Tuesday, October 05, 2021

MONOPOLY CAPITALI$M TESCO XBOSSES TAKE OVER
Labour and Lib Dems urge Morrisons owners to protect workers

Politicians say they will ensure the chain is not heaped with debt and stripped of assets after £7.1bn takeover
US private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice won an auction on Saturday to take control of the supermarket chain. 
Photograph: Tolga Akmen/AFP/Getty Images

Kalyeena Makortoff
@kalyeena
Sun 3 Oct 2021 

Opposition parties have urged Morrisons’ incoming private equity owners to protect workers and ensure that the supermarket is not heaped with debt and stripped of assets as a result of the company’s pending takeover.

Politicians from Labour and the Liberal Democrats have signalled that they will be keeping an eye on US private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R), which over the weekend won a tense auction with a rival suitor to take control of the supermarket chain for £7.1bn.

“Morrisons is a much-loved British firm which has been rooted in communities up and down the country for over 100 years,” Seema Malhotra, Labour MP and shadow minister for business and consumers, said. “The new owners must urgently deliver binding assurances for workers, pension fund holders and local people.”

“We cannot see a repetition of previous cases where businesses have been loaded with debt and asset-stripped. Morrisons is a great British company, which must be safeguarded for the future,” Maholtra added.

Unions and politicians have raised concerns over the wave of private equity takeovers aimed at UK firms, warning companies could be stripped of their property holdings and burdened with borrowed funds to pay off private equity backers, and that working conditions would deteriorate without binding guarantees.

Sarah Olney, Lib Dem MP and the party’s spokesperson for business, said: “It would be a great shame to see local teams lose their stake in the future direction of the business. With uncertain economic times ahead, the new owners must pass the key tests of not loading the business with debt, not cutting jobs, and critically, protecting existing working conditions.”

Labour has already warned it would crack down on the private equity industry if it gains power, saying it would close a loophole on carried interest, which lets private equity executives pay a lower rate of tax on their bonuses, resulting in larger payouts. Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said on Twitter that it would “reduce some of the tax incentives leading to asset-stripping.”



CD&R has tried to ease politicians’ fears by confirming that there were no plans to sell off Morrisons’ attractive store estate to raise cash, and promising that the company’s head office would remain in Bradford. Morrisons – which employs about 120,000 staff in the UK – owns the freehold for 85% of its 497 stores, which has been tipped as an attractive asset for any buyer. It also prides itself on its 19 manufacturing sites including bakeries, abattoirs, fishing fleets and egg farms.

But CD&R has also reached a deal with pension trustees to provide additional security and support for the scheme in a move that helped the private equity firm clinch backing from the Morrisons board even before the takeover went to auction.

The private equity firm, which narrowly beat the 286p offer by a consortium led by Softbank-owned Fortress Investment Group with a 287p bid on Saturday, has also expressed support for Morrisons’ recent pay award of at least £10 an hour for all workers in stores and manufacturing sites.

A CD&R spokesperson said: “CD&R values Morrisons’ distinctive business model and is committed to supporting it, including the successful ESG [environmental, social, and governance] and broader stakeholder engagement strategies of the company that are essential to its continued success.”

But Maholtra said the UK government had a responsibility to hold CD&R to its promises. “It must ensure that the new owners are responsible, long-term investors, seeking to build the business for the future and that decisions taken are also in the public interest.”

CD&R’s offer, which has been backed by the Morrisons board, will go to a shareholder vote on 19 October.


The battle for Morrisons, which has been running since May, is the most high-profile of a raft of bids for British companies this year, reflecting private equity’s appetite for cash-generating UK assets.

CD&R has committed to retain Morrisons’ Bradford headquarters and its existing management team led by CEO David Potts, execute its existing strategy, not sell its freehold store estate and maintain staff pay rates. The commitments are not, however, legally binding.

Leahy was CEO of Tesco for 14 years to 2011 and will now be reunited with Morrisons CEO Potts and Chairman Andrew Higginson, two of his closest lieutenants at Tesco.

Potts, who joined Tesco as a 16-year-old shelf-stacker, will make more than 10 million pounds from selling his Morrisons shares to CD&R. Chief operating officer Trevor Strain will pocket about 4 million pounds.


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ALL THAT IS OLD IS NEW AGAIN
Ferdinand Marcos Jnr, son of former dictator, runs for president of the Philippines

The 64-year-old, who is popularly known as ‘Bongbong’, had long been touted as a candidate. He narrowly lost a bid for the vice-presidency in 2016

He has served as provincial governor, congressman and senator since his return in 1991 from exile following his father’s 1986 overthrow

Reuters in Manila
Published: 5:04pm, 5 Oct, 2021

Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos, son of late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, his wife, Louise, left, and his sister Imee, right, pictured in 2018. Photo: Reuters

The son and namesake of the Philippines’ former dictator Ferdinand Marcos announced on Tuesday he will run for president in next year’s elections, ending months of speculation over his political ambitions.

Ferdinand Marcos Jnr, who is popularly known as “Bongbong”, had been touted as a potential candidate for either the presidency or the vice-presidency, having been involved in politics since his return in 1991 from exile following his father’s 1986 overthrow.

