Wait until students figure out that DeSantis’ Florida and communism are bedfellows! | Opinion


Fabiola Santiago

MIAMI HERALD
Tue, May 10, 2022, 

What do Cuba and Florida have in common?

Book-banning, censorship — and, added into the mix this week, state-mandated school indoctrination for political purposes.

They’re hallmark practices of the Communist Party-led regime in Cuba, tools used for six decades to keep Cubans isolated and in the dark about information that falls outside of what the ruling party’s ideology commands people to believe.

Ironically, after this year’s GOP-dominated legislative session, the same manipulative tactics are now pillars of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ public education system.

Math textbooks and literary books are being banned because some comité a la Cuba — aka “Moms for Liberty,” made up of citizens jazzed and empowered by Republicans into a state of hysteria — deemed them inappropriate and sounded the alarm.

Educators are being censored and handed guidelines, embedded into law, about what they’re allowed to say and not say to students on race or gender identity. Nothing that makes whites uncomfortable. Nothing about being gay or trans in kindergarten to third grade when kids are full of questions about fellow classmates or themselves.

It all reminds me of the atmosphere of repression during my elementary school education in Cuba.

But self-awareness isn’t a Florida Republican attribute.
Mandated communism lesson

And so, DeSantis and the Florida Legislature have mandated, starting with the 2023 school year, that Florida’s middle-school students get an earful about the horrors of communism every Nov. 7, declared “Victims of Communism Day.”

Public school teachers in Florida will be required to dedicate at least 45 minutes of instruction that day to Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong and Fidel Castro. As well as to the “poverty, starvation, migration, systemic lethal violence and suppression of speech” that people endured under their regimes.

Yet, these same students can’t be taught about the “poverty, starvation, migration, systemic lethal violence and suppression of speech” to which Blacks have been — and still are — subjected to in this country.

But irony isn’t a concept Florida Republicans understand.

The “horrors of prejudice” lesson would fall under the banned “critical race theory.” A no-no to mothers like the one who got a book banned because it said that the United States has not eradicated poverty or racism.

Incredibly so, Cuba does exactly that, too.

The only allowed point of view is that the Cuban Revolution eradicated racism and that poverty is the fault of the U.S. embargo, not the failed economic system.

READ MORE: DeSantis signs bill mandating communism lessons in class, as GOP leans on education
Cuban Americans and DeSantis

You would think that Cuban Americans, Venezuelans and Nicaraguans would run as fast as they could from authoritarian DeSantis and oppose practices that should remind them of the repressive regimes they or their parents fled.

But no, the increasingly conservative Hispanics in the state have their blinders on because the right is their preferred side of the political spectrum. Hence, it’s okay for fascists to ban, censor and indoctrinate.

That these practices conspire against democratic principles is of no importance.

That they’re hypocritical, who cares?

The cancel culture Republicans were so dead-set against during the national reckoning with racial history after George Floyd’s murder has now become their prized turf — with Florida a leading stage for culture wars of the right.

Sadly so, Miami’s first-generation Cuban Americans in state office are the perfect fools in the endeavor to obfuscate.

It should worry Hispanics that DeSantis and the retrograde Republican Legislature are banning books, censoring schools and cracking down on businesses that don’t share their political opinion, plus demonizing only one ideology for crass political purposes.

If it crushing evil was the goal, they would also dedicate lessons to Nazism and the rise of right-wing paramilitary and hate groups in the nation, and specifically, Florida. But that’s too close to the base for comfort, isn’t it?

The right isn’t happy with sending their children to segregated, religious private schools and publicly-funded charters. They want to shape the rainbow of children enrolled in public schools in their 1950s image.

Just like Fidel Castro famously tried to build, from the cradle to the grave and using the education system and his propaganda apparatus, a new generation of suckers.

“El nuevo hombre,” Castro called the generation of Communists being shaped.

What will we in Florida call the generation that DeSantis and his Cuban American Education Commissioner, former Sen. Manny Diaz Jr., are trying to indoctrinate?

Send suggestions, please.

State Sen. Manny Diaz Jr., speaks during the Honoring the Victims of Communism press conference at the Freedom Tower in Miami on Monday, May 9, 2022.

There’s not a thing DeSantis can teach me about communism or any other kind of authoritarianism, including his. I know Cuba’s brand first-hand.

Unlike the ignorant, party-compliant 40-something, Miami-born, Cuban American legislators and lieutenant governor enabling DeSantis, I went to school in Cuba until the sixth grade. That, and 42 years of writing about Cuba and Cuban Americans, is why I easily recognize political chicanery.

My teacher mother refused to indoctrinate children and had to resign. It would be really something if the young teachers in my family had to do the same here because of the repressive atmosphere the GOP has brought to Florida classrooms.

But maybe there’s hope.

One fine day, a smart, fearless kid will raise her hand in the middle of the communism lesson and ask: “Isn’t that what Republicans do in Florida?”

THE WORLD ANTI BOLSHEVIK LEAGUE REBRANDED

DeSantis signs bill mandating communism lessons in class, as GOP leans on education


Bianca Padró Ocasio

MIAMI HERALD
Mon, May 9, 2022 

Public school teachers in Florida will soon be required to dedicate at least 45 minutes of instruction on “Victims of Communism Day” to teach students about communist leaders around the world and how people suffered under those regimes.

Speaking at Miami’s Freedom Tower before a crowd of local lawmakers and supporters, Gov. Ron DeSantis signed House Bill 395, which designates Nov. 7 as the state’s official “Victims of Communism Day,” making Florida one of a handful of states to adopt the designation.

It is, however, the first state to mandate school instruction on that day, as Florida Republicans continue to seize on education policy while placing school curriculum at the forefront of their political priorities ahead of the 2022 midterms.

The bill, which DeSantis signed along with two street designations in honor of Cuban exiles, would require the instruction to begin in the 2023-2024 school year. It would require teaching of Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong and Fidel Castro, as well as “poverty, starvation, migration, systemic lethal violence, and suppression of speech” endured under those regimes.

