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FIRST LOOK:

BloombergNEF and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy will host an event TODAY at 12:00 pm EST to answer questions about their tenth edition of the Sustainable Energy in America Factbook, and trends from the year in clean energy.  

'Still Keeping The Light On' — Solar Projects Come to Abandoned Coal Mines in SW Virginia: Six abandoned coal mines in southwest Virginia are being transformed into solar energy installations as part of an effort by the Nature Conservancy, the Washington Post reports. TNC hopes the project can be a model for similar sites nationwide. The conservation group views the Appalachian Mountains as one of the most critical regions on the planet for conservation and has purchased more than a quarter million acres of forest in the region. Partnering with Dominion Energy and Sun Tribe, TNC hopes to capitalize on the large areas flattened by mining operations near existing transmission lines and bring clean energy jobs to the overwhelmingly rural and Republican area that has lost more than 27,000 people since 2010. “We’re very proud to be an energy-producing community,” Lou Wallace, whose family has relied on coal for generations and who now chairs the Russell County Board of Supervisors, told the Post. “This is helping us to reimagine how we produce energy. So we’re still able to say we’re keeping the lights on somewhere.” (Washington Post $)

Possible Gas Explosion Rocks Maryland Apartment Complex: A massive explosion ripped through a Silver Spring, Maryland, apartment complex including affordable housing units Thursday, sending at least 10 people to the hospital, three with critical injuries, and displacing 100 more. Some residents reported smelling gas before the explosion, one telling NBC Washington of a "heavy smell of gas" when he left the building before the blast, and the smell of gas hung in the air as first responders helped residents into ambulances. The explosion was reminiscent of a gas explosion in 2016, also in Silver Spring, that killed seven and wounded dozens more. (Explosion: Washington Post $, WUSA-9, WBAL, Washington Post $, AP)WTOP, FOX 5, New York Times $, NBC; Heavy smell of gas: NBC4)

Choice Of Climate Action Or Gas And Oil Confronts Biden As Industry Fights Over Building Codes: As Republicans and the oil and gas industry (falsely) blame the Biden administration's efforts to address climate change for contributing to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the gas, a new report concludes one proposed Alaska oil and gas project could undo all of the administration's efforts to expand renewables on public lands. The report released by the Center for American Progress found ConocoPhillips' Willow Project in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska would cause 260 million metric tons of CO2 pollution, far outstripping the administration's claimed 129 million metric tons of CO2 pollution avoided by renewable energy projects on public lands. Meanwhile, HuffPost reports, the gas industry is also waging a campaign to kill a provision of model building codes that would aid increased adoption of EVs, an arcane process with major implications. (Gas or climate: E&E News; Willow Project: E&E $; Building codes: HuffPost)

OIL WAR$: 'People will feel that': Fed's Powell says war could fuel inflation (Politico)

EXTREMELY NORMAL: Powell: Expect banks to shift climate risk to taxpayers (E&E $)

"GREEN" GREEN: Sustainable finance is poised to fund the future of the planet, addressing climate change, equity, and governance (Business Insider), Almost all climate-related corporate disclosures are inadequate, CDP says (Reuters), TotalEnergies target of lawsuit to test ‘greenwashing’ in advertising (FT), Sustainable finance is poised to fund the future of the planet, addressing climate change, equity, and governance (Business Insider)

OPINION: Senate Republicans must end their block of well qualified Federal Reserve nominees (The Hill, Reps. Maxine Waters, Alma Adams, and Joyce Beatty op-ed