“Join me in this noblest of causes and we will succeed. Together, we will rise again,” the 64-year-old said in a speech streamed on social media. “I will bring … unifying leadership back to our country.”


Ferdinand Marcos Jnr at a press conference in 2016, the year of his failed vice-presidential run. Photo: AP

Marcos Jnr has served as provincial governor, congressman and senator and ran unsuccessfully for the vice-presidency in 2016, a defeat he challenged in the courts. His sister Imee is a senator and mother Imelda a former congresswoman.

Marcos Jnr was in second place behind incumbent President Rodrigo Duterte’s daughter, Sara, in a recent PulseAsia Research survey of voter preference, though she has denied plans to run.

As Duterte exits Philippine election, will daughter Sara run for president?
2 Oct 2021


He is the fourth candidate to announce a run for the presidency, joining a growing field of contenders seeking to replace Duterte, who is not permitted to run for a second term under the constitution, and has decided to retire.

Manila City mayor Francisco Domagoso registered on Monday, following newly retired boxing icon

Manny Pacquiao. Senator Panfilo Lacson, a former police chief, also intends to run.

Marcos Jnr on Tuesday took an oath as chairman of a political party that had earlier nominated him as its presidential candidate.

His tilt for the country’s highest office comes even as the 1970s martial rule era of the elder Marcos is fresh in many minds.


The late dictator Ferdinand Marcos, left, and his wife Imelda pictured in 1985.
 Photo: AFP

His family, one of the most famous in the Philippines, has long sought to rebuild its image and has repeatedly denied allegations it plundered billions of dollars of state wealth when in power, which ended in a People’s Power uprising.

Marcos Jnr’s failed bid for the vice presidency in 2016, which he narrowly lost to Leni Robredo, was a blow for the family, which had gone into exile in the
United States after the patriarch’s humiliating downfall in 1986.

He and his wife Imelda were accused of massive corruption while in power.

Marcos Jnr accused Robredo of electoral fraud and spent nearly five years waging a legal battle challenging the vote. The country’s top court  dismissed the protest in February.

Opinion: Why Marcos the dictator still inspires pride in the Philippines
25 Mar 2018


“Let us bring Filipinos back to one another in service of our country, facing the crisis and the challenges of the future together,” Marcos Jnr said on Tuesday.

If Marcos Jnr’s presidential bid succeeds, it would be a remarkable political comeback for the family.

Imelda has said previously she dreams of her son – a senator from 2010 to 2016 – becoming the country’s leader.

Duterte is an ally of the Marcos family, which got a boost from his 2016 election victory. His government gave the ex-dictator’s remains a hero’s burial and publicly floated the idea of winding down the hunt for his hidden wealth.

Analysts predict a possible alliance between Marcos Jnr and the president’s daughter for the 2022 election, which they say would be a formidable combination attracting votes from their respective strongholds in the north, centre and south of the country.


Sara Duterte-Carpio, Davao City Mayor and daughter of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who analysts predict may form an alliance with Marcos Jnr. 
Photo: Reuters

The Philippines’ election season kicked off on Friday as celebrities and political scions flocked to the offices of the elections commission to file their nominations.

The process launches a typically noisy and deadly seven months of campaigning for more than 18,000 positions.

But the Covid-19 pandemic and the economic downturn caused by lockdowns is expected to dampen the atmosphere.

Additional reporting by Agence-France Presse
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YESTERDAY'S NEWS TODAY
Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group announce research partnership on China’s economic trajectory
RIGHT WING TALK SHOP

Press Release
ChinaEconomy & Business

Container barge passing by in Shanghai, China. Increasingly, the center of gravity of the global trade and financial system is shifting East, toward China, and South.
Source: Markus Winkler for Unsplash

Multi-year partnership to produce unique insights on China’s economy and implications for Biden Administration policymaking; Rhodium partner Daniel Rosen to be named as Atlantic Council Senior Fellow

WASHINGTON, DC – March 9, 2021

– The Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center and Rhodium Group today announced a multi-year partnership dedicated to understanding China’s economy.

The flagship project of the partnership will be a data visualization toolset for analyzing China’s economic trajectory. Building on Rhodium Group’s extensive past work tracking China’s policy choices, the first release is scheduled for June 2021, followed by quarterly updates. The project – titled Pathfinder: Anticipating China’s Economic Future – will examine China’s economic direction in six key areas: three external (trade, direct investment, and portfolio investment) and three internal (market competition, financial system, and innovation).

This regularly updated compendium of novel indicators will anchor a new publication series that helps inform the Biden Administration’s economic approach to China, complementing the GeoEconomics Center’s current China Economic Spotlight.

Josh Lipsky, Director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center said, “We are proud to partner with Rhodium Group to shed light on the defining economic challenge of this generation – how to grapple with China’s power. The Atlantic Council’s growing body of work on China is designed to inform smart policymaking, and the crucial missing link in Washington and beyond is a full understanding of how China’s economy truly operates.”