“That body count of Mao is something that everybody needs to understand because it is a direct result of this communist ideology,” DeSantis said, noting that tens of millions of people died in China under his rule. “I know we don’t need legislation here to do this but I think it’s our responsibility to make sure people know about the atrocities committed by people like Fidel Castro and even more recently people like Nicolas Maduro.”

The second bill, Senate Bill 160, designates street names in honor of Arturo Diaz Artiles, Maximino and Coralia Capdevila, and Oswaldo Paya.

Rosa Maria Paya speaks about her father while Governor Ron DeSantis watches during a Honoring the Victims of Communism press conference at the Freedom Tower in Miami on Monday, May 9, 2022. Paya’s late father, Oswaldo, will have a plaza named after him. DeSantis later sign Senate bill 160 to make this designation.

“There are so many people in our community who have suffered and our own family members have suffered and to us it’s so gratifying to honor them,” said Armando Ibarra, president of Miami Young Republicans and founder of the Florida Commission of Victims of Communism.

Ibarra’s group works closely with Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, an international organization that commemorates the victims of communism and promotes education on the evils of communist regimes. The organization has developed its own curriculum, one of the materials on which the State Board of Education would model its own lessons, said Miami Sen. Manny Diaz, who was appointed last week as the state’s new Education Commissioner.

“We haven’t reviewed it, but the things set forth in the bill have to be taught,” said Diaz.

---

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Bolshevik_Bloc_of_Nations

The World Anti-Communist League was founded in 1966. Its chief organizers were the Taiwanese and South Korean governments and an organization called the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations. It has since grown to more than 90 chapters on six continents, and includes ex-Nazis, right-wing terrorists, and other unsavory characters.

Author: Scott Anderson, Jon Lee Anderson

Publish Year: 1986

Inside the League: The Shocking Expose of How Terrorists, Nazis, …

www.amazon.com/Inside-League-Terrorists-Infiltrated-Anti-Communist/dp/0396…

Police and protesters clash in Philippines capital after presidential elections

 

Police and protesters clash after presidential elections

 

Philippines: protests erupt as son of late dictator wins presidency

 

Hundreds protest Marcos' election win in Manila

 

#Philippines #Manila #Protest

New generation of Marcos, Duterte set to lead Philippines

Tue, May 10, 2022, 7:02 p.m.·2 min read

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The powerful alliance between the son of the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos and the daughter of outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte is set to usher in six years of governance in the Philippines that are concerning to human rights activists.

A look at the pair set to take office June 30 after their apparent landslide election victories in Monday's elections:

FERDINAND MARCOS JR.

A former provincial governor, congressman and senator, the 64-year-old son who goes by his childhood nickname “Bongbong” would return his family to the presidency 36 years after the “People Power” revolt ousted his father and sent him into exile for filching billions and mass human rights abuses.

His mother, Imelda Marcos, twice unsuccessfully attempted to retake the seat of power after returning with her children to the Philippines from exile in the United States, where her husband died in 1989.

Marcos Jr. has defended his father’s legacy and steadfastly refuses to apologize for or acknowledge the atrocities and plunder during the dictatorship. Married to a lawyer, with whom he has three sons, he has stayed away from controversies, including a past tax conviction and the Marcos family’s refusal to pay a huge estate tax. Throughout his campaign, he tenaciously stuck to a battle cry of national unity. He denies accusations that he financed a yearslong social media campaign that harnessed online trolls to smear opponents and whitewash the Marcos family’s checkered history, daring critics to “show me one.”

SARA DUTERTE

Sara Duterte, 43, is the outgoing mayor of Davao City, which was her father's constituency before he was elected president in 2016.

A lawyer and reserve officer in the Philippine army, Duterte has carved out her own political career and, although at times supportive of her father, is considered more levelheaded and pragmatic.

Duterte's party originally wanted her to succeed him, but she chose instead to run for vice president.

A mother of three, she has been the longtime mayor of Davao, an economically vibrant city where the elder Duterte first carved a political name with his populist rhetoric and often bloody approach against criminality, especially trafficking and use of illegal drugs, before he rose to the presidency in 2016.

The Associated Press

California lays out plan to drastically cut fossil fuel use

KATHLEEN RONAYNE
Tue, May 10, 2022



Work is done on a house under construction in Sacramento, Calif., on Feb. 11, 2021. A plan released by the California Air Resources Board on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, suggests California require all new homes built starting 2026 to have electric appliances including heaters and stoves.

 (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)More


SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — New homes built in California starting in 2026 need to be powered by all-electric furnaces, stoves and other appliances if California is to meet its ambitious climate change goals over the next two decades, according to a state pollution-reduction plan released Tuesday.

The roadmap by the California Air Resources Board sets the state on a path to achieve “carbon neutrality” by 2045, meaning as much carbon is removed from the air as is emitted. The state’s timeline is among the most ambitious in the nation; Hawaii has a similar goal and some other states have a 2050 deadline.

California could reach its goals through a drastic transition away from fossil fuels that power cars, trucks, planes, ships, homes, businesses and other sectors of the economy. The board staff recommends the state cut the use of oil and gas by 91% by 2045 and use technology to capture and store carbon emissions from remaining sources.

The plan was put together by air board staff and it is not final; a public comment process will begin and the political appointees who make up the air board will ultimately decide whether to make any changes. The Legislature or other regulatory bodies would have to agree to put the various policies in place. The California Energy Commission, for example, sets building codes.

Still, state officials said the document represents an important step for California and the rest of the nation. California is the nation's most populous state and has the world's fifth largest economy compared to other nations. That economic power means the state's policy choices can drive major business changes, and other states often follow California's lead on climate policy.

“When final, this plan will serve as a model for other industrial economies around the world,” said Jared Blumenfeld, secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency.

But neither environmental justice advocates nor the oil industry were happy. Environmental groups blasted the plan for its reliance on carbon capture technologies, which they say allows oil refineries, cement plants and other industries to continue polluting in disadvantaged neighborhoods. They also pointed to a little-noted element of the plan that calls for the expansion of natural gas capacity as a failure by the air board.

“At a time when we need to be planning for a phaseout of fossil fuels, our top air regulators are instead planning for a massive expansion of dirty gas-fired power plants,” Ari Eisenstadt, campaign manager for Regenerate California, said in a statement. The group is a partnership between the California Environmental Justice Alliance and the Sierra Club that advocates for clean energy.

