ECOCIDE

BLM Moves to Fast-Track Oil Permits in Alaska Petroleum Reserve

By Julianne Geiger - Sep 04, 2026

The Bureau of Land Management wants to cut the permitting time for some oil and gas projects in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve to as little as 60 days, according to a Friday press release.

The proposed rule would replace separate case-by-case reviews for qualifying production sites with a standardized process covering common, repeatable activities that BLM says have already been studied extensively. Rights-of-way and some drilling permit applications meeting predetermined criteria could receive decisions within 60 days.

The National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska covers roughly 23 million acres on Alaska’s North Slope. About 3.5 million acres are currently under lease.

There are considerably more leases to develop after this year.

BLM’s March NPR-A auction drew bids on 187 tracts and generated more than $163 million, the highest revenue ever collected in a lease sale for the reserve. The auction also produced the largest number of tracts receiving bids and the second-largest acreage total sold in a single NPR-A sale. ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, and a Repsol-Shell consortium were among the successful bidders.

Getting acreage leased and getting oil out of it are two very different timelines in Alaska.

Operators still need drilling permits, rights-of-way and approvals for roads, pipelines, pads and other permanent infrastructure. BLM says more than two decades of permitting work in the reserve gives it enough environmental data to standardize reviews for projects similar to infrastructure already approved there.

The proposal followed a petition from the Alaska Oil and Gas Association requesting a uniform approval process and a 60-day timeline for qualifying projects. BLM is preparing an environmental impact statement alongside the new rule.

The agency has already rescinded a 2024 rule that restricted development in the reserve and reopened nearly 82% of the NPR-A to oil and gas leasing.

The administration has also expanded leasing elsewhere in Alaska, including this year’s first auction of drilling rights in the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

The NPR-A proposal now enters a 60-day public comment period ending November 9. For companies holding acreage from the record March auction, the more immediate number is 60 days, which is the proposed clock for turning at least some permit applications into decisions.

By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

Superhot Geothermal Just Got A $180 Million Vote Of Confidence

By Haley Zaremba - Sep 02, 2026

• Quaise Energy closed a $180 million Series B, with $35 million coming from drilling giant Nabors Industries.
• 
  
• The Houston startup's millimeter wave drilling technology aims to reach superhot rock anywhere on Earth, freeing geothermal from geologically lucky spots like Iceland.
• 
  
• Rhodium Group projects geothermal could meet up to 64% of data center demand growth by the early 2030s, positioning it as a real answer to AI's power crunch.
• 
  

As the artificial intelligence boom drives major energy demand growth and catalyzes an all-of-the-above approach to energy development, enhanced geothermal energy is catching a windfall of investment dollars and renewed policy interest. A new wave of next-gen geothermal energy projects and startups may have the backing it takes to bring the cutting-edge, round-the-clock clean energy technology out of the lab and into commercial markets across the United States.

Geothermal energy is not a new technology, but its applications are severely limited in its traditional form. The process uses the thermal energy from the Earth’s core where it naturally escapes to the surface – such as in geysers – where it then converts that heat into electricity. The problem is that such vents are geological anomalies, making geothermal energy viable and scalable in places like Iceland and almost nowhere else on the planet.

But creative approaches to tapping into that natural thermal energy could soon bring geothermal energy to a grid near you. Enhanced geothermal methods borrow drilling technologies from the oil and gas sector – and even from nuclear fusion in some cases – to dig deeper into the Earth to access the core’s heat from nearly anywhere on the surface. These technologies are hugely promising for the clean energy transition and for commercial application as they are totally emissions-free, but are not intermittent like solar and wind. And, critically, they continue to enjoy broad bipartisan support, including strong policy backing by the current administration.

Some companies are looking to take this approach one step further, drilling down even deeper to reach hotter temperatures for more powerful energy generation. And one of the leading startups looking to develop this ‘superhot’ geothermal at a utility scale just got a huge step closer to bringing that plan into reality. Houston-based geothermal startup Quaise Energy just announced the final close of its Series B funding this week, raising a total of $180 million in equity financing. A significant chunk of that money – $35 million – comes from drilling heavyweight Nabors Industries.

