaza,” Mr Cardin, who is Jewish, told The Independent. “The UNRWA operates in other countries besides Gaza.”


Halting UNRWA funding comes as part of a much larger $1.2 trillion spending bill just days ahead of the government shutdown deadline. The so-called minibus spending bill will fund the State Department; the Pentagon; the Department of Homeland Security; Congress; the Department of Health and Human Services; the Department of Education; financial services and the general government. If the bill passes, Congress will have finally completed the appropriations process for the current fiscal year following several failed spending bills and continuing resolutions.

Given Republican opposition to the spending bill and the razor-thin Republican majority, the legislation will likely be subjected to a suspension of the rules vote, which would require a two-thirds majority vote in the House. But if progressives oppose the spending bill, the legislation might not survive.

This bill would not be the first time the US has halted or cut funding to the UNRWA. In 2018, then-President Donald Trump cut all funding before President Joe Biden restored it in 2021.

Should the minibus pass, Mr Biden has already committed to signing it immediately.

The Independent has always had a global perspective. Built on a firm foundation of superb international reporting and analysis, The Independent now enjoys a reach that was inconceivable when it was launched as an upstart player in the British news industry. For the first time since the end of the Second World War, and across the world, pluralism, reason, a progressive and humanitarian agenda, and internationalism – Independent values – are under threat. Yet we, The Independent, continue to grow.

Documentary details Indigenous-led efforts to reintroduce salmon to key waterway

The largest river in the Pacific Northwest — the "Columbia" — was once teeming with wild salmon, and Indigenous communities hope that it will be again.

A recent documentary, Bringing the Salmon Home, tells the story of a key initiative to bring salmon back to this river.

Before colonization, sockeye and Chinook were especially plentiful in its upper reaches. These salmon, a keystone species and main food staple, are so important for Indigenous communities in the region that they’re considered family. 

"Bringing [the salmon] home is like bringing our children home," Wayne M. Christian (Wenecwtsin), of Secwépemc and syilx ancestry, says in the documentary.

The Columbia twists and turns for 800 km from the crest of the Rocky Mountains before crossing the international line into the “United States” and travelling another 1,200 km, where it eventually drains into the Pacific Ocean near “Astoria, Oregon.” 

Before colonization, it was the greatest salmon-producing river system in the world. But in the late 1800s, settlers began overfishing the Columbia. Then, dams were built without consultation from the local nations and tribes, blocking salmon from returning to the upper Columbia River region. In 1939, no salmon returned.

On July 29, 2019, a three-year agreement between the syilx Okanagan Nation, the Secwépemc Nation, the Ktunaxa Nation and the provincial and federal governments officially went into effect. The agreement saw the three nations coming together to create a unified vision around reintroducing salmon into the upper Columbia River region.

Related video: Indigenous highlights at Sundance Film Festival (Indian Country Today)   Duration 1:43   View on Watch

Bringing the Salmon Home: The Columbia River Salmon Reintroduction Initiative is an effort dedicated to crafting a long-term plan to see fish stocks return for Indigenous food, along with social and ceremonial needs. By reintroducing salmon to the upper Columbia River, the goal is also to benefit all community members in the region and the ecosystems as a whole.

In 2022, after seeing over 500,000 salmon return into the lower Columbia system after decades-long efforts from the Okanagan Nation Alliance, the three nations — as well as “Canada” and “British Columbia” — extended the initiative for another three years. That same year, 21 Indigenous Youth from the three nations gathered at the headwaters of the Columbia River for the first Youth Salmon Warriors gathering. They crafted a Salmon Warriors statement, a short video and other presentations.

A documentary was produced by the group behind the initiative shortly after, highlighting the wisdom of the Salmon Warriors, Elders and knowledge keepers, and the ongoing legacy of colonialism on salmon and the Columbia River. More importantly, it explored the collaborative work around reintroducing salmon to the region’s waterways.

The Bringing the Salmon Home documentary was screened in syilx Okanagan communities throughout January and February. Billie Jean Gabriel, the syilx Okanagan outreach and engagement organizer for the initiative, was present at each screening to promote the work being done and to answer any questions community members had.

IndigiNews reporter Aaron Hemens attended a viewing of the documentary in snpink’tn (Penticton) and later caught up with Gabriel to talk about the film and salmon reintroduction efforts.

The following Q&A has been edited for length and clarity.

Aaron: I was hoping we could talk about the theme of coming home. It’s in the name Bringing The Salmon Home. But also, it was something that was talked about throughout the documentary – with the Salmon Warriors, all the Elders and knowledge keepers – was bringing the salmon home as a return to culture and things that colonialism had tried to take away with the removal of salmon and also with residential schools. 

