The changing geography of “energy poverty”

Study of the U.S. shows homes in the South and Southwest could use more aid for energy costs, due to a growing need for air conditioning in a warming climate.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

A growing portion of Americans who are struggling to pay for their household energy live in the South and Southwest, reflecting a climate-driven shift away from heating needs and toward air conditioning use, an MIT study finds. 

The newly published research also reveals that a major U.S. federal program that provides energy subsidies to households, by assigning block grants to states, does not yet fully match these recent trends.

The work evaluates the “energy burden” on households, which reflects the percentage of income needed to pay for energy necessities, from 2015 to 2020. Households with an energy burden greater than 6 percent of income are considered to be in “energy poverty.” With climate change, rising temperatures are expected to add financial stress in the South, where air conditioning is increasingly needed. Meanwhile, milder winters are expected to reduce heating costs in some colder regions. 

“From 2015 to 2020, there is an increase in burden generally, and you do also see this southern shift,” says Christopher Knittel, an MIT energy economist and co-author of a new paper detailing the study’s results. About federal aid, he adds, “When you compare the distribution of the energy burden to where the money is going, it’s not aligned too well.”

The paper, “U.S. federal resource allocations are inconsistent with concentrations of energy poverty,” will be published in Science Advances. 

The authors are Carlos Batlle, a professor at Comillas University in Spain and a senior lecturer with the MIT Energy Initiative; Peter Heller SM ’24, a recent graduate of the MIT Technology and Policy Program; Knittel, the George P. Shultz Professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management and associate dean for climate and sustainability at MIT; and Tim Schittekatte, a senior lecturer at MIT Sloan. 

A scorching decade

The study, which grew out of graduate research that Heller conducted at MIT, deploys a machine-learning estimation technique that the scholars applied to U.S. energy use data. 

Specifically, the researchers took a sample of about 20,000 households from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Residential Energy Consumption Survey, which includes a wide variety of demographic characteristics about residents, along with building-type and geographic information. Then, using the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey data for 2015 and 2020, the research team estimated the average household energy burden for every census tract in the lower 48 states — 73,057 in 2015, and 84,414 in 2020. 

That allowed the researchers to chart the changes in energy burden in recent years, including the shift toward a greater energy burden in southern states. In 2015, Maine, Mississippi, Arkansas, Vermont, and Alabama were the five states (ranked in descending order) with the highest energy burden across census bureau tracts. In 2020, that had shifted somewhat, with Maine and Vermont dropping on the list and southern states increasingly having a larger energy burden. That year, the top five states in descending order were Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama, West Virginia, and Maine. 

The data also reflect a urban-rural shift. In 2015, 23 percent of the census tracts where the average household is living in energy poverty were urban. That figure  shrank to 14 percent by 2020. 

All told, the data are consistent with the picture of a warming world, in which milder winters in the North, Northwest, and Mountain West require less heating fuel, while more extreme summer temperatures in the South require more air conditioning.

“Who’s going to be harmed most from climate change?” asks Knittel. “In the U.S., not surprisingly, it’s going to be the southern part of the U.S. And our study is confirming that, but also suggesting it’s the southern part of the U.S that’s least able to respond. If you’re already burdened, the burden’s growing.”

An evolution for LIHEAP?

In addition to identifying the shift in energy needs during the last decade, the study also illuminates a longer-term change in U.S. household energy needs, dating back to the 1980s. The researchers compared the present-day geography of U.S. energy burden to the help currently provided by the federal Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), which dates to 1981. 

Federal aid for energy needs actually predates LIHEAP, but the current program was introduced in 1981, then updated in 1984 to include cooling needs such as air conditioning. When the formula was updated in 1984, two “hold harmless” clauses were also adopted, guaranteeing states a minimum amount of funding.

Still, LIHEAP’s parameters also predate the rise of temperatures over the last 40 years, and the current study shows that, compared to the current landscape of energy poverty, LIHEAP distributes relatively less of its funding to southern and southwestern states.

“The way Congress uses formulas set in the 1980s keeps funding distributions nearly the same as it was in the 1980s,” Heller observes. “Our paper illustrates the shift in need that has occurred over the decades since then.”

Currently, it would take a fourfold increase in LIHEAP to ensure that no U.S. household experiences energy poverty. But the researchers tested out a new funding design, which would help the worst-off households first, nationally, ensuring that no household would have an energy burden of greater than 20.3 percent. 