The Western States Petroleum Association, meanwhile, decried the plan would mean more “bans, mandates and expensive regulations."

“Forcing people to pick certain jobs, certain cars, certain homes, and certain times to use energy is out of touch with how ordinary people live," WSPA President Catherine Reheis-Boyd said in a statement.

Changing how buildings and means of transportation are powered is at the center of the air board's plan. It suggests the state require all new homes to have electric appliances starting in 2026 and new businesses by 2029. For existing homes, 80% of appliance sales should be electric by 2030 and 100% by 2035. That would help ensure older homes transition to electric-powered appliances when owners need to upgrade.

Transportation, meanwhile, is the state's largest single source of greenhouse gas emissions. The state is already on track to require all new passenger cars sold to be zero-emission by 2035. The plan also recommends: All truck sales to be zero-emission by 2040, 10% of airplane fuel demands to be met with hydrogen or batteries by 2045, 100% of drayage trucks to be zero-emission by 2035, and 100% of passenger train sales to be zero-emission by 2030.

The plan would put significant new demand on the electric grid, requiring the state to rapidly scale up solar power and storage options, as well as hydrogen infrastructure including pipelines.

California's 2045 carbon neutrality goal stems from an executive order then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed in 2018. But the air board has been required to release a roadmap for achieving the state's climate goals every five years since 2008.

The last version of the plan explored how California will meet a state law requiring a 40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2030. Some observers of the process had called for a robust analysis of the state's progress toward the 2030 goal, including the role California's signature cap-and-trade program was expected to play.

But the 200-plus page document released Tuesday includes just a small section on the state's progress toward 2030 and does not directly lay out what level of emissions reductions are expected from the various programs the state already has in place. It says the role of cap and trade in achieving the state's goals will likely diminish. The program requires businesses to buy credits equal to how much carbon they want to emit, with the goal of spurring reductions overtime as the price of credits increase.

The air board won't assess whether changes are needed to reach the 2030 goal until after the scoping plan is finished, the plan said.

California could lead the nation in natural carbon removal. This bill would do just that

Cristina Garcia , Ellie Cohen
Tue, May 10, 2022,

California has long been a leader in climate solutions and environmental justice, but we’ve fallen behind. For the last several years, oil and gas lobbyists have stalled meaningful climate legislation in our state. This must be the year we summon the political will to put bold ideas into action.

The task ahead of us is clear: Scientists have repeatedly found that the only path to a stable climate is to rapidly phase out fossil fuels and begin removing up to a trillion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The latest United Nations report again warned that the U.S. and other wealthy nations must pick up the pace in order to avoid even more devastating drought, heatwaves and wildfires worldwide.

Opinion

California can be a model for the world by ending the era of oil and gas, rapidly transitioning to a clean energy economy, and demonstrating cost-effective solutions that draw carbon out of the atmosphere. We must do so in ways that improve the health and well-being of the communities affected most.

The Natural Carbon Sequestration and Resilience Act of 2022 (Assembly Bill 2649) would make California the first state in the nation to set a statutory target for drawing down and sequestering carbon through proven methods like urban tree-planting, composting food waste, and applying it to soils and habitat restoration.

There is a lot of discussion about carbon removal in Sacramento right now, so let’s be perfectly clear: Carbon capture and storage at smokestacks — the fossil fuel industry’s favorite new climate “solution” — has proven time and again to be ineffective, expensive and polluting.

Unlike natural carbon removal, carbon capture doesn’t remove previously-emitted climate pollution from the atmosphere, which science says is necessary for a livable future. Continuing to dig up and burn fossil fuels will perpetuate harmful pollution in communities living near drilling sites, disproportionately impacting working-class families of color. Another technological approach, direct air capture, is still in its infancy — energy-intensive, expensive, and not yet feasible.

California lawmakers shouldn’t be fooled. Only natural carbon removal, as outlined in AB 2649, can safely and cost-effectively draw down past emissions this decade while also improving community health.

A recent report from The Climate Center found that California’s agricultural and urban lands have the potential to capture up to 103 million metric tons of past climate pollution from the atmosphere per year. The bill sets a goal of sequestering an additional 60 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year by 2030 — equal to the annual greenhouse gas pollution from roughly 13 million cars.

AB 2649 helps us return to a stable climate and will have immediate benefits for the communities bearing the brunt of the climate crisis. Healthier soils hold more water when it rains, improving water and food security. Natural carbon removal solutions can slow the spread of wildfires and help replace chemically-intensive agriculture practices that endanger farm workers.

In cities from Sacramento to Los Angeles — where Black and brown communities are exposed to deadly heatwaves and some of the most polluted air in the nation — urban tree-planting can save lives by reducing extreme heat impacts and cleaning the air.

There’s no single solution to the climate crisis, but natural carbon removal is critical. Investing in these solutions today will pave the way toward a climate-safe future for all while improving public health and environmental justice at home.

Assemblymember Cristina Garcia represents California’s 58th Assembly District. 

Ellie Cohen is the CEO of The Climate Center, a climate and energy policy nonprofit.

Q&A: California lawmakers push for carbon capture to reduce greenhouse gases

One proposal focuses on more trees and wetlands as part of a natural carbon-capture program.

Proposed state legislation calls for a variety of natural carbon-capture efforts, including wetlands restoration. Above, Los Cerritos Wetlands in southeast Long Beach, shown on Monday, Oct. 12, 2020, has plans for restoration. (Photo by Howard Freshman, Contributing Photographer)

By MARTIN WISCKOL | Southern California News Group
PUBLISHED: March 17, 2022 

California could embrace a groundbreaking program to capture greenhouse gases by planting more trees, restoring wetlands and promoting more carbon-absorbent farming, thanks to proposed legislation that would set a goal of removing 60 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the air each year.

That goal, if achieved, would be the equivalent of taking more than 13 million gasoline vehicles off the road annually.

While much of the discussion of global-warming solutions focuses on reducing emissions, the process of extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere increasingly is seen as the other indispensable component.

