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    Trump news at a glance: president’s ‘board of peace’ set to meet, minus some key US allies

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    Some European leaders have criticised the organisation’s murky funding and political mandate – key US politics stories from Wednesday 18 February at a glanceDozens of world leaders and national delegations will meet in Washington DC on Thursday for the inaugural meeting of Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, as major European allies declined to join the group and criticised the organisation’s murky funding and political mandate.The White House has indicated that the summit for his new ad hoc council at the renamed Donald J Trump Institute of Peace will heavily function as a fundraising round, with Trump announcing on social media that countries have pledged more than $5bn toward rebuilding Gaza, which has been devastated in the war with Israel and remains in a humanitarian crisis. Continue reading… More

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      Trump has done more than harm the government’s ability to fight global heating | Jamil Smith

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      By repealing the EPA’s determination that greenhouse gases threaten public health, the president is denying reality itselfThe climate crisis is killing people. These deaths are measurable, documented and ongoing. Concluding otherwise is just playing pretend. Studies explain the mechanics, but lived experience supplies the truth. The people who suffer the consequences see the fire rising and water closing in. They need their government’s help.Despite that, the president of the United States stood at a microphone last Thursday and abdicated his duty to them. “It has nothing to do with public health,” he claimed about the climate crisis while announcing that the federal government would repeal the Environmental Protection Agency’s “endangerment finding”, a determination that greenhouse gases endanger human health and welfare. “This is all a scam, a giant scam.”Jamil Smith is a Guardian US columnist Continue reading… More

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      Democratic senators launch inquiry into EPA’s repeal of key air pollution enforcement measure

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      Senators said repeal was ‘particularly troubling’ and was counter to EPA’s mandate to protect human healthMore than three dozen Democratic senators have begun an independent inquiry into the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) following a huge change in how the agency measures the health benefits of reducing air pollution that is widely seen as a major setback to US efforts to combat the climate crisis.In a regulatory impact analysis, the EPA said it would stop assigning a monetary value to the health benefits associated with regulations on fine particulate matter and ozone. The agency argued that the estimates contain too much uncertainty. Continue reading… More

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      More pollution and higher energy costs: critics condemn Trump’s anti-environment agenda

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      US courts, scholars and Democrats are pushing back against the president’s aggressive drive to boost fossil fuelsDonald Trump’s aggressive drive to boost fossil fuels, including dirty coal, coupled with his administration’s moves to roll back wind and solar power, face mounting fire from courts, scholars and Democrats for raising the cost of electricity and worsening the climate crisis.Four judges, including a Trump appointee, in recent weeks have issued temporary injunctions against interior department moves to halt work on five offshore wind projects in Virginia, New York and New England, which have cost billions of dollars and are far along in development. Continue reading… More

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      Trump’s EPA reapproves contentious weedkiller dicamba for some GM crops

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      Environmental groups said dicamba drift has damaged vegetable farms, trees and other critical plantsThe Environmental Protection Agency on Friday reapproved the weedkiller dicamba for use on genetically modified soybeans and cotton, a pesticide that has raised widespread concern over its tendency to drift and destroy nearby crops.The agency said dicamba was critical for farmers who would otherwise have their crops threatened by fast growing weeds. To ensure the pesticide is used safely, the agency said it imposed strong protections and limits on its use. Continue reading… More

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      What Trump’s plans for the Arctic mean for the global climate crisis

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      With plans to sell off over a million acres of natural habitat for oil and gas development, the Trump administration is ignoring the dire impact on its fragile ecosystem• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereThis week, the Trump administration took a key step towards opening new leases for oil and gas drilling across millions of acres in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge – a pristine and biodiverse expanse in northern Alaska and one of the last wildlands in the US still left untouched.With a call for nominations officially issued on Tuesday, the US Bureau of Land Management began evaluating plots across the 1.5 million-acre Coastal Plain at the heart of the refuge – an area often referred to as the American Serengeti, thanks to its rich tundra ecosystems, which provide habitat for close to 200 species and serve as the traditional homelands of the Iñupiat and Gwichʼin peoples.Flawed economic models mean climate crisis could crash global economy, experts warnFossil fuel firms may have to pay for climate damage under proposed UN taxThe lithium boom: could a disused quarry bring riches to Cornwall?Trump’s Greenland threats open old wounds for Inuit across Arctic‘Erasure of years of work’: outcry as White House moves to open Arctic reserve to oil and gas drillingArctic endured year of record heat as climate scientists warn of ‘winter being redefined’ Continue reading… More

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      Here’s why US household energy bills are soaring – and how to fix it | Mark Wolfe

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      Trump has prioritized fossil fuel companies over consumers, hitting the lowest-income families hardestDonald Trump promised to cut energy prices by 50%. Instead, average electricity prices over the past year have risen by about 6.7%, while natural gas prices have increased by 10.8%. Energy prices are influenced by many factors beyond any president’s direct control, including market conditions, weather-driven demand, regional infrastructure constraints and the rapid growth of energy-intensive datacenters that are driving new system costs. Policy choices do not determine prices on their own, but they do shape market outcomes, and the direction of this administration’s energy policy has been clear.From his first days in office, President Trump made clear that his energy agenda would prioritize fossil fuel producers over consumers. His administration moved to expand US liquefied natural gas exports, increasing exposure to volatile global markets. At the same time, it froze wind power projects that provide some of the cheapest new electricity, intervened to keep costly coal plants running, and backed the elimination of energy-efficiency tax credits that lower household energy bills.Mark Wolfe is executive director of National Energy Assistance Directors Association, co-director of the Center on Energy Poverty and Climate and adjunct faculty at the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy at George Washington University Continue reading… More