“We think that’s probably the most equitable way to allocate the money, and by doing that, you now have a different amount of money that should go to each state, so that no one state is worse off than the others,” Knittel says. 

And while the new distribution concept would require a certain amount of subsidy reallocation among states, it would be with the goal of helping all households avoid a certain level of energy poverty, across the country, at a time of changing climate, warming weather, and shifting energy needs in the U.S.

“We can optimize where we spend the money, and that optimization approach is an important thing to think about,” Knittel says. 

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Written by Peter Dizikes, MIT News

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Journal

Science Advances

DOI

10.1126/sciadv.adp8183 

Article Title

US federal resource allocations are inconsistent with concentrations of energy poverty

Article Publication Date

9-Oct-2024

 

Viruses are teeming on your toothbrush, showerhead

New study finds ‘untapped biodiversity’ in the bathroom

Northwestern University

 

image: 

In a new study, samples collected from showerheads and toothbrushed comprised more than 600 different viruses — and no two samples were alike.

view more 

Credit: Ivan Radic

Step aside tropical rainforests and coral reefs — the latest hotspot to offer awe-inspiring biodiversity lies no further than your bathroom.

In a new Northwestern University-led study, microbiologists found that showerheads and toothbrushes are teeming with an extremely diverse collection of viruses — most of which have never been seen before.

Although this might sound ominous, the good news is these viruses don’t target people. They target bacteria.

The microorganisms collected in the study are bacteriophage, or “phage,” a type of virus that infects and replicates inside of bacteria. Although researchers know little about them, phage recently have garnered attention for their potential use in treating antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections. And the previously unknown viruses lurking in our bathrooms could become a treasure trove of materials for exploring those applications.

The study will be published Wednesday (Oct. 9) in the journal Frontiers in Microbiomes.

“The number of viruses that we found is absolutely wild,” said Northwestern’s Erica M. Hartmann, who led the study. “We found many viruses that we know very little about and many others that we have never seen before. It’s amazing how much untapped biodiversity is all around us. And you don’t even have to go far to find it; it’s right under our noses.”

An indoor microbiologist, Hartmann is an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Northwestern’s McCormick School of Engineering and a member of the Center for Synthetic Biology.

The return of ‘Operation Pottymouth’

The new study is an offshoot of previous research, in which Hartmann and her colleagues at University of Colorado at Boulder characterized bacteria living on toothbrushes and showerheads. For the previous studies, the researchers asked people to submit used toothbrushes and swabs with samples collected from their showerheads.

Inspired by concerns that a flushing toilet might generate a cloud of aerosol particles, Hartmann affectionately called the toothbrush study, “Operation Pottymouth.”

“This project started as a curiosity,” Hartmann said. “We wanted to know what microbes are living in our homes. If you think about indoor environments, surfaces like tables and walls are really difficult for microbes to live on. Microbes prefer environments with water. And where is there water? Inside our showerheads and on our toothbrushes.”

Diversity and opportunities

After characterizing bacteria, Hartmann then used DNA sequencing to examine the viruses living on those same samples. She was immediately blown away. Altogether, the samples comprised more than 600 different viruses — and no two samples were alike.

“We saw basically no overlap in virus types between showerheads and toothbrushes,” Hartmann said. “We also saw very little overlap between any two samples at all. Each showerhead and each toothbrush is like its own little island. It just underscores the incredible diversity of viruses out there.”

While they found few patterns among all the samples, Hartmann and her team did notice more mycobacteriophage than other types of phage. Mycobacteriophage infect mycobacteria, a pathogenic species that causes diseases like leprosy, tuberculosis and chronic lung infections. Hartmann imagines that, someday, researchers could harness mycobacteriophage to treat these infections and others.

“We could envision taking these mycobacteriophage and using them as a way to clean pathogens out of your plumbing system,” she said. “We want to look at all the functions these viruses might have and figure out how we can use them.”

Most microbes ‘will not make us sick’

But, in the meantime, Hartmann cautions people not to fret about the invisible wildlife living within our bathrooms. Instead of grabbing for bleach, people can soak their showerheads in vinegar to remove calcium buildup or simply wash them with plain soap and water. And people should regularly replace toothbrush heads, Hartmann says. Hartmann also is not a fan of antimicrobial toothbrushes, which she said can lead to antibiotic-resistant bugs.