“We are unlocking the most powerful clean energy source on Earth, and the Series B signals deep conviction across a wide range of investors,” Carlos Araque, CEO and President of Quaise Energy, was recently quoted in Business Wire. “Quaise’s millimeter wave technology changes the equation entirely by reaching superhot rock at temperatures and depths that are inaccessible with conventional drilling, transforming geothermal from a location-dependent resource into a global energy solution,” added Nabors President and CEO Anthony G. Petrello.

The timing for gigawatt-scale geothermal power could not be better, as reliable and indigenous forms of clean energy become more important than ever against the backdrop of the artificial intelligence boom. Data center hyperscalers are driving up energy demand projections at a jaw-dropping rate and changing the global energy landscape at a nearly incomprehensible rate. Geothermal could be an indispensable part of the solution to this ballooning energy problem. New York-based research firm and think tank Rhodium Group geothermal says that geothermal could meet up to 64 percent of the expected growth in data center energy demand as soon as the early 2030s.

Geothermal could also transform the energy landscape in quieter, but no less important ways, such as by changing the way that we heat and cool our buildings. As extreme weather conditions grow more common and more intense, energy-efficient heating and cooling is a surprisingly critical part of the energy security puzzle.

What is more, the nascent nature of geothermal technology offers some critical advantages. As Latitude Media reported back in April, “geothermal has the chance to get it right the first time” – particularly when it comes to managing public backlash and policy snags such as those that have created major bottlenecks for nuclear, solar and wind energies.

In short, the time is right for a geothermal energy breakthrough. Whether or not superhot holds the answer, the sector’s progress is a huge step in the right direction at an absolutely critical juncture for national and global energy security.

By Haley Zaremba for Oilprice.com

On the Heuristics of Fear: The Ecological Catastrophe Scenario

If the right decisions are not made in the coming years and drastic systemic changes are not implemented, the destruction of planetary habitats can no longer be stopped.


Volunteers and firefighters work to extinguish a forest fire burning in the mountains of the rural area of Epuyen, in the Patagonian region of Chubut province, Argentina, on February 1, 2026.
(Photo by Gonzalo Keogan / AFP via Getty Images)

Klaus Moegling
Sep 02, 2026

Common Dreams


The escalation of the current crisis-ridden conditions in the areas of climate change, the economy, international security, and the development of democracy—leading to dystopian future scenarios—need not occur in this form. However, there is a real possibility that they could occur if humanity fails to bring about a paradigm shift, makes the wrong decisions, and continues its destructive behavior toward the planet.
Learning from the ‘Anticipated Danger’

The construction of negative scenarios in the sense of an anticipated possibility of dystopian development can certainly serve a constructive purpose.

In his book The Imperative of Responsibility, the philosopher Hans Jonas developed what he called a “heuristics of fear,” by which he meant that potential undesirable developments should be recognized in all their severity and menace and described in drastic terms commensurate with their presumed magnitude. According to Jonas (1979/2015, 7), this enables a society to look the potential risks squarely in the eye and thereby resolve to acknowledge its own responsibility for the planet and the fate of future generations:
What can serve as a compass? The anticipated danger itself! In its flash of lightning from the future, in the foreshadowing of its planetary scope and its human depth, the ethical principles from which the new duties of new power can be derived first become apparent.

Of course, this negative vision must be compatible with the developments already analyzed; it must not, therefore, be plucked out of thin air, even if not all the information needed for an assessment is yet available. Heuristics is a creative thought process based on estimates, assumptions, and calculations.

Immersing oneself in a likely future situation and sensing the potential of a future catastrophe can provide insights for preventive action. It is possible that the fear of a catastrophic planetary scenario could lead to a systemic shift in course and to responsible decisions.

The Inadequacy of the Paris Climate Agreements

From the spectrum of multiple crises—which are certainly interconnected—this article will focus on the disrupted relationship between humanity and nature and heuristically develop it into a negative scenario.

David Spratt and Ian Dunlop (2019, 6) predict that even if the 2015 Paris Climate Agreements were fully implemented, stable climate conditions would still not be expected. In particular, climatic feedback effects would render the Earth largely uninhabitable for human civilization by the end of the century. Even if the Paris climate targets were met, a warming of 5°C would be expected by the year 2100, with devastating consequences for life on Earth.