Billie Jean: We’ve all experienced trauma. One of the things that I’ve learned in my work and the ways that I’ve tried to heal — including this particular job that I’m now in — is that trauma is pain that we didn’t choose, and healing is pain that we choose. So I think about coming home and bringing the salmon home. I feel like our nations are ready to be uncomfortable, sit in the same room, and work together to bring the salmon home. And I don’t know that we’ve been able to do that any other time in history since colonization. 

Apparently, we had salmon in the creeks and rivers that I grew up on, but they were just really low numbers. The Columbia hasn’t had salmon for 86 years. I never grew up fishing for salmon. I didn’t grow up tasting salmon very much. I had a little bit here and there, but I didn’t even know anything about our people and our way. I feel like so many of us, since we’ve been talking about residential schools finally, are coming home from a very long dissociative state of being outside of our bodies — a trauma state. We’re starting to come back to our bodies. And through coming back to our bodies, we’re starting to wake up, and the land is telling us who we are. And as we walk the land, as we go into the river, as we talk to the fish, as we pray for the fish, we’re waking up our DNA of who we are.

In your own words, can you describe what a Salmon Warrior is? It was Jade Montgomery-Waardenburg who said you don’t have to be a biologist to be a Salmon Warrior. There are different streams and channels you can go down, she said.

I love that, and I think she said you don’t have to be on the frontlines to be a warrior. That really hit me hard, in a good way. Because we all have gifts. And our job, I believe, is to understand our gifts and to do good work.

I feel like a Salmon Warrior embodies the understanding that there’s always work to do. I’m recognizing that if we can’t do the little things, we can’t do the big things. So when you’re cleaning fish, if you can’t clean 150 to 250 fish, how are you going to can it all? How are you going to put food away for the winter? If you can’t go out and get that fish for yourself, how are you going to feed yourself through the winter? 

I don’t know because none of us were there, but I can imagine some of us developed great discipline in that lifestyle of being on land, providing for ourselves, and having economies of mutual aid. And we are returning to that as much as we can — we’re healing, and we’re trying to get that into the work personally, in our community and then in our Nation. I feel like a Salmon Warrior embodies that this work will be ongoing. It’s got to go beyond the lifecycle of a single salmon. It’s really developing the skill sets within our young people to recognize the leadership that needs to be cultivated within them to continue this work for decades. Some of us didn’t get that discipline, that work. And we’re late to the game, which is me. I’m what you call a late bloomer. 

When I think of a Salmon Warrior, there’s no age limit. However, we are specifically focusing on our Youth at this time because we want to create future leaders who will continue to carry this work beyond the single cycle of one life, of one salmon.

This is a personal opinion, but because our children are in school, they’re learning a colonial way of life. I feel like the Salmon Warrior program is an opportunity to learn more about the syilx way of life. I’m really excited for our Youth who see more and more programs like this.

Something I remember hearing a lot in the documentary was the passing on of knowledge through salmon. Could you speak to the notion of how knowledge and culture are passed on through salmon?

Culture is the context in which we get to be in relationship to one another. Food is one of the universally binding cultural practices. 

When we build context with one another, it’s knitting; it’s binding our relational ties together really tightly. Salmon as a keystone species — as a sacred food, as a sacred kin, as in our captikʷł, as one of the animal chiefs that gave themselves as food for the people to be — that’s a really special relationship. To be in relationship with your food and where your food comes from from the beginning, like getting your hands in the water and catching that fish, there’s something that happens in our brains as human beings that deeply impacts us.

Salmon is one of those foods that when we lost it, we lost who we are. We lost our way. Because we’ve been doing this since the beginning of time. And when you took away our right to feed ourselves, we really forgot who we were. We’ve been struggling to find our way ever since.

And that’s something you mentioned earlier, and in the documentary as well, is this notion of the people reawakening.

Yeah. They say that at the Kettle Falls — as you saw in the documentary — it was a place where nations got together, and there was no fighting. Because there was so much food, we didn’t have to fight over it. It was a time of celebration because we got to go home and feed our people. It’s pretty hard to be mad when you’re joyful. It’s hard to pick a war when your bellies are full. 

Wars are often the opposite times. But I can imagine when the salmon came — and all the people came to feed themselves and bring that fish home — I can just imagine the elation, joy, and purpose it gave people. You just don’t have that anymore. And that’s what we want. That will make us feel good, having real, deep, meaningful purpose and connection to our food. Indigenous food sovereignty is all about asserting jurisdiction and enforcing our right to sovereignty over our food — where our food comes from and how we manage that.