We are proud to partner with Rhodium Group to shed light on the defining economic challenge of this generation – how to grapple with China’s power.
Josh Lipsky, Director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center

Launched in 2020, the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center is organized around three pillars: the Future of Capitalism, the Future of Money, and the Economic Statecraft Initiative. The Center prides itself on impactful data visualization projects and has a proven track record of internationally recognized work. In the past several months, the Center produced major reports on the rise of central bank digital currencies, the dramatic changes in global monetary policy, and the shifting use of sanctions worldwide.

Addressing the goals of the project, Rhodium Group Founding Partner Daniel Rosen asks,

  “Is China’s economy diverging so fundamentally from market principles that the only appropriate response is decoupling? Leaders lack a sound analytical framework for approaching this crucial question. If they over- or under-react it will have severe consequences. By fairly gauging the aspects of China’s economic system that matter most we will provide that framework.”

Rhodium Group is recognized for pathbreaking, objective analyses of what makes China’s economy tick and its implications for the United States and other market economy nations, businesses, and workers.

To integrate the work of the two organizations, Rosen will also serve as a Senior Fellow within the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center. He brings three decades of experience tracking China’s economic evolution.

For media inquiries, please contact press@atlanticcouncil.org


China is not heading toward a market economy, often due to its own policies, report concludes

China ‘is clearly not what was envisioned’ when it was admitted into the World Trade Organization in 2001, Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group find

The nation has back-pedalled from its stated economic objectives, and the US and other market economies must protect themselves when dealing with it

Jodi Xu Klein

Published: 12:01pm, 5 Oct, 2021


Shipping containers from China are unloaded at the Port of Los Angeles in California. A new report concludes that the country is not on a track to becoming a market economy. Photo: AFP

China has fallen short of meeting its stated reform goals and is not on track to become a market economy, a report assessing China’s development has concluded.

As a result, the United States and other market economies must develop commercial rules to protect their systems better when they deal with China until it becomes a more open economy, according to the report, China Pathfinder, published by the Atlantic Council and Rhodium Group on Tuesday.

The report found that while the last decade saw some progress, China’s back-pedalling from a more open economy, which began in 2016, was particularly prominent in the past year when Beijing began to crack down on private firms in the technology and education sectors and pursued a growth strategy intended to make China less reliant on the outside world.

BEHIND PAYWALL



ALL TOGETHER NOW; 
CHINA IS A STATE CAPITALIST REGIME, WITH ELECTRICITY!

LET'S CONFIRM THIS WITH THE LENNINIST TROTSKYISTS

Lenin and State Capitalism: Debunking a Persistent Myth

Posted on  by Bolshevik

Something I have run up against repeatedly over years of discussing Marxist politics in person and online is the myth that Lenin mistakenly believed socialism to be a form of capitalism. One piece of “evidence” for this claim is a quote drawn from Lenin’s “The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It.” In the section titled “Can We Go Forward If We Fear to Advance Toward Socialism?” Lenin argued, “For socialism is merely the next step forward from state-capitalist monopoly. Or, in other words, socialism is merely state-capitalist monopoly which is made to serve the interests of the whole people and has to that extent ceased to be capitalist monopoly” (emphasis in original).

To critics of Bolshevism, this snippet represents a damning indictment of how far Lenin departed from Marx’s understanding of socialism. The social-democratic SPGB, one the groups who frequently employ the quote to dismiss Lenin’s politics, has claimed that “Lenin knew that he was introducing a new definition of socialism here which was not to be found in Marx.” Alongside the SPGB are a large number of anarchist or “libertarian communist” websites that have latched onto the quote as indicative of Lenin’s purportedly nefarious political designs. “Lenin was clear what kind of economy he was aiming for,” claims one anarchist brochure, “a state capitalist one.” Another anarchist site buries the quote deep within a pile of other quotes supposedly revealing a direct line of development from Lenin to Stalin.

The problem with such claims is that they fail to understand what Lenin meant by “state capitalism,” and how it differed from the “state capitalism” that they claim existed under the planning framework that was constructed during the First Five Year Plan. For Lenin, state capitalism still had profit-making capitalists (and some firms under joint ownership). It operated primarily through lease concessions to foreign industrialists, made by the proletarian state, to improve or generate investment in a particular industry. It tried to encourage bourgeois co-operatives among petty producers, and was geared toward checking the worst excesses of capitalist management and enterprise by enforcing “controls” in the interests of the working class. The system was quite different than the one that prevailed from the early 1930s onward in the Soviet Union.

Even if we set aside all outside knowledge of what Lenin did or did not mean by the term, the quote in question does not say anything even remotely similar to what its cherry-pickers have claimed it does. A close textual reading makes it clear that Lenin definitely saw a link between state-capitalist monopoly and socialism (otherwise, why even bring them up in the same sentence?). But the relationship is not one of strict equation between the two, for if it were, Lenin would not have identified socialism as “the next step forward from” capitalism.  Instead, Lenin thought that the relationship was one of sharing a specific feature: the existence of “monopoly.” In contrast to “state-capitalist monopoly,” though, socialist monopoly would be “made to serve the interests of the whole people” and would no longer be “capitalist monopoly.” Far from being a revision of Marxism, Lenin’s remarks are consistent with what any Marxist would support. After all, if a governing body under socialism did not have a “monopoly” or ultimate authority over all the means of production, that by definition would point to the continued existence of private property in the means of production. And what Marxist would argue for that?