It must also be taken into account that not all countries have accepted the Paris Agreements or, in some cases—such as the U.S. under Trump—have since withdrawn from them.

Fires, Storms, Overheating, and Floods

A worst-case scenario for such an increasingly hot biosphere must anticipate a rise in wildfires. Vast areas of the Earth will begin to burn. Fire walls driven by massive gusts of wind will devour everything in their path: trees and bushes, houses, animals, and people. Such firestorms are beyond human control and cannot be fought; they depend on heavy rainfall, and it is unclear whether such rain will fall in the burning regions at all due to climate shifts. The result will be the desolation of entire regions, leading to humanitarian, ecological, and financial problems on a global scale. The fires of 2025 and 2026 are already offering a glimpse of what lies ahead for humanity.

Future average temperatures in the Persian Gulf are projected to reach 50-60°C, meaning that for the average person, human life here will no longer be possible—or will only be possible in artificially cooled spaces. Even in the countries of the Global North, mass mortality is beginning due to overheated living environments. Initially, this will affect older people and those who are already ill, and will then spread to people who would otherwise be considered healthy. Circulatory shock, overheating, and dehydration will then also affect younger people.

It is undisputed that sea levels will rise due to the melting of the poles, the warming of seawater, and the accompanying melting of Arctic ice.

However, a potential average rise of 2.5 meters by 2100 does not represent the extreme level of sea-level rise. During storm surges in particular, the rise in sea level can be several times this value and lead to flooding deep into continental areas. This will also affect the Global North.

Islands, coastal regions, and low-lying inland areas will be flooded, destroying living conditions there and, in turn, triggering migration. Not only will island groups disappear, but large parts of countries such as Bangladesh and India will also be flooded, triggering mass exoduses. In this context, the rise in sea level, combined with the monsoon rains in this region—which are already becoming increasingly devastating—will have a particularly dangerous effect.

The thawing of Arctic and Siberian permafrost, through the associated release of carbon dioxide and methane, will lead to a massive increase in global warming and abruptly intensify all related processes.

In other parts of the world, climate shifts are causing air masses with extremely different temperatures to collide, resulting in devastating storms such as tornadoes and hurricanes. Houses, cars, animals, and people are swept up into the air and smashed to pieces. Skyscrapers collapse, and the infrastructure—including electricity, water, and gas lines, as well as the internet—is irreparably destroyed. Radioactivity is released from destroyed nuclear power plants; it circulates in the Earth’s atmosphere, falls as rain, and will lead to increased rates of cancer and birth defects in humans and animals.

Catastrophic Impact on Social and Political Development on a Global Scale

Massive migration—in the form of mass exoduses or mass migrations—will be triggered by climate change. Migration to date should be viewed, at best, as the tip of the iceberg in this context, as billions of people will set out as refugees if global warming continues unchecked. It is not difficult to imagine the conflicts—including military confrontations—that will arise from these upheavals in the struggle for ecologically intact regions.

Global warming will lead to massive crop failures and associated famines. The global agricultural food system will collapse. The struggle for food and survival will lead to massive price increases, looting, and military conflicts. The call for a heavy hand, for authoritarian leaders, and for police-state methods will grow louder even in democracies.

Far-right governments will attempt, in the interests of their constituencies, to deny climate change and continue to rely on the exploitation of fossil fuels.

The struggle for drinking water will intensify, on the one hand due to increasing periods of drought and, on the other, due to the growing trend toward profit-driven privatization of water sources. Privatized water sources will be guarded by militarized security forces against raids by groups of thirsty people. In drought-stricken areas, people will die of thirst—especially those who no longer have the financial means to purchase water, a scarce and therefore increasingly expensive commodity.

Spratt and Dunlop (2019, 9) describe the societal consequences of climate change even at the 3°C level. States and societies will be overwhelmed and will face extreme collective stress:
The flooding of coastal communities around the world—particularly in the Netherlands, the United States, South Asia, and China—has the potential to call regional and even national identities into question. Armed conflicts between nations over resources such as the Nile and its tributaries are likely, and a nuclear war is possible. The societal consequences range from heightened religious zeal to utter chaos. In this scenario, climate change triggers a lasting change in humanity’s relationship with nature.