For you to see these three nations working together to be a unified voice for salmon, how has it been for you to witness that and be part of this initiative?

It’s really powerful for me personally because my dad is syilx. He learned from a lot of Secwépemc people because he went to a residential school in Kamloops. He also went to a residential school in Cranbrook, which is Ktunaxa. 

I think that because our communities have intermarried for generations, and we’ve shared fishing sites, we’ve shared food gathering sites of other kinds — not just salmon, but all of our foods. There’s so much mutual exchange that has happened throughout history between our nations. It’s important that we heal those relationships and that we recognize one another as kin. That we work together because we have to think of everybody downstream from us. We can’t just think of ourselves. And so this work is really important because it’s going to allow us space and opportunity to heal with one another, not just at the nation level, but at the personal level as well. 

How can Youth and others from the three nations get involved in this initiative?

You can go to our website at www.columbiariversalmon.ca , where you’ll meet our five partners and learn about the initiative, as well as our team and shared principles. We also have our annual report there and our Youth Salmon Warriors statement as well. You can even watch our documentary online  — everything you need to know is there, including signing up for our newsletter.

Also, you can go to the Okanagan Nation Alliance website at www.syilx.org. You can find out about the hatchery  located in Penticton and do a hatchery tour. On the website, under the fisheries department, there is information about conservation, protection, restoration and enhancement of Indigenous fisheries. Right now, there is currently information about salmon spawning, and you can learn how to identify a salmon nest in the stream. 

This has been really wonderful talking with you. Do you have any final thoughts or comments you’d like to share? I would say let’s get on the land and do something. Healing happens on the land. We can talk and talk and talk, but more action is needed. I think my final thought would be to tell people to get out on the water. The more time you spend trying to get your hands on fish, the more you can really get into the work. 

Editor's note: This is a corrected story. A previous version of the story incorrectly stated that the Columbia River flows for 480 km in Canada. In fact it is 800 km. We have also removed a reference to Billie being a "spokesperson" for the initiative as the correct title is in fact "outreach and engagement organizer."

Aaron Hemens, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, IndigiNews

Meta Platforms must face advertisers' class action, US appeals court says

FILE PHOTO: Figurines with computers and smartphones are seen in front of Facebook logo in this illustration, July 24, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo© Thomson Reuters

By Jonathan Stempel

(Reuters) -A divided U.S. appeals court said Meta Platforms must face a class action by advertisers that accused the Facebook and Instagram owner of overcharging them by fraudulently inflating the number of people their ads might reach.

In a 2-1 decision on Thursday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said advertisers could sue for damages as a group over Meta's claims about the "potential reach" of their ads.

Advertisers said the metric used measured the number social media accounts, not the lower number of actual people, and inflated the number of potential viewers by as much as 400%.

The court also decertified a separate class seeking injunctive relief, meaning the advertisers cannot sue as a group, because it wasn't clear that the main plaintiff had legal standing to sue.

A dissenting judge would have decertified both classes. The advertisers have estimated Meta could owe more than $7 billion of damages, court papers show.

Meta and its lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The Menlo Park, California-based company has said ads generate "substantially all" of its revenue, which totaled $134.9 billion in 2023. Net income was $39.1 billion.

Class actions afford potentially greater recoveries at lower cost than if plaintiffs are forced to sue individually.

Related video: Meta's Battle with FTC Thickens, Court Rejects Bid to Stop Privacy Investigation (Benzinga)  Duration 0:55  View on Watch

Circuit Judge Sidney Thomas wrote for the majority that because Meta provided the same alleged misrepresentation about potential reach, advertisers could try to prove that their alleged damages stemmed from a "common course of conduct."

The class covers potentially millions of individuals and businesses that have paid for ads on Facebook and Instagram since Aug. 15, 2014.

Their lawsuit included a claim that senior executives knew that duplicate and fake accounts, including from bots, inflated the "potential reach" metric, but took steps to cover it up.

Circuit Judge Danielle Forrest, in a partial dissent, said she would decertify the damages class because of individualized questions about what advertisers understood about what Meta was telling them before they bought ads.

Geoffrey Graber, a lawyer for the advertisers, said he looked forward to taking the damages case to a jury.