But we honestly do not need to delve into this rather monastic kind of exegesis, because Lenin, in his aptly named pamphlet “‘Left-wing’ Childishness,” discussed at length how he envisioned state capitalism functioning in the process of transitioning to socialism. Conveniently, it even contains a clear explanation of what he meant in the aforementioned quote:

“No one, I think, in studying the question of the economic system of Russia, has denied its transitional character. Nor, I think, has any Communist denied that the term Socialist Soviet Republic implies the determination of Soviet power to achieve the transition to socialism, and not that the new economic system is recognised as a socialist order.

But what does the word ‘transition’ mean? Does it not mean, as applied to an economy, that the present system contains elements, particles, fragments of both capitalism and socialism? Everyone will admit that it does. But not all who admit this take the trouble to consider what elements actually constitute the various socio-economic structures that exist in Russia at the present time. And this is the crux of the question.

Let us enumerate these elements:

1) patriarchal, i.e., to a considerable extent natural, peasant farming;

2) small commodity production (this includes the majority of those peasants who sell their grain);

3) private capitalism;

4) state capitalism;

5) socialism.

Russia is so vast and so varied that all these different types of socio-economic structures are intermingled. This is what constitutes the specific features of the situation.

… 

At present, petty-bourgeois capitalism prevails in Russia, and it is one and the same road that leads from it to both large-scale state capitalism and to socialism, through one and the same intermediary station called ‘national accounting and control of production and distribution.’ Those who fail to understand this are committing an unpardonable mistake in economics. Either they do not know the facts of life, do not see what actually exists and are unable to look the truth in the face, or they confine themselves to abstractly comparing ‘capitalism’ with ‘socialism’ and fail to study the concrete forms and stages of the transition that is taking place in our country. Let it be said in parenthesis that this is the very theoretical mistake which misled the best people in the Novaya Zhizn and Vperyod camp. The worst and the mediocre of these, owing to their stupidity and spinelessness, tag along behind the bourgeoisie, of whom they stand in awe. The best of them have failed to understand that it was not without reason that the teachers of socialism spoke of a whole period of transition from capitalism to socialism and emphasised the ‘prolonged birth pangs’ of the new society. And this new society is again an abstraction which can come into being only by passing through a series of varied, imperfect concrete attempts to create this or that socialist state.

It is because Russia cannot advance from the economic situation now existing here without traversing the ground which is common to state capitalism and to socialism (national accounting and control) that the attempt to frighten others as well as themselves with ‘evolution towards state capitalism’ (Kommunist No. 1, p. 8, col. 1) is utter theoretical nonsense. This is letting one’s thoughts wander away from the true road of ‘evolution,’ and failing to understand what this road is. In practice, it is equivalent to pulling us back to small proprietary capitalism.

In order to convince the reader that this is not the first time I have given this ‘high’ appreciation of state capitalism and that I gave it before the Bolsheviks seized power I take the liberty of quoting the following passage from my pamphlet The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It, written in September 1917.

‘. . . Try to substitute for the Junker-capitalist state, for the landowner-capitalist state, a revolutionary-democratic state, i.e., a state which in a revolutionary way abolishes all privileges and does not fear to introduce the fullest democracy in a revolutionary way. You will find that, given a really revolutionary-democratic state, state-monopoly capitalism inevitably and unavoidably implies a step, and more than one step, towards socialism!

‘. . . For socialism is merely the next step forward from state-capitalist monopoly.

‘. . . State-monopoly capitalism is a complete material preparation for socialism, the threshold of socialism, a rung on the ladder of history between which and the rung called socialism there are no intermediate rungs’ (pages 27 and 28).”

Lenin himself, then, is clear regarding what he meant by the quote. In a country where what Lenin called “patriarchal” production and “small commodity production” were pervasive, he envisioned “state capitalism” as a means of integrating small, isolated producers into a larger system of “national accounting and control of production and distribution.” It is in that sense, not in the sense of state bureaucrats operating as a new capitalist class, that Lenin understood state capitalism to be an important economic advance in the transition to socialism, which was viewed as something quite distinct (see numbers 4 and 5 in the quote). The idea that this stage could be skipped over, with petty producers being directly integrated into a smoothly operating planning apparatus, is utopian. Admittedly not any more utopian than the idea that workers have no need for their own state in the aftermath of a socialist revolution, or the idea that one can understand Lenin’s highly specific, contextually bound programmatic statements without having done any significant investigation into his political biography or even the history of the Russia circa 1918-1928. So, if nothing else, at least Lenin’s critics are consistent.

Certainly there are debatable criticisms that can be made of Lenin’s politics at various junctures of his life. But whatever the criticism, it should be an informed one, not the kind of dishonest distortions that have accumulated around out-of-context quotes. Such tactics do no credit to those deploying them, and short-circuit the process of intellectual and political development that must occur if socialist revolution is ever to be anything more than utopian moralizing.