Furthermore, if a UN in need of strengthening fails to dissuade unscrupulous governments from the generationally selfish destruction of the rainforest for the purposes of livestock ranching, soybean cultivation, the search for mineral resources, or land speculation, then this, too, will not only destroy the Earth’s lungs but also bring about a drastic climate shift.

Wars raging globally and emissions from explosions and fires exacerbate climate change while simultaneously preventing the affected regions from taking effective measures against this climatic dystopia. The military in active service is becoming the largest institutional global destroyer of the climate.

These are just a few of the developments addressed so far. Threats such as temperature changes and the resulting diversion of the Gulf Stream, the narrowing of the temperature difference between the North Pole and the equator—which leads to a weakening of the jet stream—the release of methane trapped in the seabed, insect die-offs due to the increased use of pesticides in agriculture, the destruction of clean drinking water due to overfertilization of fields, as well as plastic pollution in the oceans and the demise of all life in increasingly larger marine regions are likely to represent additional ecological tipping points that will further exacerbate the massive problems already mentioned.

When Will the “Point of No Return” Be Reached?

The question is when the global situation will reach a point from which there will be no return to ecological balance for many generations to come.

The progression of overpopulation, coupled with unchecked economic growth and rampant consumerism, leads to increased ecological exploitation of the Earth system under the conditions of an increasingly overcrowded planet.

However, it is to be expected that population pressure is not primarily responsible for environmental destruction, but rather, in particular, the irresponsible consumption of resources by the wealthier segment of the world’s population (Roettig 2021).

The “point of no return” is likely to be crossed soon. Once the biosphere’s planetary responses develop an uncontrollable momentum of their own that turns against human civilization and the conditions necessary for all life on Earth, it will be too late—both for prevention and for mitigation.

Over the past 20 years, the planet’s resilience has reached its breaking point; in some areas, it has demonstrably been exceeded.

The Doomsday Clock makes this clear. According to the Doomsday Clock—founded and calculated in 1947 by Albert Einstein, among others—we are already 85 seconds away from the destruction of the planet’s foundations as of February 2026. In 1991, we were still 17 minutes away from destruction.

Eco-Imperialist and Systemic Causes

Violent competition over the use of resources is intensifying as more people’s basic needs—and, in particular, their luxury needs—must be met. Not only the struggle for clean drinking water and food, but also the struggle for lithium, cobalt, uranium, etc., is leading to violent conflicts between different groups of people and regions. German political scientist Hans-Jürgen Burchardt criticizes the fact that the rich industrialized nations are the main contributors to climate change, yet the Global South bears the brunt of its consequences.
Thus, following the phase-out of nuclear power, Germany’s energy transition is also made possible by cheap coal imports from Colombia. There, mining takes place in highly environmentally damaging open-pit mines; entire communities are forcibly displaced for this purpose, and human rights violations are commonplace. Even the much-lauded green economy, which relies on electric mobility, would not be possible without the lithium reserves in the Andes. Locally, however, lithium mining robs residents of their livelihoods.

The war in Ukraine, too, must be viewed not only from a geostrategic perspective but also through an eco-imperialist lens, in which Russia and the US are attempting to divide up Ukraine’s natural resource deposits among themselves.

Conclusion: The Need for a Positive Vision of Social Development

The outline presented here of a dystopia of planetary development—based on a negative ecological scenario—should have made it very clear: If the right decisions are not made in the coming years and drastic systemic changes are not implemented, the destruction of planetary habitats can no longer be stopped. If, in addition to a biosphere in decline, further stressors arise—such as potentially runaway generative AI, authoritarian and aggressively acting nation-states at war with one another, and the threat of a nuclear inferno—this will likely spell the end of humanity. No more and no less.

The ecological dystopia outlined here does not have to come to pass. Everything depends on how responsibly and competently the current generation—which is currently active in the global centers of power—will act, and on the corrective influence that civil society resistance can exert in this regard.


Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.