WAR IN EUROPE: Fossil fuel companies are exploiting Russia's attack on Ukraine (Popular Information), Russia's invasion of Ukraine could set back fight against climate change — or turbocharge it (Yahoo), Ukraine war prompts European reappraisal of its energy supplies (The Guardian), Big oil is exiting Russia. What does that mean for the climate? (Grist), Europe could cut Russian gas imports by over a third in a year, IEA says (Reuters), Turn down heating by 1C to reduce need for Russian imports, Europeans told (The Guardian, TIME), Italy won't find it easy to kick Russian gas habit (Reuters), Arctic Council in upheaval over Russia as climate change transforms region (Reuters), Gas and aluminium hit fresh records; oil, wheat soar on supply turmoil (Reuters), Mining companies may pause growth plans amid Ukraine war, inflation (Reuters), War threatens supply of ‘green’ aluminum for cars, beer cans (E&E News), While other oil majors pull out of Russia, Chevron says Caspian pipeline is ‘key’ (Houston Chronicle), What we know about Ukraine’s shelled nuclear plant (Bloomberg $)

• SANCTIONS: Bipartisan bill banning Russian oil sets up clash with White House (Politico, Washington Post $, AP, New York Times $, The Hill, Axios, The Hill), EU sanctions would gradually deplete Russia's oil revenues - EU energy chief (Reuters), Total’s top financier urged to sever ties due to Russia exposure (Bloomberg), Climate groups press banks, asset managers to sever Russian ties (Bloomberg $)
• US IMPACTS: 'People will feel that': Fed's Powell says war could fuel inflation (Politico Pro $), War scrambles US energy from oil to nuclear (E&E News)

DEFENDING DEMOCRACY: ‘Traitors get shot’: son testifies against father in Jan. 6 trial (New York Times $, NPR, Business Insider, CNN)

WORDS AND THEIR MEANINGS: The ironic effort to wave away climate change in favor of ‘clean air’ (Washington Post $)

PLASTICS: For the first time, nations band together in a move toward ending plastics pollution (Inside Climate News, Grist)

AUSTRALIA FLOODING: Australia ‘underprepared’ for deadly floods despite decades of climate warnings, expert says (The Independent), Are eastern Australia’s catastrophic floods really a one-in-1,000 year event? (The Guardian), ‘Black hole’: telecommunications outage hampering flood rescues and recovery in northern NSW (The Guardian), 'We are doing our best’: rescuers fear for animals injured in NSW and Queensland floods (The Guardian), ‘We’ve run out of lettuce’: supermarkets and restaurants face fresh food shortage after NSW and Queensland floods (The Guardian), Liberal MP wants Coalition to expand $10bn scheme supporting insurers to cover all natural disasters (The Guardian)

SOCIAL COSTS OF POLLUTION: Biden admin asks 5th Circuit to revive carbon metric (E&E $)

IPCC WG2: Five key points in the IPCC report on climate change impacts and adaptation (The Conversation), UN report paints dire picture of the Gulf of Mexico’s future (AP)

CLIMATE DIPLOMACY: Economic ties among nations spur peace. or do they? (New York Times $)

SCOTUS: Supreme Court climate skeptics will help decide the fate of the planet (Slate)

AGENCIES: USDA emphasizes flood control in face of climate disasters (E&E News)

EPA: Enviros seek to defend Biden EPA fuel efficiency rule (E&E $), Inside the Trump EPA’s final moves on climate (E&E News)

DOI: Interior announces 7 political hires (E&E $), Watchdog dismisses whistleblower complaint against BIA (E&E News)

THE HILL: Soil ‘moonshot’ boosters target Farm Bill to aid climate fight (Bloomberg Government)

HOUSE: House approves bill to help veterans exposed to toxics (E&E News), Pelosi tepid on federal gas tax holiday (Politico Pro $)

SENATE: US senators grill [FERC] regulators over climate policy on natural gas projects (Reuters, Politico Pro $), Manchin outlines energy demands as Dems mull next steps (E&E News)

ELECTIONS: [LCV] backs Casten over Dem challenger (E&E $)

NOMINEES & CONFIRMATIONS: Democrats court GOP support for Supreme Court nominee (E&E News)

CITIES AND STATES: The end of oil drilling in L.A. (The New Yorker $), Kentucky bill would divest from financial companies that boycott fossil fuels (WKYU)

• FLORIDA: Florida bill could obliterate the state’s up-and-coming solar industry (Canary Media), Florida House passes bill to establish climate change resiliency office (The Hill)
• CALIFORNIA: This California city's attempt to charge people for driving back-fired. Here's why that matters for everyone (TIME)