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Hong Kong start-up Geb Impact looks to scale up microalgae cultivation as a sustainable source of protein

Geb Impact is conducting pilot production of microalgae with its proprietary technology, with plans to ramp up output to one metric tonne per month

The Hong Kong Innovation and Technology Fund has funded half of the start-up’s HK$2 million (US$257,000) project to scale up microalgae cultivation

Martin Choi
+ FOLLOW
Published: 4:00pm, 3 Oct, 2021


James Chang, founder and chief executive of Geb Impact Technology, displays food products made with ingredients from microalgae protein produced by the Hong Kong biotech start-up. 
Photo: Dickson Lee

Hong Kong biotech start-up Geb Impact Technology is eyeing the rapidly growing plant-based food market as a sustainable supplier of microalgae-based protein to food manufacturers.

As leading plant-based food producers, such as Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods, continue to benefit from increasing consumer demand, Geb Impact sees an opportunity to supply the sustainable ingredient made from microalgae.

“We are able to produce that protein sustainably, so if we become the supplier [for food manufacturers] in terms of that protein, there is no limit to how much they can produce,” said James Chang, founder and chief executive of Geb Impact.

Microalgae are single-cell microorganisms found in fresh and salt water that grow through photosynthesis, consuming carbon dioxide and producing oxygen. As microalgae do not compete for natural resources or farmland, they are considered one of the most promising sustainable sources of food ingredients.


Protein powder made from microalgae is poured into a dish at a research laboratory in Singapore. Microalgae are considered one of the most promising sustainable sources of food ingredients. Photo: AFP

Chang said microalgae can yield the equivalent of 30 to 50 metric tonnes per hectare, about 15 times more than soybeans, noting that this can go some way in alleviating the hunger crisis currently gripping the world. A United Nations report in July showed that there was a dramatic worsening in world hunger in 2020 caused by the pandemic, with nearly one in three people without access to adequate food.

The global plant-based food market is expected to reach US$74.2 billion by 2027, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.9 per cent from 2020 to 2027, according to a report by market intelligence provider Meticulous Research in September 2020.

“The pandemic has led to some best practice models for the plant-based products industry as the coronavirus epidemic has conveyed to the forefront the connection between public health and animal meat consumption, which provides consumers a ground to go for a plant-based diet,” Meticulous Research analysts wrote. “From a manufacturing and distributing point of view, this industry has faced unprecedented demand from manufacturers as well as consumers.”

“This is a potential disruptive product for the plant-based alternative protein [market], because of the high proliferation rate,” said Chang, noting that cost will come down as production is scaled up. “We are very confident that it can be a sustainable food source without having to become a victim of climate change or limited resources.”

Founded in 2013, Geb Impact is currently conducting pilot production of microalgae with its proprietary technology at their 13,000 sq ft facility in Sheung Shui. Their product: a freeze-dried microalgae powder containing dietary proteins, lipids and vitamins can be used as an ingredient in different food products.


Geb Impact has launched Eiyoka Algae Foods to showcase proof-of-concept products incorporating microalgae.
 Photo: Dickson Lee

The company aims to produce one metric tonne of microalgae powder per month and has partnered with Sweet Secrets, a health-conscious bakery, to create plant-based cupcakes with microalgae frosting. It also has a tie-up with plant-based culinary nutrition platform Our Conscious Kitchen to create an antioxidant spice blend.

The company hopes to partner with more restaurants, bakeries and chefs to bring microalgae-based food products to more consumers in Hong Kong, before expanding into China and the rest of south Asia, where there is a growing vegan market, said Chang.

Geb Impact has also launched Eiyoka Algae Foods to showcase proof-of-concept products incorporating microalgae, such as their shrimp roe noodles which can be bought online.

The start-up has received a grant from the Hong Kong Innovation and Technology Fund under the government’s Enterprise Support Scheme, funding half of their HK$2 million (US$257,000) project to scale up microalgae cultivation.

Impact investment firm Dao Foods International has also invested in Geb Impact to further develop microalgae cultivation and help extend their product reach into China.

Singapore scientists make bandages out of durian husks

Geb Impact was also looking for series A investment over the next two years, to hire new professionals and buy more equipment to scale their production and increase capacity to reach industrial levels.

“Ingredient companies are better positioned in the current environment of greater social and environmental awareness from consumers,” Credit Suisse Research Institute wrote in a report in June.

“We anticipate that ingredient companies will gain a greater share of the value chain as they aid manufacturers in improving innovation and speed to market.”
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Evolving Yeast Shows How Complex Life May Have Arose

Over two years, clumps of single-celled yeast grew into a multicellular structure that could explain how living organisms developed on early Earth

Ben Panko October 1, 2021


In researching the formation of these multicellular organisms, Ratcliff used a strain of snowflake yeast with budding “daughters” that tend to cling to their parents, allowing the creation of small clumps of connected yeast cells. A. Zamani, S. Cao and W. Ratcliff/Georgia Tech via Twitter

To many, it’s a familiar story—the simple, single-celled organisms living in the ancient Earth’s proverbial “primordial stew” slowly evolved into complex, multicellular organisms that today includes modern humans. But that crucial leap from unicellular to multicellular is poorly understood, in part due to scientists today having no real way to witness it happening. Now, new research that’s been released as a preprint explains how scientists have observed hundreds of thousands of yeast cells start to create multicellular groups, possibly modeling how this process played out.