Klaus Moegling
Prof. Dr. Klaus Moegling is a political scientist, sociologist, and author of the book "Realignment. A peaceful and sustainably developed world is (still) possible." Which you can read here: https://www.klaus-moegling.de/international-edition/

 

How Would Transferring Law Enforcement Over Israeli Settlers To Police Deepen De Facto Annexation Of The West Bank? – Analysis

By Arab News

By Sherouk Zakaria

Key Takeaways:

• Defense Minister Katz on Aug. 17 ordered an IDF plan (two-week clock) to give Israeli police “civilian enforcement” over West Bank settlers while the army keeps authority over Palestinians—analysts call it another shift from temporary occupation command to permanent civilian institutions.
• Context cited: Smotrich’s 2023 Settlement Administration, Hillel Roth’s 2024 Civil Administration powers, Feb. 2026 land-purchase easing into Areas A/B; Yesh Din 2005–25 data that ~94% of settler-violence files close without indictment; OCHA 1,380+ settler incidents in 2026; Katz already ended Israeli administrative detention.
• Palestinian analysts (Mustafa, AbuMousa) and HRW/UN COI say uniforms matter less than impunity and Oslo’s Area C being absorbed; Israel rejects systematic enablement and blames a fringe—Qusra’s siege is the on-the-ground test.

Israel’s proposed transfer of law enforcement powers over settlers in the occupied West Bank from the military to the police would further embed Israeli civilian institutions in the territory, in a move analysts said marks another step toward de facto annexation.

Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Aug. 17 that he had instructed the Israeli Defense Forces to prepare a plan to hand over responsibility for “civilian enforcement” concerning Israeli settlers in the West Bank to the police. Under the proposal, to be drawn up within two weeks, the military would retain authority over Palestinians across the territory.

While analysts said the transfer would do little to curb settler violence against Palestinians, they noted its significance lies in shifting another function of West Bank governance from the military — whose authority as an occupying power is legally temporary — to Israel’s permanent civilian institutions.

Tahani Mustafa, political analyst and visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said the move was part of steady measures taken by Israel to entrench a new reality on the ground through institutional, legal, and structural means.

“This is basically a combination of all three mechanisms that Israel has been pursuing since Oct.7 war on Gaza,” Mustafa told Arab News.

Under international occupation law, the military commander acts as a temporary administrator of the occupied territory. Transferring this authority to permanent civilian institutions erodes that distinction, Mustafa said.

“By putting it into the hands of civil powers, you’re in effect making that now part of the territory of Israel,” she added.

Katz’s announcement came amid a surge in settler violence and an ongoing siege by violent settlers of Palestinian residents in the village of Qusra, southeast of Nablus, despite the deployment of Israeli forces.

The proposed transfer would build on a series of measures taken by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to reshape the administrative structure of the West Bank by shifting powers over planning, land and enforcement into Israel’s domestic governing institutions, alongside a rapid expansion of settlements since the October 7, 2023 war in Gaza.

In February 2023, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich was given authority over key West Bank civilian affairs within the Defense Ministry, including settlement planning and land policy, through a newly created Settlement Administration.

The process deepened in May 2024, when powers previously held by the military-run Civil Administration over matters including planning, construction, land transactions, registration and government property were delegated to a civilian deputy, Hillel Roth.

In February, Israel’s security cabinet eased restrictions on Israeli land purchases and expanded Civil Administration enforcement into Areas A and B, both under Palestinian civil authority.

For Palestinians, the Israeli police takeover in the West Bank would do little to protect them from the soaring settler violence.

Jaser AbuMousa, a Palestinian political analyst and senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, said suspected Israeli offenders are already investigated by police and prosecuted in civilian courts rather than the military courts used for Palestinians.

“The Israeli police already have jurisdiction over Israeli citizens in the West Bank. Settlers have never been tried in military courts; they are investigated by police and prosecuted in Israeli civilian courts,” AbuMousa told Arab News.

The IDF hands Israeli suspects detained in the West Bank over to the police for interrogation or arrest, who often release the suspects without charge.

Israeli rights organization Yesh Din, which has tracked offenses from 2005 to 2025, found that 93.6 percent of investigations into settler violence against Palestinians closed without an indictment, and only about 3 percent ended in full or partial conviction.

Offenses committed by Israelis against Palestinians showed that the police failed in investigating 82 percent of these cases.

The Palestinian Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission warned that Israel’s proposal to transfer enforcement to the police could weaken the field response to settler attacks, especially if Israeli soldiers withdraw from the initial intervention duties without an immediate and effective police response.

Although the proposal has not yet come into force, the commission said the directive’s political impact began before implementation. “It sends a message about the priority given to protecting outposts,” the commission said.