“This practice is now viewed by the scientific community as an essential part of solving climate change,” according to a UC Davis fact sheet on carbon sequestration.

There are two basic approaches to carbon capture.

One is technological sequestration, in which greenhouse gas emissions are captured before they leave plant smokestacks, or in which carbon is extracted directly from the atmosphere. Expense is a key issue in both cases, although there is federal funding and proposed state legislation to promote that approach. Assemblywoman Cottie Petrie-Norris, D-Irvine, is an author of two such bills

The second is approach is to push for more natural sequestration, as proposed in a draft bill by Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, D-Downey.

Here is a look at how these approaches work — or could work.

Isn’t the Earth already absorbing huge amounts of carbon dioxide?

Yes. Forests, grasslands and rangelands absorb about 25% of man-made carbon emissions while the ocean absorbs 25% to 30%, according to UC Davis. But plant-rich landscapes are disappearing, thanks to wildfires and deforestation, and a growing amount of carbon absorbed by the ocean is hurting marine life — including coral — through acidification.

The Amazon rainforest, one of the Earth’s most important “carbon sinks,” is a particular area of concern. A study published March 7 in the journal Nature Climate Change said the Amazon ecosystem is approaching a tipping point toward irreversible die-off, and that in coming decades more than half the rainforest could turn into a savanna.

Projections show the Earth on a path to the potentially devastating temperature increase of 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (3 degrees Celsius) by 2100, with the 2015 Paris Agreement setting a goal of half that amount. Meeting that target would require cutting 2010 greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 and, additionally, removing 1 trillion metric tons of the gases from the atmosphere by 2050, according to United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
How can California promote more natural carbon removal?

Garcia’s draft bill, AB 2649, sets a goal of 60 million metric tons of natural carbon dioxide capture by 2031 and 75 million metric tons by 2036. It would require the Natural Resources Agency to develop programs to meet those goals. While the bill currently has only skeleton language, the full draft is expected to be formally introduced next week.

“The programs should facilitate practices such as compost application, riparian restoration, cover crops, hedgerows, and planned grazing, among other relevant practices,” according to the draft bill, which is being sponsored by The Climate Center.
Trees aren’t mentioned in the bill?

No, but forests are.

“Forests have more potential than any other sector,” said Laurie Wayburn, president of the Pacific Forest Trust, at a Wednesday, March 16, online briefing on natural carbon capture. One key to that is better forest management, including reducing the amount of wildfires, she said.

A report by The Climate Center also calls for more trees to be integrated with farming operations and for more plants along roadways. It also specifies significant opportunities for diverting landfill bound organic waste to grazing fields and farmlands, where it can promote better growth of plants which in turn capture carbon.
What about capturing carbon dioxide before the emissions leave the factory? Or extracting it directly from the atmosphere?

Last November’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law included $15 billion to promote such projects nationwide. Petrie-Norris’ AB 2944 would streamline the permitting process while AB 1676, which she authored with two Assembly colleagues, would help establish such carbon capture as a priority. On the Senate side, SB 905 would establish demonstration projects for reducing carbon emissions at cement factories, which are a particularly troublesome source of greenhouse gases.

According to AB 1676, such carbon capture could eliminate 60 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in the state annually. That would be in addition to the 60 million metric ton goal for natural carbon removal.
Why are many environmentalists wary of technological carbon capture?

Capturing emissions at factories has been happening since the 1970s, but in limited amounts because of the costs involved. Currently, there are just 26 such operations worldwide, according to Ellie Cohen, CEO of The Climate Center. She cited a study that found 81% of the carbon captured was then used to enhance oil recovery, meaning it was used for a product that increased greenhouse gases.

“So the net benefit is negative (environmentally),” Cohen said.

Removing carbon directly from the air is a less developed technology and costs as much as $600 per ton of carbon, according to an online Q&A with UC Riverside experts. Engineering professor Mihri Ozkan said in order for that process to be viable, the cost would have to be reduced to $100 per ton.

Environmentalists describe both technological approaches as costly and still in development stages, while natural carbon capture can be affordably implemented immediately.
What happens to carbon once it’s captured?

With natural carbon capture, the carbon is absorbed by the plant and then into the soil, where it can remain for decades or centuries.

With technological carbon capture, it can be injected into porous, subterranean rock formations, although environmentalists warn of the possibility of leaks and the vulnerability to earthquakes.

Researchers are also exploring using the captured carbon dioxide to create other products, such as urea, which is used in fertilizer and in the manufacture of plastics, and graphene, which is used to create screens for smart phones.

‘We’re very excited’: Canada’s clean energy firms eye soaring EU electricity prices

Jeff Lagerquist
Wed, May 11, 2022

The European Union is reportedly preparing fast-track permits for clean energy projects to help replace Russian fossil fuels. REUTERS/Andreas Mortensen

Canadian clean energy producers say they’re benefiting from European electricity rates that prompted some governments to roll out measures to shield consumers and businesses from rising prices.

Kingsey Falls, Que.-based Boralex (BLX.TO) and Toronto-based Northland Power (NPI.TO) reported first-quarter financial results on Wednesday. In both cases, management noted the dual impacts of high electricity rates in Europe, as well as the push among nations on the continent to sever energy ties to Russia.

“We’re very excited about the new opportunities that are arising as a result of rising electricity prices, and the European push for energy security,” Northland CEO Mike Crawley told analysts on a post-earnings conference call on Wednesday. He said “higher market prices” from its Gemini wind farm off the coast of the Netherlands helped the company top analyst expectations in its latest quarter.
Boralex Inc. (BLX.TO)

Boralex CEO Patrick Decostre pointed to a “sharp rise in energy prices” in France, mainly attributed to extended outages at many of the country’s nuclear reactors. The company is France’s largest independent producer of onshore wind power with more than 60 farms in operation scattered across the country, according to company’s website.

“The other good news is that the price in the UK has also increased a lot. So the demand for electricity is even higher,” Decostre said on a call with analysts. Boralex has plans for a 90 megawatt wind project in the highlands of Scotland.