“Microbes are everywhere, and the vast majority of them will not make us sick,” she said. “The more you attack them with disinfectants, the more they are likely to develop resistance or become more difficult to treat. We should all just embrace them.”

The study, “Phage communities in household-related biofilms correlate with bacterial hosts but do not associate with other environmental factors,” was supported by Northwestern University.

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Journal

Frontiers in Microbiomes

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Cells

Article Title

Phage communities in household-related biofilms correlate with bacterial hosts but do not associate with other environmental factors

Article Publication Date

9-Oct-2024

 

Are ideas contagious?

University of Virginia College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences

The COVID-19 pandemic gave the global medical community the opportunity to take giant strides forward in understanding how to develop vaccines and implement public health measures designed to control the spread of disease, but the crisis also offered researchers the chance to learn more about another kind of contagion: ideas. 

Mathematician and assistant professor of biology Nicholas Landry, an expert in the study of contagion, is exploring how the structure of human-interaction networks affect the spread of both illness and information with the aim of understanding the role social connections play in not only the transmission of disease but also the spread of ideas and ideology.

In a paper published this fall in Physical Review E with collaborators at the University of Vermont, Landry explores a hybrid approach to understanding social networks that involves inferring not just social contacts but also the rules that govern how contagion and information spread.

“With the pandemic, we have more data than we’ve ever had on diseases,” Landry said.  “The question is, What can we do with that data and how much data do you need to figure out how people are connected?”

The key to making use of the data, Landry explained, is to understand their limitations and understand how much confidence we can have when using epidemic models to make predictions.

Landry’s findings suggest that reconstructing underlying social networks and their impacts on contagion is much more feasible for diseases like SARS-CoV-2, Mpox or rhinovirus but may be less effective in understanding how more highly infectious diseases like measles or chickenpox spread.

However, for extremely viral trends or information, Landry suggests it may be possible to track how they spread with more precision than we can achieve for diseases, a discovery that will better inform future efforts to understand the pathways of both contagion and misinformation.

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Journal

Physical Review E

DOI

10.1103/PhysRevE.110.L042301 

Article Title

Reconstructing networks from simple and complex contagions

Article Publication Date

7-Oct-2024

 

Early human species benefited from food diversity in steep mountainous terrain

Peer-Reviewed Publication

Institute for Basic Science

 

image: 

Map of Africa and Eurasia showing sites with evidence of human occupation. The inset shows a magnified view of Europe.

view more 

Credit: Institute for Basic Science

A new study published in the journal Science Advances [1] by researchers at the IBS Center for Climate Physics (ICCP) at Pusan National University in South Korea shows that the patchwork of different ecosystems found in mountainous regions played a key role in the evolution of humans.

A notable feature of the archeological sites of early humans, members of the genus Homo known as hominins, is that they are often found in and near mountain regions. Using an extensive dataset of hominin fossils and artifacts, along with high-resolution landscape data and a 3-million-year-long simulation of Earth’s climate, the team of scientists from ICCP have provided a clearer picture of how and why early humans adapted to such rugged landscapes. In other words, they have helped explain why so many of our evolutionary relatives preferred being “steeplanders” as opposed to “flatlanders.”

Mountainous regions have enhanced biodiversity because the changes in elevation result in shifts of the climate, providing a range of environmental conditions under which different plant and animal species can thrive. The authors showed that steep regions usually exhibit a larger variety and density of ecosystems and vegetation types, known as biomes. Such biome diversity was a draw for early humans, as it provided increased food resources and resilience to climate change, an idea known as the Diversity Selection Hypothesis [2].

“When we analyzed the environmental factors that controlled where human species lived, we were surprised to see that terrain steepness was standing out as the dominant one, even more than local climate factors, such as temperature and precipitation.“ said Elke Zeller, PhD student from the IBS Center for Climate Physics and lead author of the study.

On the other hand, steep regions are more difficult to navigate than flatter terrain and require more energy to traverse. Hominins needed to gradually adapt to the challenges of rougher terrain in order to take advantage of the increased resources. The ICCP researchers examined how, over time, human adaptations changed the cost-benefit balance of living in rugged environments.

The adaptation towards steeper environments (Figs. 1 and 2) is visible for the earliest human species Homo habilis, Homo ergaster, and Homo erectus until about 1 million years ago, after which the topographic signal disappears for about 300,000 years. It reemerges again around 700,000 years ago with the advent of better adapted and more culturally advanced species such as Homo heidelbergensis and Homo neanderthalensis. These groups, which were able to control fire, also exhibited a much higher tolerance for colder and wetter climates.