Katz’s proposal comes after he ended the use of administrative detention against Israeli civilians in November 2024, scrapping a measure that allowed the military to detain suspects without charge or trial and remove them from the West Bank.

The decision widened an already stark disparity in how Israelis and Palestinians are subjected to detention in the West Bank. At the time Katz announced the policy, seven Israelis were being held in administrative detention, compared to none today.

In comparison, Israel was holding 3,198 Palestinians in administrative detention without charge or trial by August 2026, according to Israel Prison Service figures provided to Israeli rights group HaMoked.

Rights groups and Palestinians say the government’s policies have further emboldened settlers.

The existing legal system has produced a decades-long accountability gap, with human rights organizations and international bodies accusing Israeli authorities of actively facilitating and enabling settler violence and fostering a climate of impunity.

According to Yesh Din, in roughly half of the nearly 30 incidents of organized mass settler violence documented between 2023 and late 2025, soldiers or police were present, sometimes assisting the attacks directly or indirectly.

“This is because settler violence serves Israel’s objectives to expand its control over the occupied territory by terrorizing and exercising violence against Palestinians while maintaining a semblance of the rule of law,” Yesh Din wrote in its January report.

A UN Commission of Inquiry in June said settler violence functioned as a means of implementing Israeli state policy, with authorities and violent settlers working toward shared objectives including settlement expansion, annexation and the displacement of Palestinians from their land.

On Aug. 20, Human Rights Watch said settlers received “financial, material, and legal backing” from the Israeli state and that armed attacks frequently took place under the protection of Israeli forces.

Israel has repeatedly rejected accusations that it systematically enables settler violence, dismissing concerns as overblown and attributing the attacks to fringe groups of a few hundred youths.

For AbuMousa, therefore, the real question is the extent to which the move would further normalize an existing system.

“Katz is not introducing policing where there was none. He is proposing to move a responsibility that has been exercised badly from one Israeli body to another,” AbuMousa told Arab News.

“For a farmer in Qusra, the uniform in front of him matters less than the fact that nobody is stopping what is happening,” he added.

Experts also pointed to another blurring on the ground. The distinction between settlers and Israeli security forces has become difficult to draw on the ground.

A growing number of settlers became officers after attending hardline ideological pre-military academies.

Following the Oct. 7, 2023 war, thousands of settler reservists were mobilized into local defense units responsible for protecting settlements in the West Bank as most soldiers were sent to fight in Gaza and Lebanon.

According to Yesh Din, around 7,000 settlers were armed and mobilized into these units during the first months of the war.

While many are no longer on active reserve duty, the military has allowed them to keep their firearms and uniforms, according to Yesh Din, enabling soaring violence by settlers posing as soldiers.

Netanyahu’s government inaction was also widely seen as part of efforts to win over blocs of ultranationalist voters ahead of the election campaign in October.

Violence in the West Bank reached record levels this year as extremist settlers routinely enter Palestinian towns, clashing with villagers, burning homes, mosques and cars, and stealing livestock.

By late July, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs had documented more than 1,380 settler-related incidents in 2026 across more than 250 Palestinian communities — an average of about 6.6 incidents a day.

More than 2,300 had been displaced by settler attacks and related access restrictions this year, while 87 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli settlers and soldiers in the West Bank, according to the Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry.

The growing settler violence and rapid settlement expansion drew regional and international condemnation.

Today, more than 500,000 Israelis live in settlements in the West Bank, which are illegal under international law, among 3 million Palestinians in the territory.

The longer-term significance of Katz’s proposal also lies in what it means for the framework established by the 1995 Oslo II agreement that divided the West Bank into Areas A, B and C.

Area A placed civil and internal security affairs under the Palestinian Authority; Area B placed civil affairs and Palestinian public order under the PA while Israel retained overriding security powers; and Area C remained under full Israeli civil and security control.

AbuMousa said that under Oslo, Israeli police are not meant to operate in Areas A and B without coordination, but the February 2026 cabinet decisions already pushed Civil Administration enforcement into both. “A permanent Israeli civilian police presence would go further,” he told Arab News.

The deeper problem was that Area C, which Oslo envisaged as temporary and negotiable, is being absorbed into permanent Israeli institutions.