EU nations including Germany, France, Italy and Spain have announced plans to cut taxes or issue rebates in a bid to soften the blow of higher energy prices. At the same time, the 27-member bloc is reportedly preparing fast-track permits for renewable projects to help replace Russian fossil fuels.

“Countries such as Germany, the UK, and the Netherlands have specifically higher targets for off-shore wind,” Crawley said. “Northland is well-positioned, we believe, to achieve these objectives.”

Toronto-listed Northland shares climbed 1.81 per cent to $38.34 at 1:45 p.m. ET on Wednesday. Boralex added 1.66 per cent to $38.04.

EU Must Speed Green Deal to Shut Out Russian Gas, CEOs Say

John Ainger
Tue, May 10, 2022, 


(Bloomberg) -- More than 100 companies from Microsoft Corp. to Unilever Plc want the European Union to intensify its focus on renewable energy as the bloc races to end its dependency on Russian fossil fuels.

“At the core of the current energy security and price crises sits an overdependence on volatile, imported fossil gas, oil and coal,” chief executives and other business leaders said in a letter to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. “This is the time to be bold and double down on delivering the Green Deal,” the EU’s push for carbon neutrality by mid-century.

The EU can accelerate its shift by scaling up investments in renewable energy, improving building insulation and encouraging businesses to choose low-carbon technologies, according to the letter seen by Bloomberg. Tax cuts and income-support measures could help spur the change, said the companies, which include Iberdrola SA and retailer H&M.

Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February exacerbated an energy-supply crunch already under way in Europe, sending commodity prices soaring to record levels. Now the continent is facing potential fuel disruptions as Russia -- the EU’s biggest gas provider -- threatens to cut supplies if buyers don’t pay in rubles.

Next week the EU is set to launch its plan to slash the use of Russian gas by two-thirds this year. It’s set to include measures that will speed the permitting process for wind and solar farms, while also creating incentives for consumers to use less energy.

Before the war, Russia was responsible for around 40% of the EU’s gas imports, a figure the bloc wants to bring down to zero this decade. While the EU is burning more coal and seeking energy from alternative sources that could temporarily raise emissions, it wants to accelerate the transition in the longer term.

The CEOs called for a strengthening of key pillars of the Green Deal by increasing ambition in areas like the EU’s carbon market, albeit with more support for domestic industry. They’re also seeking to increase the specialized workforce needed for the transition to cleaner energy.

Solar rooftops, manufacturing to get boost under draft EU plan

Tue, May 10, 2022
By Kate Abnett

BRUSSELS, May 10 (Reuters) - The European Commission hopes to jumpstart a large-scale rollout of solar energy and rebuild Europe's solar manufacturing industry, as part of its bid to wean countries off Russian fossil fuels, a draft document seen by Reuters showed.

"Solar electricity and heat are key for phasing out EU's dependence on Russian natural gas," the Commission said in the draft, due to be published next week in a package of proposals to end the European Union's reliance on Russian oil and gas.

Solar photovoltaics (PV) costs have plunged by more than 80% over the last decade, but the technology produced only 5% of EU electricity in 2020. Solar's share in heat production was even lower, at 1.5%.

Brussels would launch a "European Solar Rooftops Initiative" to help cut gas-fuelled power and heating in homes, offices, shops and factories, the draft said.

The scheme would require the EU and national governments to take action this year to limit permitting times to three months for rooftop installations. It would push countries to use EU funding and launch support programmes for rooftop panels, and install solar energy in all suitable public buildings by 2025.

Another EU scheme would bring together governments and training providers to focus on skilling solar sector workers, while an "EU Solar Industry Alliance" would use the bloc's budget and carbon market "innovation fund" to support investments in manufacturing.

Europe has around 14 planned solar component manufacturing projects, but some need billions of euros in financing to launch.

China supplied 75% of EU solar panel imports in 2020. Europe has struggled to compete with its own large-scale factories, despite the EU imposing anti-dumping and anti-subsidy controls on solar panels from China between 2013 and 2018.

"The solar turnaround has never been tackled in concrete terms," said EU Green lawmaker Michael Bloss, who alongside countries including Austria, Lithuania and Spain, has called for Brussels to tackle the issue with legal tools, rather than voluntary schemes - such as by legally requiring new buildings to have solar rooftops on flat roofs, public buildings and supermarkets across Europe.

A separate draft document, seen by Reuters, would tweak EU law to fast-track permitting deadlines for some renewable energy projects.

 (Reporting by Kate Abnett; editing by David Evans)

EU plans one-year renewable energy permits for faster green shift

Kate Abnett
Mon, May 9, 2022

BRUSSELS, May 9 (Reuters) - The European Union executive wants to speed up the bloc's green transition and cut its reliance on Russian fuels by allowing some renewable energy projects to receive permits within a year, a draft document shows.

Brussels will next week unveil a package of measures to end the European Union's reliance on Russia, by boosting renewable energy, saving energy and increasing gas imports from elsewhere.

As part of this, the European Commission will propose rules requiring countries to designate "go-to areas" of land or sea suitable for renewable energy, where such projects would have a low environmental impact, the draft legislative proposal shows.

"The permit-granting process for new projects located in renewables go-to areas shall not exceed one year," the document said, adding that this could be extended by three months in "extraordinary circumstances".

That compares with the EU's current two-year deadline for permitting such schemes, which can also be extended by an extra year. Projects outside of go-to areas would stick to this timeline, the draft said.

Renewable projects often face far longer delays, however, owing to red tape, local opposition or concerns about protecting endangered species, raising concerns that the bloc will struggle to expand wind and solar energy fast enough to meet climate change goals.

In Greece, for example, eight years is a typical timeline for approving wind energy projects, the Hellenic Wind Energy Association said.

"Renewable energy sources are crucial to fight climate change, reduce energy prices, decrease the Union's dependence on fossil fuels and ensure the Union's security of supply," the document said.

Permitting and building renewable energy projects would be labelled as in the "overriding public interest", enabling a simplified assessment. EU citizens would still have the right to participate in decisions on the projects, the draft said.

Go-to areas would avoid protected sites or bird migration routes, and prioritise built areas like rooftops, roads and railways, industrial sites and public land around them.