“The decrease in topographic adaptation around 1 million years ago roughly coincides with large-scale reorganizations in our climate system, known as the Mid-Pleistocene Transition. It also lines up with evolutionary events such as a recently discovered ancestral genetic bottleneck, which drastically reduced human diversity, and the timing of the chromosome 2 merger in hominins. Whether this is all a coincidence, or whether the intensifying glacial climate shifts contributed to the genetic transitions in early humans, remains an open question,” said Axel Timmermann, Director of the IBS Center of Climate Physics and co-author of the study.

How humans have evolved over the past 3 million years and adapted to emerging environmental challenges is a hotly-debated research topic. The results of the South Korean research team provide a new piece in the puzzle of human evolution. Averaged over hundreds of thousands of years, across different species and continents, the data clearly show that our ancestors were “steeplanders.”

“Our results clearly show that over time hominins adapted to steep terrain and that this trend was likely driven by the regionally increased biodiversity. Our analysis suggests that it was beneficial for early human groups to populate mountainous regions, despite the increased energy consumption needed to scale these environments,” said Elke Zeller in summary.

 

[1] The evolving 3-dimensional landscape of human adaptation, Elke Zeller, Axel Timmermann, Science Advances, doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adq3613, (2024)

[2] Human adaptation to diverse biomes over the past 3 million years, Elke Zeller, Axel Timmermann, Kyung-Sook Yun, Pasquale Raia, Karl Stein and Jiaoyang Ruan, Science, vol. 380, 6645, pp. 604-608, doi: 10.1126/science.abq1288 (2023)

Top: Scatter plot showing time and latitude of sites with evidence of human occupation, middle: biome diversity associated with hominin sites, calculated using a moving average of 15 sites. Bottom: area roughness associated with hominin sites, calculated using a moving average of 15 sites. Gray shading shows the approximate timing of the Mid-Pleistocene Transition (MPT).

Credit

Institute for Basic Science

---

Journal

Science Advances

DOI

10.1126/sciadv.adp2809 

Method of Research

Computational simulation/modeling

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

The evolving 3-dimensional landscape of human adaptation

Article Publication Date

9-Oct-2024

 

Ukraine Claims to Have Damaged a Russian Minesweeper in the Baltic Sea

Aleksandr Obukhov (Russian Ministry of Defense)

Published Oct 8, 2024 4:33 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

Ukraine's military intelligence agency, the GUR, claims that it has sabotaged a Russian minesweeper in the Baltic Sea - hundreds of miles from Ukrainian territory. It is the second Russian Navy vessel that the agency claims to have damaged using covert methods this year.

According to the GUR, the Baltic Fleet minesweeper Aleksandr Obukhov was disabled just before it was scheduled to go into service after a yard period. The Baltysk-based vessel suffered "severe damage" due to a tiny hole in a pipe, which allowed water to enter the engine. 

The Obukhov is the first-in-class of the modern Project 12700 Alexandrit-class minesweeper design, one of nine sister ships delivered by a yard in St. Petersburg. The model is intended for prolific production and 40 hulls are planned. These vessels are fiberglass-hulled, reducing their magnetic signature, weight and cost. 

The shipbuilder selected a Soviet-era radial engine for the Alexandrit-class, the 42-cylinder M503. This is a complex powerplant with a high power-to-weight ratio, designed for missile and torpedo boats, and it produces about 2,500 horsepower with seven banks of seven cylinders each. 

"Now the Russian minesweeper is undergoing major repairs, and this may turn out to be a serious problem - a damaged M-503 engine is a rather scarce thing. Repair of a key installation on a ship is technically difficult and expensive," suggested the GUR. 

The agency noted that the Obukhov had just come out of a yard period in St. Petersburg in July. 

The sabotage attack on the Obukhov is the second that Ukraine has claimed on a vessel of the Baltic Fleet this year. In April, the GUR asserted that a Russian defector lit a fire aboard the Buyan-M class corvette Serpukhov in the port of Kaliningrad, destroying its communications and automation systems. The damage to the Serpukhov took the warship out of action for at least six months, the GUR claimed, and the defector was smuggled out of Russia and back to Ukraine.

"This operation came as a shock to the enemy, and the FSB was furious," GUR officer Andriy Yusov told Ukrainian media at the time. 