FERC: Ohio ratepayer advocate asks FERC to end RTO return on equity 'adder' for AEP, Duke, FirstEnergy (Utility Dive),  FERC hearing: Gas fights, Manchin and a 'snowball effect' (E&E $)

IMPACTS: Dengue, lyme, and cholera: how climate change is spurring disease (Grist), Scientists warn seawalls can make rising waters worse in the long run (Climate Home), The arctic seafloor is degrading and could be a climate time bomb (Vice)

DROUGHT: Climatologists: Drought to worsen in Oregon, Idaho this year (AP)

FLOODING: NC State study: More than a million square miles of US at risk of flood damage (Observer)

GEOENGINEERING: Can cloud seeding help quench the thirst of the US west? (Yale Environment 360)

EMISSIONS: Fossil fuel dominance will limit US emissions decline through 2050, EIA says (Politico Pro $)

RENEWABLES: Australia's Macquarie to launch offshore wind energy business (Reuters), Clean energy broke records in 2021 but still can’t catch up with oil and gas (The Verge), Explaining the record-breaking offshore wind sale (Inside Climate News), Study: offshore wind can disrupt radar on fishing boats (E&E $), Portland schools, in new climate policy, say no to renewable gas (Portland Business Journal $)

LNG: Venture Global brings Calcasieu Pass LNG plant online with first cargo (Houston Chronicle)

OIL & GAS: Why $100 oil could hurt the energy transition more than it helps (Reuters explainer), [Persian] Gulf bourses rise amid scramble for resources (Reuters), Bid to ban Russian oil imports gains steam on Capitol Hill (E&E News), Can African gas replace Russian supplies to Europe? (Al Jazeera), Global climate change report has implications for New Mexico drought, oil and gas (Carlsbad Current Argus)

COAL: ‘Off the charts’: Coal prices surge as West shuns Russia (E&E News)

UTILITIES: Electricity prices and customer debt are rising: 'There will be suffering,' warns consumer advocate (Utility Dive)

GRID: EnergyHub buys Packetized Energy to get millions of thermostats and EVs to help balance the grid (Canary Media)

EVs: Approval procedure for Tesla factory near Berlin completed - Handelsblatt (Reuters), Ford reorganizes to better make EVs (E&E $), Putting a charge in the gas-guzzling power boat industry (Axios), When electric cars rule the road, they’ll need spots to power up (New York Times $), Sony and Honda announce tie-up to make electric cars (New York Times $)

TREES: Terraformation targets $100 million for early stage forestry fund (Reuters)

NEW$ YOU CAN U$E: How to divest your 401(k) from fossil fuels (Canary Media), Incandescent lightbulbs are on the way out. Here's how to shop for more efficient replacements. (Washington Post $)

BUSINESS: Companies are accelerating their investment in combating the climate crisis (Business Insider)

WILDLIFE: How corals can be ‘trained’ to cope with heat stress from climate crisis (The Independent), This map shows where biodiversity is most at risk in America (New York Times $), Together, toxics and climate change hinder fish growth (Environmental Health News)

• Russia's attack on Ukraine is a clear warning to US to become energy independent with renewables (The Hill, Admiral Dewnnis McGinn (Ret.) op-ed)
• Sarah Bloom Raskin belongs at the fed (Wall Street Journal, Alan Blinder op-ed $)
• Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination to the Supreme Court signals historic change (Scalawag Magazine, Anita Hill op-ed)
• We cling to our memory of the perfect summer – before flood, fire and plague. But the past is gone and we have to wake up (The Guardian, Brigid Delaney op-ed)
• Why the Bronx can lead on electrifying buildings for community health and jobs (Bronx Times, Nathalia Fernández and Keith Kinch op-ed)
• Putin has world over an oil barrel, proving why we can't cut deals with dictators (Houston Chronicle, Chris Tomlinson column)
• Europe prepares for high gas prices to last into 2023 (Reuters, John Kemp op-ed)
• Ukraine crisis reinvigorates Biden’s build back better agenda (Energy Monitor, Justin Gerdes op-ed)
• Southwest’s dryness shifts rivalries over water (Christian Science Monitor, The Christian Science Monitor Editorial Board)

Bloomberg, Politico and AP Coverage Of Ukraine-Related Energy Myths Show the Do’s and Don’ts Of Disinfo Reporting

Last week, we pointed out how disinformation peddlers and outlets sprang into action in the immediate chaos and confusion of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, blaming greens from Greta to President Biden for Russia’s aggression. 