The overall areas would be subject to an environmental assessment, but individual projects would no longer need one, unless they would significantly affect the environment in another EU country, the draft said.

Smaller projects with less than 150kW capacity in go-to areas would face a faster six-month permitting process, or nine if there are issues around safety or the impact on the power grid.

The speedier permit rules would not apply to plants that burn biomass for energy. (Reporting by Kate Abnett; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Danish Renewable Firm Said to Consider Stake Sale to Fund Growth

Francois de Beaupuy and Jan-Henrik Förster
Tue, May 10, 2022

(Bloomberg) -- European Energy A/S is considering selling a 10% stake that could value the Danish renewable power company at as much as 3 billion euros ($3.2 billion), people familiar with the matter said.

The closely held company is working with a financial adviser to help raise funds for its next phase of expansion, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information. The company could be valued at 2.5 billion euros to 3 billion euros in the planned transaction, they said.

Talks are ongoing and there’s no certainty a deal will materialize, the people said. A spokesperson for the Copenhagen-based firm declined to comment.

The Danish solar and wind operator, which is developing projects in more than a dozen European nations as well as in the U.S., Brazil and Australia, is seeking to benefit from investor interest in renewables as nations push to accelerate the fight against global warming. The Danish government alone plans to quadruple the production of solar and onshore wind energy by 2030 to support the green transition.

Europe is also seeking to quicken its move toward renewables following Russia’s war on Ukraine, and the consequent uncertainty over oil and gas supplies.

European Energy, founded in 2004, aims to have 1.5 gigawatts of clean power capacity under construction this year. It says it had 20 gigawatts in development in Europe at the end of last year. The company predicted in February that its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization will rise 66% this year to 135 million euros.

It is also among a group of companies that recently signed a partnership to provide methanol produced with renewable power to help shipping giant A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S cut its use of fossil fuels.

A Showdown Over Coal Could Decide Who Wins Australia's Election


Ben Westcott and Jason Scott
Tue, May 10, 2022,

(Bloomberg) -- A coal-mining community that has elected the same political party for more than a century could decide Australia’s next government this month in an election that has divided the nation over how to battle climate change.

Poll after poll has shown that the majority of Australians want to cut greenhouse gas emissions, but with the ruling conservative Liberal-National coalition holding power by a single seat and the two main political camps almost neck and neck, it could come down to a handful of constituencies where an abrupt end to coal mining would devastate communities, leaving thousands of workers without jobs.

At stake is the policy of a nation that is a potential renewable-energy superpower but still gets 70% of its electricity and about a quarter of its exports from fossil fuels. Hastening an end to the nation’s vast coal industry would make a major contribution to the global effort to limit planetary warming.

With campaigning reaching a crescendo before the May 21 vote, the spotlight has fallen on Hunter, an electorate about the size of Jamaica some 100 miles north of Sydney, and famous for wine and coal. The Hunter Valley is one of huge contrasts, with bucolic century-old vineyards along the winding Hunter River bookended by some 40 operating mines to the west and the world’s largest coal-export port of Newcastle in the east.

Ravaged by the bushfires of Australia’s “Black Summer” two years ago, but dependent on fossil fuel sales, it is the nexus of the country's climate dilemma, and helps explain the political paralysis that's left the nation largely silent in efforts to craft global policy to accelerate action on emissions.

Almost one in 10 workers in Hunter are directly employed by the coal mining industry, a blue-collar legacy that made it a safe bet for 112 years for the center-left Labor Party. In recent elections, Labor’s promises to accelerate the fight against climate change have spooked many traditional supporters, threatening to hand the seat to the ruling coalition headed by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who once famously brandished a lump of coal in parliament in support of the fossil fuel sector.

Now with Labor narrowly ahead in opinion polling, winning Hunter could be vital for Morrison to hang on to power. In the last election in 2019, Labor’s strong climate-change action promises caused a 9% swing to the government. A similar shift this month would see Morrison’s party win the seat for the first time.

But it’s a delicate balancing act for both sides. To garner support from the country at large, Morrison and opposition leader Anthony Albanese have been burnishing their climate credentials. A survey last year by the Sydney-based Lowy Institute showed that 55% of Australians now say the government’s main priority for energy policy should be “reducing carbon emissions.”

Morrison pledged A$50 million ($35 million) of new investment to help create jobs in the region during a Wednesday campaign visit in Newcastle, and vowed to develop “world-leading technology in solar, hydrogen, storage and green metals.”

In Hunter, though, political campaigns are also about promising to save jobs and keep the coal industry going long enough to safeguard livelihoods.

“Hunter Valley coal is the best coal in the world, so while there is still a market for coal, it will continue to be serviced by the mines of the Hunter Valley,” said Matthew Swan, the Port of Newcastle’s business development manager, in his office overlooking docks that ship more than 150 million tons of the fuel a year.

Swan’s words have found an unusual supporter in Labor’s candidate for Hunter — Dan Repacholi.

Olympian Task

“While people want to buy our coal, we’ll sell them our coal,” said Repacholi, a giant, four-time Olympian pistol shooter and former coal worker. We will “keep building and building and building until the export market decides that and the world decides that that’s not the way we’re going to go anymore.”

On the hustings, Repacholi effortlessly bonds with workers dropping in from the local pits and businesses, but his party’s traditional reputation for bolstering miners’ rights has been eroded by its strong climate-change stance. Labor has pledged to reduce emissions 43% by 2030 and boost the share of renewable energy to 82%, with a net zero target by 2050.

For Morrison’s government, the balance is even harder. There’s a growing sense that voters could punish his conservatives at the election after almost a decade in power during which they tore up one of the world’s first carbon-trading programs and refused to significantly penalize polluters. Australia has one of the largest per-capita emissions tallies in the developed world and climate scientists have linked a wave of natural disasters under Morrison’s watch to climate change, including the “once every 1,000 years” floods that smashed the continent’s east coast this year.

The government did finally set a 2050 net zero target ahead of last year’s Glasgow climate summit, but hasn’t set new interim goals and its outline for change has been criticized for relying on technologies still in development, such as hydrogen, to deliver the bulk of emission reductions.