“This is the coolest paper we’ve ever written,” evolutionary biologist and lead author Will Ratcliff of Georgia Tech told Michael Greshko of National Geographic.

Ratcliff has devoted the last decade working with yeast to better understand multicellular life. Some single-celled organisms such as yeast reproduce through the process of budding, in which a cell grows a small copy of itself protruding from its surface. That copy typically splits off from its parent cell when it reaches maturity, creating two independent, single-celled organisms.

While multicellular life comprises the most visible organisms on this planet today, it’s worth keeping in mind that for much of life’s existence on Earth, single-celled organisms were the only game in town, reports Veronique Greenwood of Quanta. It was only about 2 billion years after the first life on Earth is suspected to have formed that the first evidence of multicellular organisms exists in fossil records.

What motivated the evolution of single-celled organisms into multicellular organisms is still hotly debated, with some scientists suspecting that cells that clumped together could have better avoided being consumed by unicellular predators or more efficiently found resources.

In researching the formation of these multicellular organisms, Ratcliff used a strain of snowflake yeast with budding “daughters” that tend to cling to their parents, allowing the creation of small clumps of connected yeast cells. However, these clumps appeared to reach a maximum size when they grew to a few hundred cells in number.



To figure out why the yeast stopped growing, Ratcliff and his collaborators recalled that the early Earth had little oxygen compared to the modern day. After a few years of running experiments with several different mutations of yeast in varying levels of oxygen, the scientists noticed that the strains that consumed no oxygen started to grow into clumps large enough to be visible to the naked eye. It appeared that yeast clumps consuming oxygen would intentionally limit their size, likely so the cells inside the clump could have access to the rich energy source provided by the gas.

Remarkably, the large yeast structures become firm like gelatin as a result of their cellular structures becoming entangled with each other.

Inspired by a famous, decades-long experiment observing colonies of E. coli bacteria growing, the scientists behind the experiment hope to continue allowing the yeast in this study to evolve and observe how it changes.

“Not a lot of people want to do a 30-year-long evolutionary experiment,” Ratcliff told Greshko. “But I think the payoff here is huge.”


Ben Panko | READ MORE
Ben Panko is a staff writer for Smithsonian.com
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INDIGENOUS CAPITALI$M 

No need for federal involvement in Alberta coal mine review, First Nations say

Environment Minister said that First Nations had dropped

objections to federal involvement in review

Bob Weber · The Canadian Press · 
The existing Vista mine near Hinton is owned by the U.S. coal giant Cline Group and began shipping coal for export in May 2019. (Bighorn Mining)

Two Alberta First Nations say they're not convinced the federal government needs to be part of an environmental review for a large thermal coal mine expansion proposal in the province.

And both the Ermineskin and Whitefish Lake First Nations say they're concerned the review promised by federal Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson won't consider the economic impact that turning down the planned expansion would have.

"The scope of consultation must include [Whitefish Lake's impact and benefits agreement]," said a letter to the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada from Darryl Steinhauer, Whitefish Lake's consultation coordinator.

"In response, Canada has been clear that consultation on the reconsideration will not address the (agreement) or directly related matters."

Federal review

The statements come after Jonathan Wilkinson said Friday that First Nations had dropped their objections to federal involvement in a review of Coalspur Mines's project, which would create North America's largest thermal coal mine in the Rocky Mountain foothills west of Edmonton.

Wilkinson was announcing the reinstatement of a federal review, which is considered to be more rigorous than strictly provincial reviews. He had originally announced the review in 2020, after concluding the mine's footprint was large enough and its production big enough to cross federal thresholds.

But Ermineskin and Whitefish Lake support the project for its economic benefits and argued their treaty rights were violated when Wilkinson failed to confer with them. They took the federal government to court, requesting a judge order the minister to rethink his decision.

After the court suspended Wilkinson's decision and ordered him to reconsider, a series of meetings were held with affected First Nations. On Friday, Wilkinson said their concerns had been answered.

"We consulted very extensively with Ermineskin (First Nation) and Ermineskin has actually sent us a letter essentially withdrawing their objection to us going through the designation process," he said from Milan, where he was attending a climate conference.

But Carol Wildcat, the band's consultation director, said in a letter to the Impact Assessment Agency that Ermineskin still doesn't think Ottawa is needed.

"[Ermineskin]'s position is that a review of the [project] by the Alberta Energy Regulator is sufficient and that a review under the Impact Assessment Act is not necessary," she wrote. "[Ermineskin] neither supports or opposes a federal review of the projects."

But she also said any review must consider the band's financial concerns.