 

Explosion on Russian Icebreaker Undergoing Repairs Injures Two Workers

Kapitan Kosolapov part of the fleet maintaining navigation in the eastern Baltic around St. Petersburg (Rosmorport)

Published Oct 7, 2024 4:50 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

Russian officials confirmed reports that two workers carrying out repairs at the Kanonersky shipyard were burnt during an explosion. They were working on the icebreaker Kapitan Kosolapov as Russia was preparing for the winter ice breaking season in the eastern Baltic.

The two workers were welders sent to repair a fuel tank leak aboard the icebreaker which was built in 1976. According to the media outlet 78.ru the workers were at the bottom of the fuel tank and had rearranged the fuel lines while making repairs. A spark from the welding equipment caused an explosion on Sunday afternoon, October 6.

Both workers suffered severe burns to their hands and faces. They however were able to make their way out of the tank. They were both taken to a hospital.

The St. Petersburg Investigative Department confirmed the incident and said they were conducting a “pre-investigation check” to determine the facts.

The vessel was one of three built by the Wartsila Shipyard in Finland for Russia in 1976. The vessel originally sailed for the Azov Shipping Company and was later transferred to Rosmorport. Since 2021, it has been part of the North-Western Basin Branch Icebreakers, a fleet of 14 vessels that meet the requirements of work in ice conditions of the Baltic Sea. Kapitan Kosolapov is a diesel-powered icebreaker with an ice-class four hull capable of operating in field ice up to 1 meter thick at speeds of 2 knots. Its navigation is restricted to within 50 miles of the coast but it is part of a critical fleet used to keep the port of St. Petersburg operational in the winter months.

Work was preparing the fleet for the upcoming ice breaking season. It is the second icebreaker damaged during a shipyard incident in 2024. In February, the icebreaker Ermak, built by Wartsila in 1974, was damaged by another welding incident while also undergoing repairs at a St. Petersburg shipyard. Reports were that it took eight hours to bring the fire under control.

ECOCIDE

After Weeks Ablaze, Fire Aboard Tanker Sounion Appears to be Out

Firefighting operations aboard the tanker Sounion, September 2024 (JMIC)

Published Oct 7, 2024 9:01 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

Nearly seven weeks after Houthi terrorists attacked the tanker Sounion in the Red Sea, the fires that raged on the vessel's decks appear to have finally been put out, based on open-source satellite data. 

Sounion was attacked by Yemen's Houthi rebel group three times on August 21, disabling the engine and leaving the ship adrift. After the crew abandoned ship, Houthi fighters returned to plant explosive charges on deck, starting multiple small fires that have burned for weeks. 

Greek salvors began fighting the fire aboard the Sounion on September 23, and had achieved "promising results" by the end of September. Some of the fires were under control within a week of active response efforts, according to UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO). 

In an update, UKMTO reported that as of Sunday, the firefighting effort was near completion and "some fires are extinguished and others under control." 

On Monday, multiple open-source intelligence analysts reported that the Sounion's heat signature was no longer showing up on infrared satellite imagery, indicating that the fires had been extinguished or suppressed to the point that they were no longer detectable by remote sensing. Visual imaging taken by the EU Sentinel-2 satellite also showed an absence of smoke on scene, a change from prior days. 

The success of the firefighting effort is good news for the entire Red Sea region. In the event of an explosion, sinking or spill, the one-million-barrel cargo aboard Sounion would have a pollution potential exceeding that of the Exxon Valdez. A spill of that magnitude would affect a large swathe of the Red Sea, likely including the Houthi-controlled coastline of western Yemen. 

 

LNG-Fueled Fleet to Double as Current Orders Are Delivered Says SEA-LNG

SEA-LNG highlights the growth including CMA CGM's giant containership fleet (CMA CGM)

Published Oct 8, 2024 6:52 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

Industry coalition SEA-LNG is highlighting the strong growth in LNG-fueled vessels in the world fleet as well as the continuing investment in the new sector from leading shipping companies. The trade group which was launched eight years ago continues to promote LNG as a realistic alternative marine fuel pathway while also saying that engineering efforts are making strong progress on the environmental concerns associated with methane.

Citing data from DNV, SEA-LNG highlights that LNG-fueled vessels now account for more than two percent of the global shipping fleet and once the current orderbook is delivered it will double to four percent. Calculated based on deadweight tonnage (DWT) they report the LNG fleet is on track to represent six percent of the global fleet.