In a speech in Perth on Saturday, Morrison said that if re-elected, his government would tackle climate challenge “in a way that maintains competitiveness of our traditional industries — not writing those industries off, but strengthening them in efficient and technologically advanced ways.” The government’s candidate for Hunter, James Thomson, did not respond to requests for an interview.

For workers in Hunter, the key is not to keep the coal industry going at all costs, but to come up with a realistic way to transition to clean energy without destroying the community.

“The idea that someone is going to be able to walk out of a mining pit on Friday and rock up at a hydrogen factory on Monday and do a course over the weekend -- that’s not how it works,” said Warrick Jordan of the Hunter Jobs Alliance, established by a group of unions and environmental groups to help navigate the energy transition.

Singleton, in the heart of the coal-mining region, is one of seven local government areas out of more than 500 surveyed by the the Centre for Policy Development that would be “severely” impacted by global decarbonization. Eliminating fossil fuels could affect about 300,000 jobs throughout Australia connected to coal, oil and gas exports, the center said.

“We’re not planning for the future,” said Sue Gilroy, head of the Business Chamber in Singleton, which has a population of about 22,000. “We could be diversifying and growing the other industries and the other opportunities that we have in the Hunter.”

Oldest Vineyards

Those other industries include the nation’s oldest vineyards, dating back as early as the 1820s, which have a pressing need to address global warming.

More than 2,600 hectares (6,425 acres) of the valley are now under vines, including estates such as Tyrrell’s, Brokenwood and Mount Pleasant. Steadily rising temperatures over the past decades have forced growers to take steps to protect harvests, such as increasing irrigation and spraying vines with sunscreen.

“The effects of climate change are really present and obvious in the wine industry — earlier harvests, more extreme rainfall, more extreme heat events, more compressed vintages” said Alisdair Tulloch, who runs a vineyard certified as carbon neutral by Australia's government.

Extreme weather has also pushed more people to worry about the effects of climate change in the region. Until the bushfires two years ago, Fiona Lee believed the effects of global warming would only be felt by future generations. Her house near the Hunter Valley was one of about 3,000 destroyed during Australia’s 2019 and 2020 bushfires after a prolonged drought. Now she’s a full-time climate activist.

“There’s been quite an awakening in Australia” after the blazes, Lee said from an office where she coordinates opposition to a planned A$600 million gas plant in the town of Kurri Kurri. “There needs to be much more money in the Hunter to support workers in the transition. I can’t believe there’s no plan.”

US Air Force test shows the A-10 Warthog can take out modern tanks with armor improvements with its powerful cannon


Julie Coleman
Tue, May 10, 2022,

An A-10 Thunderbolt II sits on the ramp at Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan, April 20, 2014.

U.S. Air Force/Senior Master Sgt. Gary J. Rihn

A US Air Force test showed that the A-10 attack aircraft, which is over 40 years old, can take out even modern tanks with its gun.


The air service tested the attack aircraft against main battle tank surrogates with explosive reactive armor.


The plane's GAU-8 Avenger cannon can fire around 3,900 rounds per minute.

The US Air Force demonstrated that the A-10 Thunderbolt II, a close-air support mission plane that has been in service for over 40 years, is able to knock out modern tanks equipped with armor improvements with its powerful cannon.

In February, the Air Force carried out a first-ever test at the Nevada Test and Training Range in which pairs of A-10Cs unleashed armor-piercing incendiary rounds against up-armored surrogate main battle tanks with Explosive Reactive Armor, a kind of protection for modern armored vehicles designed to reduce the damage incoming rounds cause, the Air Force's 53rd Wing said in a statement last Friday.

In the aftermath of the test, analysts examined videos, photos, and the tanks themselves to determine the damage inflicted by the Warthog, and they determined that the vehicles had been rendered inoperative.

The Air Force said the test "proved that modern-day armored vehicles equipped with Explosive Reactive Armor are vulnerable to the A-10C Thunderbolt II's" gun.

The A-10 Thunderbolt II, often called the "Warthog" and sometimes seen with painted teeth on its nose – is probably most famous for its GAU-8 Avenger, an impressive 30 mm cannon protruding from the nose of the plane that can fire 3,900 bullets per minute, producing a loud "BRRRRT" noise.

"A typical A-10 gun employment uses 120 rounds, which means an A-10 is capable of employing fires on nine to ten targets before exhausting its gun munitions," Maj. Kyle Adkison, the 422nd Test and Evaluation Squadron A-10C division commander, said in an Air Force press release. "Against large fielded forces, A-10 formations are capable of engaging nearly 40 armored vehicles with 30 millimeter munitions," he continued. "That's a significant amount of firepower."

The Air Force statement said the "A-10 can continue to deliver massive rapid firepower with devastating effects on enemy vehicles in a contested environment," but despite the Warthog's capabilities, the Air Force has been trying to retire the plane since 2015 to free up funds for other projects. Its efforts, however, have been repeatedly thwarted by Congress.

"No member of Congress wants to lose, or stand by and silently lose, a fleet of aircraft or a capability from their state or district, which, of course translates to jobs," Deborah Lee James, the 23rd secretary of the Air Force told Military.com in 2020.

The A-10 was first introduced in the 1970s and is the Air Force's first aircraft designed specifically to provide close-air support to ground forces. The service said it plans to continue testing other munitions against up-armored vehicles.

Canada's federal public servants afraid to speak truth to power: study


Canada’s public service leaders have a problem telling the truth to their political bosses.


© Provided by Ottawa Citizen

The Peace Tower, symbol of Canada's federal government. 

An impartial public service is a cornerstone of a successful democracy.

Kathryn May, Policy Options - 

A new report, Top of Mind , says they feel ill-equipped to gather evidence for policy advice, especially in a world where facts are distorted and drowned out by disinformation, polarization and hyperpartisan politics.

To make matters worse, they appear afraid to tell their political masters the hard truths when they do find them.

Getting back to the basics in policy-making and execution are among the top worries that senior bureaucrats raised in the new study into the state of the public service in Canada. It was conducted by two think-tanks, the Ottawa-based Institute on Governance (IOG), and the Brian Mulroney Institute of Government at St. Francis Xavier University.