"[Ermineskin] will expect the [agency's] consultation process to address the potential impacts of (its) decisions about the projects on [the band's benefits agreement]."

A federal spokesperson was not immediately available for comment.

Wilkinson has said several times that new thermal coal projects don't fit with Canada's climate change policies and any new projects will have to surmount a high bar for approval.

Environment minister restores federal assessment of Hinton coal mine

By Bob Weber The Canadian Press
Posted October 1, 2021 
The existing Vista mine, which is owned by the U.S. coal giant Cline Group
 and operated by Bighorn Mining, near Hinton, Alta. Credit: Bighorn Mining

Federal Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson has reinstated his decision to subject a thermal coal mine expansion in Alberta to a federal review after a court ordered him to rethink it.


“Following the reconsideration process, I have determined that the physical activities warrant (federal) designation,” Wilkinson said in a statement regarding the proposed Vista expansion project.

The existing Vista mine began shipping coal for export in May 2019 and Coalspur Mines is seeking to expand the mine near Hinton in north central Alberta.

The expansion would make Vista the largest thermal coal mine in North America. The company also plans an underground test mine on the site.

READ MORE: The Coal Facts — thermal coal vs. metallurgical coal

A federal environmental review is required when a mine expands its footprint by 50 per cent or more, or if it plans to produce more than 5,000 tonnes of coal a day.

In the early stages of its development, Vista would come in just under those thresholds and the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada ruled in 2019 that Ottawa wouldn’t get involved.

But in 2020, Wilkinson decided that the footprint was close enough and that production would eventually exceed the level triggering a federal review.

He revoked the agency’s decision and ordered a joint federal-provincial process, considered to be a more rigorous than a purely provincial assessment.

That decision was challenged in Federal Court by Coalspur and Ermineskin First Nation.

Ermineskin supports the project for its economic benefits and argued its treaty rights were violated when Wilkinson failed to consult with them. Court agreed with Ermineskin and ordered Wilkinson to reconsider.

READ MORE: Feds urged to do own review of proposed coal mine expansion near Hinton

Since then, the agency has met with 44 First Nations, including Ermineskin.

“The agency held a series of meetings to ensure it fully understood Ermineskin’s perspectives and concerns with regard to the physical activities as well as the context surrounding the previous designation requests and processes,” said a statement from agency spokesman Stephane Perrault.

“The agency documented and included the feedback from Indigenous groups consulted during the reconsideration process to ensure their views were included in the analysis provided to the minister.”

A spokesman for Ermineskin was not immediately available to comment.

Coalspur’s application to Federal Court was thrown out after the Ermineskin ruling. A spokesman for the company wasn’t immediately available to say if that application would be refiled.

Wilkinson’s latest decision is based on reasons similar to those he initially cited.

He said Ottawa’s involvement is justified by the size of the planned expansion and its potential threats to areas of federal jurisdiction, such as contamination of waterways and habitat loss for species at risk. He also said the expansion would affect the treaty rights of other First Nations who oppose the project.

Wilkinson has also brought in a policy that states thermal coal mines are inconsistent with Ottawa’s plans to fight climate change.

Thermal coal, used to generate electricity, is one of the largest sources of greenhouse gases worldwide.

1:46 Coal-dependent communities say Alberta needs to do more to prepare for industry phase-out – Feb 12, 2018
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'MAYBE ' TECH WILL SAVE US
Aviation: Germany opens world's first plant for clean jet fuel

Sustainable fuels are seen as key to making carbon-neutral flying possible. But there are some major hurdles preventing these cleaner alternatives from getting off the ground.



There is a long way to go to make air travel eco-friendly

On the day that the International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced a commitment to reach "net zero" CO2 emissions by 2050, the nonprofit organization Atmosfair has opened the world's first plant to produce carbon-neutral jet fuel.

The group, which offers offsets for emissions from flights, announced Monday that its site in Emsland, in northern Germany, is expected to begin producing eight barrels (about 1 ton) of synthetic kerosene a day in early 2022. Atmosfair did not disclose how much the project cost or how it was funded.

Synthetic kerosene, also called e-kerosene or power-to-liquid (PtL), is seen as having huge potential to slash the aviation industry's carbon footprint. But there are a few reasons the green fuel hasn't taken off yet.

Flying is one of the most carbon-intensive ways to travel because planes are powered by fossil-based kerosene. The aviation sector is responsible for around 2 to 3% of global CO2 emissions, and it wants to reduce its footprint to half of 2005 levels by 2050. But decarbonization is going to be a huge challenge.
Why synthetic kerosene?

E-kerosene is a type of Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) that can be blended with conventional jet fuel to bring down flight emissions.

SAFs are mainly biofuels made from sustainable feedstocks, such as waste products or agriculture residues. They're seen as a promising alternative because they can reduce emissions by up to 80% over the lifetime of the fuel compared to fossil kerosene.


The Atmosfair plant in Emsland is aiming to produce carbon-neutral synthetic kerosene by combining hydrogen generated by renewable electricity (from nearby wind turbines) and sustainable carbon dioxide — captured from the air and biomass.