“Thirty-one years on, Israel is registering land title there, opening it to direct purchase and now discussing permanent civilian policing,” he told Arab News.

“The PA continues administering people in Areas A and B while Israel consolidates control over the territory around them.

“That is not a step toward sovereignty. It is municipal administration inside somebody else’s planning regime.”

 

'They wrote little letters': How kids in Portugal are making money off their neighbours' plastic waste

Copyright Nelson Mota (Guarda à Casa)

By Lina Ferreira

Published on 31/08/2026 - EURONEWS

The first ever bottle deposit return scheme in southern Europe is helping the environment - and funding kids' bucket list trips.

Sisters Ariela and Alice had already been using Portugal's bottle return scheme to earn money but since June they have upped the ante: now, instead of just returning their own bottles, they are asking their neighbours' for their empty plastic bottles and making money off those too.

Since April this year, when the Volta scheme launched, plastic bottles in Portugal have a €0.10 deposit included in the cost. If you return the empty bottle to a supermarket with a Volta machine, you're given a receipt which can be exchanged for discounts or cash.

Ariela and Alice have big plans for their cash: Alice, who is ten, wants to do a three-week exchange in South Korea. Her sister Ariela, 13, wants to do the same in the United States

"They wrote little letters and I printed them with their project and the time when they were going to collect the bag," explains their mother, Karina Lauro, who moved to Portugal from Rio de Janeiro in 2024. "They leave the bag at people's doors and every day, at nine o'clock in the evening, they go back to pick up that bag with the bottles."

The empty bottles are then exchanged for money. With a clear goal: by June next year they aim to collect 120,000 bottles so they can make €6,000 each.

It was the girls who came up with the idea of using Volta to raise funds and to involve the neighbours, after their mother warned them that just using the bottles from home would not make them much money. "It was very little, wasn't it? Because it was just the bottles from our house," says Karina Lauro. "Basically, if it were only us, there would be no way."

Some people go through rubbish bins to find bottles to return

Under the Volta scheme, plastic bottles of up to three litres now carry a deposit charge of ten cents. This money can then be reclaimed if the bottles are returned. The bottles are returned via machines in supermarkets, which issue a receipt that can be converted into discounts or cash. Kiosks are also starting to appear in other busy locations or to process large quantities of bottles.

This system, run by SDR Portugal, is the country's way of responding to the Single-Use Plastics Directive (DSUP), which requires 90 per cent of deposit bottles to be collected by 2029. The directive allows European Union countries to set up deposit systems in order to reach this target.

In Portugal, the system was rolled out in April. As consumers were getting used to it, reports began to appear of bins being rummaged through, leaving rubbish scattered on the ground. In Lisbon, several residents and parish councils complained about the rubbish pile-ups. At the end of July, the PSP arrested a man for rummaging through bins, whom it described as a "rubbish miner".

This scenario was not entirely new. In an interview with Euronews last year, the president of the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA), José Pimenta Machado, spoke about possible associated environmental risks. The report also noted that in Germany, which has had a deposit return system since 2003, it is common for homeless people to rummage through rubbish in search of bottles.

But not everyone who looks for bottles is homeless. Some are doing it as a way of earning a bit of extra money and, for some young people, it has become a real summer challenge.

That is the case for two young men who work at a beach concession in Loulé. In an interview with Rádio Renascença, they insist that they do not go "digging around in the rubbish", but simply put into Volta the bottles they already have to pick up at work.

Karina Lauro is aware of the phenomenon of people searching through bins for bottles, including "people who are indeed saving them to have an income". But in this case her daughters do not go through rubbish either.

"No, they're always given to us. We don't pick anything out of the rubbish," the mother explains. "Besides, we don't go out on the streets looking for them; we go straight to people's homes."

This is also an environmental project, supporting recycling, already with another of Alice's dreams in mind: studying at Harvard.

"The aim behind this is for them really to reach that recycling figure, so that it also counts as an environmental project for Alice," the mother explains, recalling the entry criteria for North American universities.

Related

• Shark in the water: This robot can collect 21,000 plastic bottles in a day

Plastic bottles are funding food for rescued cats

António Casa Branca is the owner of Gatil Original, a sanctuary in Vendas Novas that takes in older, sick and vulnerable cats. Around a month and a half ago he had an idea: to set up partnerships with local businesses.