The study, launched in the middle of the pandemic, was aimed at understanding the challenges these executives face when doing their jobs, which is to provide reliable, well-run services for Canadians as well as policy advice to ministers. It was based on interviews with 42 senior leaders from all levels of government and a survey of 2,355 public servants in the same departments and agencies.

The big worries — which many felt were accelerated by the pandemic — included falling trust in government; the decline in sharing “fearless advice”; a hollowing out of policy capacity; a post-pandemic economic reckoning; conflicts between different levels of government; and the need for public service reform.

The report didn’t dig into the root causes, but the responses raise enough red flags to justify a debate and development of a roadmap for reform, said Stephen Van Dine, IOG’s senior vice-president, public governance.

“We have enough from this report to say we better be looking into this,” he said.

An impartial public service is a cornerstone of Canada’s democracy. Bureaucrats are supposed to speak truth to power. The ethos of “fearless advice and loyal implementation” is its motto, and public servants take an oath to uphold it when hired.

“The participants felt rational thought and evidence-based decision-making are being circumvented by politicization, polarization and disinformation,” said Van Dine.

“Do public servants have access to enough truth to give fearless advice? If all their information is coming from above rather than from networks in and outside government, how much truth is there really? What happened to the role of public education in the policy development process?”

The responses paint a picture of a bureaucracy that’s too isolated from Canadians and not independent enough from politics, said Van Dine.

Over the years, rules restricting travel and hospitality expenses put a damper on public servants’ ability to meet with provincial counterparts, industry representatives and civil society. They aren’t networking, developing contacts outside of government, or educating Canadians about the factors at play in policy-making.

© Kier Gilmour

Justice John Gomery arrives at the Château Laurier hotel Jan. 31, 2006. The Gomery Inquiry concluded that a grey zone between bureaucrats and politicians was at the heart of the sponsorship scandal and recommended ways to reset it.

“This has isolated the public service from the outside world and given the outside world the only door into government, which is through the Prime Minister’s Office or a minister’s office,” said Van Dine.

But public servants need new skills and modern technology. They need people who think digital, understand systems, analytics, data and can manage projects. That means attracting people to government and hiring them more quickly than the eight months it takes now.

All of this is having an impact on a long-strained relationship between public servants and ministers. Two-thirds of respondents said that relationship was “an important challenge that requires more effective management.”

Many respondents said the relationship is being eaten away by the “over-politicization of policy-making and choices, and the lack of opportunity to constructively challenge political direction.”

The report concluded that “speaking truth to power … seems less achievable to many participants.” Bureaucrats don’t have “safe spaces” among themselves to have all-out debates about analysis or options that “are unpopular“ or “not in tune with their government’s political position.”

Instead, they are expected to toe the party line and give politicians the advice they want to hear.

It’s unclear why. Is it because the deputy ministers aren’t encouraging dissent? Are bureaucrats holding back for fear of falling out of favour with their bosses or being seen as disrespectful?

“The strong undercurrent is that the public service has lost an element of independence and is now expected to deliver on platform commitments rather than offer objective policy advice on the feasibility of the commitment or alternative ways to achieve the objective of the platform commitment,” said the report.

This is an old problem .

Experts sounded the alarm more than 25 years ago about public servants’ hesitancy to speak truth to power. It led to the 1996 Tait report , the foundation of the public service’s values and ethics code.

Donald Savoie, a leading public administration expert, has repeatedly warned that the concentration of power in the Prime Minister’s Office is politicizing the public service. He likened it to “court government” where senior officials act like courtiers trying to ingratiate themselves, rather than delivering hard truths.

The Gomery Inquiry concluded that a grey zone between bureaucrats and politicians was at the heart of the sponsorship scandal and recommended ways to reset it.

The late auditor general Michael Ferguson famously linked the Phoenix pay system disaster to a risk-averse and “ obedient public service .” He concluded that the “ability to convey hard truths has eroded, as has the willingness of senior levels — including ministers — to hear hard truths.”

Despite these warnings, little has been done to fix the problem. The Harper government introduced the Federal Accountability Act in response to the sponsorship scandal, but many experts argue its focus on rules, oversight and compliance made matters worse .

Today’s deputy ministers climbed the ranks over the 20 years since the sponsorship scandal, and the Federal Accountability Act is the world they know. Many argue they got to the top because of their skills in dodging risks, following the rules and keeping government out of trouble.

In the new Top of Mind report, it is unclear how a lack of fearless advice is “cascading” down the ranks. Van Dine worries that assistant deputy ministers aren’t speaking up as they should now that the Public Service Commission has turned over “talent management” to the deputy ministers who appoint them.

“Now the deputy minister is holding all the cards about promotion and appointment … To what extent are they becoming more deputy servants than public servants?” he asks.

The Harper era is also when public servants found themselves drawn into partisan communications with directives, events, activities and website designs to promote the Conservative Party brand.

Today, some respondents worry that a focus on communications is supplanting policy. The current focus is on how a policy will play out or how its “messaging” will be received by Canadians, rather than getting to the nub of the issues the government wants to address.

“Make stuff less about the announcements and actually make it about the issue,” said one leader, quoted in the report. “Communicate with Canadians on that front — what is the problem you are trying to fix here? … People have the basics wrong, and it leads to bad discord.”

The Top of Mind report makes a series of recommendations that could lead to a top-to-bottom overhaul of the federal public service.

At the top of the list is a proposal for a joint Senate-Commons committee to review the Accountability Act, zeroing in on whether its onerous compliance and reporting requirements stifle innovation and create an obedience culture.

The paper also recommended modernizing the ground rules for relationships between bureaucrats and politicians and examining what’s needed for public servants to create “safe spaces for fearless advice,” so they can provide facts, analysis and policy options that don’t toe the government’s party line.

Kathryn May is the Accenture Fellow on the Future of the Public Service, providing coverage and analysis of the complex issues facing Canada’s federal public service for Policy Options. She has spent 25 years writing about the public service — the country’s largest workforce — and has also covered parliamentary affairs and politics for The Ottawa Citizen, Postmedia Network Inc. and iPolitics. This article is reprinted from Policy Options.