The number of LNG-fueled vessels has grown from 21 vessels in operation in 2010, many of them smaller ships operating regionally, to 590 in operation globally today. SEA-LNG notes that this includes the largest containerships which are twice the size of any operating in 2010. With a further 564 vessels on order, the total number of LNG-powered vessels in operation by the end of 2028 will be 1,154. 

One of the strongest growth segments is LNG carriers, where there are 772 in operation and a further 341 were on order as of the end of 2023. Strong global demand for LNG and the planned growth of exports from the United States and Qatar’s massive production expansion are driving the orders of new carriers. Included in this, are orders linked to Qatar for the world’s largest LNG carriers.

Currently, DNV calculates that a third of the global orderbook is for LNG dual-fuel vessels. SEA-LNG says this means that over 2,000 of the world’s 60,000 largest vessels are LNG-powered. Calculated by DWT, the LNG-powered fleet in operation and on order will reach 142.5 million DWT, representing six percent of the world’s total 2,224 million DWT.

Supporting the expansion in LNG dual-fuel vessels, LNG bunkers are currently available in 185 ports, with an additional 50 being added next year, reports SEA-LNG. The bunkering vessel fleet they note has increased from a single vessel in 2010 to 60 in operation today, with a further 13 on order. 

“It is gratifying that LNG is finally gaining favor amongst so many shipowners,” says Peter Keller, Chairman of SEA-LNG. “While we have always said that a basket of fuels will be required for shipping to meet the 2050 emissions reduction targets, the rationale for the LNG pathway remains unchanged. The LNG pathway using liquefied biomethane and eventually hydrogen-based e-methane currently provides the only viable option to making progress towards 2050, starting with immediate carbon reductions, now.”

Critics however point to methane emissions which environmentalists report are far more harmful to the environment than carbon emissions because they take long to dissipate. SEA-LNG however argues that LNG has virtually zero SOx and particulate matter emissions, and provides up to a 95 percent reduction of NOx emissions, and up to a 23 percent reduction in GHG emissions. 

“With continued collaborative engineering efforts across the value chain, methane slip will be eliminated for all engine technologies within the decade,” asserts SEA-LNG. “Today, 2-stroke diesel cycle engines account for approximately 75 percent of the LNG-fueled vessel orderbook. These engines have effectively eliminated slip already. For low-pressure engine technologies where methane slip remains a challenge, manufacturers have already cut the levels of slip from low-pressure 4-stroke engines by more than 85 percent over the past 25 years.”

SEA-LNG points out that the current infrastructure will also support the transition to liquefied biomethane (bio-LNG) as it scales, and eventually, e-methane (renewable synthetic or e-LNG), providing ship owners and operators with the confidence that vessels ordered today are future-proofed for 2050 and beyond. They believe the development of these future fuels produced from the anaerobic digestion of waste materials, such as manure, provides a long-term pathway and a solution toward capturing additional methane that would otherwise be released into the atmosphere.

According to SEA-LNG, the recognition of the LNG pathway and the growth in the asset base is positioning LNG to play a significant, long-term role in maritime decarbonization. 

 

Activists Hound Cargo Ship Alleged to be Carrying Explosives for Israel

Cargo ship has been hounded by activists with allegations that it is transporting explosives bound for Israel

Published Oct 8, 2024 4:37 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

Human rights groups are continuing to hound a small cargo ship for allegedly carrying explosives for Israel as it has made its way from Southeast Asia via Africa to the Mediterranean. The groups have been successful in getting the vessel denied docking privileges in Namibia, the Balkans, and now Malta, leaving the crew in search of a port.

Last week the well-known group Amnesty International issued a plea for the vessel to be turned away from a planned port call in Montenegro which caused the vessel to head toward Slovenia and Croatia before turning around and heading west in the Mediterranean.

The Kathrin (7,950 dwt) is a tween deck heavy lift registered in Portugal and managed from Germany. She can also be used to transport approximately 400 TEU. 

The ship loaded its cargo in Vietnam’s Hai Phong port and departed in late July. Activists began targeting the vessel in August on the allegations that the ship’s cargo includes eight containers of RDX Hexogen explosives. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories Francesca Albanese reiterated the allegations and alleged that the material would be used for the attacks on Gaza. No one however has ever provided details on how the cargo would reach Israel.