Partner businesses hand over their empty bottles to the cattery, which takes them back and keeps the money. The funds are then used to buy food for the animals.

"In Vendas Novas there are lots of 'bifana' [a classic Portuguese sandwich] shops and we try to set up a partnership whereby every week we go and collect the bags they set aside from that recyclable rubbish, those plastic bottles and cans," he explains. "We then go to the machine, exchange them for vouchers and go to the supermarket to swap them for pâté."

On the first attempt, donations from one bifana restaurant filled a van.

"One of the bifana owners filled my van with bags of litre-and-a-half bottles and tiny ones. I filled the van and it came to around €50," António says.

The cattery already has five partnerships, which also involve a pastry shop, and there is even an accountancy office keen to help by donating the bottles used by its staff. António Casa Branca's plan is to go around the partner businesses every day after work. "For me it's gold. I don't mind going out to ask, to beg," he says.

"If we can get €50 a week from each restaurant, from three or four restaurants, that is already enough to cover the animals' food."

It's working: António Casa Branca manages to buy all the food for the roughly 40 cats he has at the cattery. Other costs, such as the vet's bill and medicines, are still unaccounted for.

Volta machines give the option to send the money to charity. Volta's website gives the examples of the Portuguese Firefighters' League, Caritas, the League for the Protection of the Environment and the Portuguese League for Animal Rights. The organisations available depend on the machine.

But some organisations are going further in this fundraising drive. They are asking donors to bring them refund vouchers or even the bottles themselves, taking on the task of depositing them at collection points.

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"We can't let this fall apart"

For the past two weeks there has been a bin at Ota Parish Council's office for residents to leave their empty plastic bottles. In the centre of the parish a 1,000-litre container has also been left for bottles to be deposited - it filled up with bottles in just a few days.

"As we have a lot of people using it, we're thinking of putting out two more containers, one at each end of the parish," explains Nelson Mota.

Nelson grew up in Ota and remains closely connected to the area. He is part of Guarda à Casa, a civic movement that wants to restore the building where the forest rangers of the Serra da Ota used to live.

"We decided that we can do something; we can't let this fall apart," he says. "If the competent authorities can't reach us, because this year, with the deluges we've had, it's normal that the councils can't support certain projects."

Then the idea emerged of using the Volta system to raise money.

"Volta is an easy way to raise some money. It's not substantial amounts, but the kind of sums you need to start organising some events."

As well as the containers, the group also has the support of the Recreational and Sports Association, which is donating the bottles from its bar. Members of the civic group are also collecting bottles from friends and at work and then, themselves, reclaim the money at a Volta machine.

"I myself made a deposit yesterday; it came to €11.60. In other words, it was 116 bottles," explains Nelson Mota. "I handed in 116 bottles, which didn't take up space in the car, and it gave me €10 with no difficulty. I think it's worth it, isn't it?" he tells Euronews.

The success of the initiative does not surprise Nelson Mota: "Of course we're getting a good reception. People in Ota, whenever there are initiatives of this kind, always try to help. That's just how people are there."

"I never imagined it would get this big"

Ariela and Alice's project is being given a big boost by social media. Their "Sonho na garrafa" pages explain the collection process and keep a running tally of how many bottles they have managed to gather so far.

"I wanted to create that social-media presence and show this project so that it would reach people and be recorded for her future," says Karina Lauro, referring to her daughter's university dream. "But I never imagined it would get this big, because people started to embrace it."

The Instagram account has more than 12,000 followers and the TikTok has more than 250,000 likes. In this way more people have started to send encouraging messages and also to want to contribute, including people living abroad.

"Once the internet started to see them, people began wanting to donate bottles as well, to donate the money from exchanging bottles," says the mother, adding that she only accepts donations if they come from bottle deposits.

"There is a person in Ireland who sends money every week. In Ireland it's 25 cents per bottle, so she exchanges them there and sends it to the children."

Another big boost came from restaurants, which also wanted to get involved in the project. It is the mother herself who now collects the bottles from the restaurants, once a week.

By mid-August they had collected more than 5,300 bottles and €537.

"But now more messages have started to come in from other restaurants, wanting to help as well. So, with the restaurants coming on board, that number will probably double."