The output is to be mixed with conventional kerosene and transported to Hamburg Airport to fuel flights, including those of German carrier Lufthansa.

Current engines can technically run on up to 50% sustainable fuel, but that's far from being a reality right now. SAF production is currently about 0.1% of the total aviation fuel consumed globally, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
How much sustainable fuel is out there?

Some governments have introduced quotas in an effort to drive those numbers up. Germany, for example, wants 0.5% of the 10 million tons used by the German aviation industry each year to be e-kerosene by 2026, with that rising to 2% or 200,000 tons by 2030.


The Atmosfair plant is seen as a way to get the ball rolling on the manufacture of synthetic kerosene

The European Union has proposed setting a quota of 2% SAFs from 2025 with that rising to 5% — including a sub-quota of 0.7% for e-kerosene — from 2030.
E-kerosene, a game-changer?

Meeting those targets is going to require a massive ramp-up of production and as German Environment Minister Svenja Schulze pointed out at the inauguration of the e-kerosene production site that this only makes sense if renewables are ramped up at the same time.

"PtL fuels only serve climate protection if green hydrogen is used. For green hydrogen, we need much more electricity from renewable energies,” Schulze said, adding that the technology is available and functional. "It's now up to businesses to scale this and I hope many will follow the call.”


The Atmosfair plant in Emsland is only small, and isn't designed to run in the long-term, according to the organization's CEO and founder Dietrich Brockhagen.

"But we wanted to take the first step in Germany to try out the technology here and gain experience," he said.

Ulf Neuling, Renewable Fuels Group Leader at the Hamburg University of Technology, said the Atmosfair plant is "a step in the right direction to push the production of e-fuels for aviation and to start to get into commercial application."

But he stresses there will ultimately have to be bigger plants with higher production capacities if Germany wants to bring down the cost of e-fuels and scale-up the technology.



Pricey and energy-intensive

E-kerosene is currently four to five times more expensive than conventional jet fuel. It's also energy-intensive to produce, requiring large amounts of green carbon dioxide and green hydrogen.

Just powering domestic flights with e-fuels would require more renewable energy than Germany is currently able to produce.

About 40% of the electricity Germany produces still comes from fossil sources; 45% comes from renewables, but much of that is diverted to help other sectors decarbonize.

Atmosfair's Dietrich Brockhagen says current green electricity growth rates mean aviation worldwide could be fueled 100% by e-kerosene in less than a decade. But: "There is competition with other sectors, where electricity is needed more, such as rural electrification. So it's doable, but it's a question of resource allocation and distribution, and hence of policy priorities."

Neuling adds that the huge demand for green energy mean Germany will ultimately have to import electricity from other places with high potential to produce renewable electricity cheaply, such as North Africa, the Middle East or Latin America.



Germany wants 2% of aviation fuel to be synthetic by 2030.

A future of climate-neutral flights?

E-kerosene, provided it is produced with renewable electricity and available on a larger and more affordable scale, could play a significant role in making flying CO2-free — something that will likely take decades to happen.

Manuel Grebenjak, a campaigner with the Stay Grounded network, says the focus on testing alternative fuels to allow us to keep flying is a distraction from the real problem.

"We are in a climate emergency and have no time to lose. Only a reduction in air traffic can reduce emissions fast enough right now,” he said.

"At the same time we still do not produce enough renewable energy. So we have to decide: do we want to use precious green energy for essential things or for luxury activities of a global minority?”

Besides CO2, planes streaking across the sky release other gases and water vapor into the atmosphere that also contribute to global warming.

Atmosfair says optimizing flight routes and altitudes could help bring these non-CO2 effects of flying close to zero. But it acknowledges that this would require more fuel, and thus more electricity in the long run, given that the production of e-kerosene is so energy-intensive. It's just one more problem that will need to be tackled if climate-friendly flying is ever to become a reality.



SEVEN THINGS YOU MUST KNOW ABOUT FLYING
Dream destination, but climate nightmare
A return flight from Germany to the Maldives (8,000 km each way; about 5,000 miles) has an effect on the climate equivalent to releasing more than five tons of carbon dioxide per person, Germany's Environment Agency (UBA) says. A mid-range car would release the same amount after driving 25,000 km.





THE SOLUTION IS SIMPLE
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The economic case for strong action on climate change

Dan Riskin on paying to address climate change


Transitioning to a carbon neutral global economy won't be cheap, but as Dan Riskin reports, it will be easier to pay now than pay later.

CTVNews.ca
Published Sunday, October 3, 2021 

TORONTO -- By now, the environmental cost of inaction on climate change should be evident – but what about the economic cost?

In an effort to determine what various levels of climate action will mean financially, the European Central Bank recently analyzed three scenarios: political and business leaders staying the course on meeting the Paris Agreement targets, a decision to take less action now in order to save money, and nothing at all being done about climate change.

Projecting all three scenarios out 30 years and running a stress test, they found that one scenario was a clear winner when it comes to business profitability.

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CTV News Science and Technology Specialist Dan Riskin breaks it down in this week's Riskin Report.

  









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