The authorities in Malta are the latest to deny the ship port privileges. According to a report in The Times of Malta, the Kathrin had applied for permission to conduct a crew change and refuel in Malta. A government spokesman confirmed to the newspaper the details of the ban after the activist group Moviment Graffitti said that allowing the Kathrin into Malta would “make the government complicit in the ongoing genocide in Palestine.”

Amnesty International cited international humanitarian law which it says “prohibits all states from transferring weapons to a party to an armed conflict where there is a clear risk that doing so would contribute to the commission of war crimes or other serious IHL violations.” The group called for a weapons ban on Israel and Hamas while saying it had no information on how the material aboard the Kathrin might reach Israel.

Last week the vessel had been reported heading for Bar in Montenegro and then Koper in Slovenia. Some reports also suggested that the vessel was possibly heading for Ploce in Croatia. It left the Adriatic over the weekend with its AIS signal changed to “by order.”

The vessel arrived at the anchorage of Malta yesterday, October 7, and remains there. It is unclear what the ship’s destination will be as it finds itself hounded at every step. In addition, activists have made an appeal to Portugal as the flag state to become involved and they are calling for Portugal to revoke the vessel’s registry.

The Kathrin is one of several vessels that has been targeted by activists for possible involvement in transporting materials that might be destined for Israel.  

 

Montreal Dockworkers to Refuse Overtime in New Indefinite Strike

Montreal dockworkers will begin refusing overtime in their contract dispute (Port of Montreal)

Published Oct 8, 2024 5:48 PM by The Maritime Executive

 

 

The ongoing dockworkers' contract dispute in Montreal will be moving into a new phase as their union announced plans to begin refusing overtime assignments in a new effort to pressure contract negotiations. It comes a week after the union disrupted port activity by staging a three-day strike against two of the larger container terminals in the Port of Montreal.

The union representing Port of Montreal longshore workers (CUPE Local 375) has now filed a notice that it will refuse to work overtime starting at 7 am on Thursday, October 10, for an unlimited period. Under Canadian labor law, the union must file a 72-hour advance notice of any planned action.

The longshore workers at the Port of Montreal have been without a collective agreement since December 31, 2023. They contend that talks being overseen by government mediators for more than a year have now bogged down on how the employer manages scheduling, among other things. This led to a strike authorization vote in late September and the initial partial three-day strike that took place last week. The strike authorization runs for 60 days and permits a range of different actions.

“We are still bargaining with the help of two mediators from the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service assigned to the case,” said CUPE union representative Michel Murray. “We’re willing to get down to intensive negotiations, but since the employer is dragging their feet, we’re turning up the pressure so that they put forth the energy needed to find a solution.” 

The Maritime Employers Association (MEA) responded by saying that the overtime ban would have a “significant impact on deployed crews and the tasks required for operations.” They warned that incomplete shifts would cause imminent slowdowns or even halt operations at the port, and as a result, the MEA said it has “decided that employees assigned to shifts with incomplete crews will not be paid.”

The Montreal Port Authority has already warned that the escalation of the labor dispute comes at a critical time in the harvest season when export and import cargo must transit through the Port of Montreal.

“It is vital that the parties reach an agreement as soon as possible, given that $6 billion worth of goods are expected to pass through the Port of Montreal over the next few weeks," said Julie Gascon, President and CEO of the Montreal Port Authority (MPA). “The climate of uncertainty that accompanies the lack of progress between the two parties means that we have to anticipate long-term impacts. Supply chain reliability is at the heart of Port users' business decisions, and that's why I'm calling on both parties to return to the table and reassure the thousands of companies that rely on our services to export and import goods crucial to their operations.”

Port officials said that last week’s action which closed the Viau and Maisonneuve terminals operated by Termont impacted 40 percent of the total container handling capacity in Montreal. Halfway through the three-day action, on Tuesday, they said that five vessels were forced to standby and that more than 11,500 TEU were being delayed. They predicted that the action would result in a 10 percent drop in total cargo volumes handled at the Port of Montreal, which is the second-busiest port in Canada.

Major carriers responded to the ongoing disruptions by announcing that they would begin imposing surcharges on all import containers bound for the Canadian East Coast. 

The federal mediators told CBC that they continue to be in touch with both sides and are helping them with the negotiations. The union however charged that the employers refused to meet last week, while the employers’ association contended that no meeting had been scheduled.