The case is DZ Reserve et al v Meta Platforms Inc, 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 22-15916.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by David Evans and Bill Berkrot)

U$ Energy agency announces $475M in funding for clean energy projects on mine land sites



FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) — The Biden administration pumped more money into clean energy projects Thursday, announcing up to $475 million in federal funding for projects in five states — including the political battleground states of Pennsylvania, Arizona and Nevada.

The projects will accelerate clean energy development on current and former mine lands, the U.S. Department of Energy announced. The other states benefiting — Kentucky and West Virginia — are solidly Republican and have been hit hard by the downturn in the coal sector.

The funding comes from the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure law — one of President Joe Biden's hallmark legislative victories. The projects in Kentucky, West Virginia and Pennsylvania advance efforts to transition away from coal to solar and hydropower.

The administration said the clean energy projects will strengthen the country's energy security while helping ensure mining communities continue playing a role in the energy economy.

“Workers and communities that powered our country for the last 100 years deserve the chance to power us for the next 100 and beyond,” Deputy Energy Secretary David Turk said in a press call Wednesday.

Energy and climate policies have emerged as flash points in this year's presidential race between Biden and Republican former President Donald Trump. Trump has indicated he’ll try to roll back Biden’s clean energy investments and expand drilling for oil and natural gas if he returns to office.

Related video: Rezoning of future solar farms in Greene Co. approved by commission (WJHL Tri-Cities) Duration 2:02  View on Watch

Money Talks NewsSolar Panel Breakthrough Could Make Renewable Energy More Commercially Viable
1:31

WPTZ Plattsburgh-BurlingtonRenewable Energy Standard update requires 100% renewable sources sooner
2:02

KMGH Denver, COLow-Income Energy Assistance Program seeing record applications
0:51

Biden's administration said the latest round of funding reinforced his commitment to building an “inclusive and equitable clean energy future that creates healthier, more resilient communities.”

In Kentucky, a $1.3 billion pumped storage hydroelectric facility will be built on a former coal mine site, Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear said. The project has been approved for a federal grant totaling up to $81 million to assist with construction of the plant in Bell County in southeastern Kentucky, Beshear said.

“The mountains in this area provide the perfect landscape for moving water from one elevation to another, creating electricity when we need it,” Turk said.

Coal employment numbers in Kentucky have fallen sharply over the last decade as demand for coal has declined. Kentucky employed about 4,700 mine workers at the end of 2023, including about 2,700 in underground mines, compared to nearly 12,000 total miners in 2013, according to numbers provided by the state.

The Lewis Ridge Pumped Storage Project by Rye Development in Kentucky will create about 1,500 construction jobs to build what officials described as a first-of-its-kind coal-to-pumped storage hydropower facility, Beshear said.

“We believe ... this is the largest investment ever in eastern Kentucky,” he said.

Once built, the facility will create 30 operations jobs and generate enough energy to power nearly 67,000 homes, he said.

The federal funding also will support:

—A project in southeast Arizona to deploy direct-use, geothermal, clean heat combined with a battery energy storage system at two active copper mines. It will help decrease the mines’ reliance on thermal backup generators while supporting the annual extraction of 25 million pounds (11.3 million kilograms) of copper. Kathleen Quirk, president of Freeport Minerals Corp., said the copper the project plans to extract from already-mined material was previously considered unrecoverable. The project aims to create 121 construction jobs and 12 permanent operations jobs.

—A project in Nevada's Elko, Humboldt and Eureka counties to develop a solar facility and accompanying battery energy storage system across three active gold mines. By shifting to clean energy, the project could demonstrate a replicable way for the mining industry to reach net-zero operations while meeting growing demands for minerals, the Energy Department said. Project construction is estimated to create about 300 jobs.

—A project in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania, to repurpose nearly 2,700 acres (1,090 hectares) of former coal mining land to create a utility-scale solar facility. The project will generate enough clean energy to power more than 70,000 homes. It will increase regional access to clean energy and fill a critical electricity-generation gap following the closure of the Homer City coal plant, the department said. More than 750 construction jobs and six operations jobs are expected to be created by the project. The project owner, Boston-based Swift Current Energy, has said construction could begin as early as summer 2024 and is scheduled to be online by the second half of 2026. In November, it announced that it had a 20-year contract to supply power to New York’s grid.

—A project in Nicholas County, West Virginia, to repurpose two former coal mines with a utility-scale solar system that would power about 39,000 homes. The two inactive mine sites provide land and access to existing energy infrastructure that will transmit the solar energy the project generates to the grid. The project is projected to create about 400 construction jobs and four operations jobs.

___

O’Malley reported from Philadelphia.

Bruce Schreiner And Isabella O'malley, The Associated Press