Since then, Republicans have only further doubled-down on the patently ridiculous notion that climate activists calling for clean energy instead of fossil fuels are responsible for continued reliance on fossil fuels, and thankfully, political journalists are starting to report on it. 

Ben Lefebvre and Zack Colman, for example, wrote a piece at Politico taking apart the GOP’s latest disinfo talking points, though really, all you need to read is the headline: Republicans seize on Ukraine to attack Biden's climate policies. But the facts are against them.

Making sure that even non-readers who are skimming headlines are informed that the political propaganda covered is false is one of the most important things journalists can do when covering disinformation, because an order of magnitude more people will skim the headline than will actually click through to read the content. 

And they’d miss out, because the Politico piece not only clearly describes how Republicans are trying to “link President Joe Biden’s climate policy and rising gasoline prices to the war in Ukraine,” but more importantly that “their rhetoric largely defies reality.” 

Instead of heavily quoting from the disinformation, the piece largely links out to reference it, only including actual quotes between content properly contextualizing it as false or misleading, for example explaining that Biden hasn’t limited oil exports at all, that “the Interior Department processed more oil and gas drilling permits during Biden’s first year in office than the Trump administration did in its final year” and that domestic oil production in the US is “close to where it was before the Covid-era collapse in fuel demand in 2020.” 

Politico does quote Republicans blaming Biden’s Keystone XL cancellation for high oil prices, but only to then point out that it “wouldn't be transporting oil now even if Biden had allowed the project to proceed” and just as importantly, “it hasn't stopped shipments from Canada” so that oil is still on the global market. 

They even include a reference to how ridiculous it is, writing that “many energy experts roll their eyes at the notion that shifting toward green energy was putting countries at the mercy of producers like Russia.” 

Going a step further, they even, somehow, got a quote from the head of Ukraine’s national natural gas company, who told them, “The move to renewables was and is the right thing to do, but it is intertwined with geopolitics. The success of both the climate change fight and containing Russia depends on how the world manages the simultaneous transition from dependence on both Russia and fossil fuels."

In a fair world where Republicans were bound by truth and reality, Politico’s debunking of the myth would put it to rest, and we’d move on to the next good-faith debate. But of course this world is not fair, and no one can stop liars from telling lies. 

But you can at least try and balance them with the truth, which is what a recent Bloomberg story by Ari Natter and Jennifer Dlouhy does, reporting on Big Oil’s efforts to exploit the Ukraine war but including some great quotes and analysis to let readers know the reality that, for example while the industry is clamoring for more permits to drill, they're already sitting on around 9,000 unused permits. 

API and others were pushing for the Biden administration to lift what few regulations are in place to constrain their pollution before Russia even breached the Ukrainian border. As Collin Rees of Oil Change International told Bloomberg, that industry is “trying to take incredibly cynical advantage of a really tragic situation. That makes it all the more clear we need to break our dependence on fossil fuels around the world and that means more distributed renewables.”

A similar call from the nuclear industry to pad their profits with public funds was described in the Bloomberg story as “shameless opportunism,” by Ediwn Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists. 

Those sorts of quotes are important because they let readers know that the claims are as ridiculously false and self-serving as they seem, there isn’t some secret sophistication, it’s just sophistry. 

None of that, unfortunately, comes through in an Associated Press piece by Matthew Daly, which largely and uncritically repeats the oil industry and Republicans' false attacks, and makes no attempt to inform readers that the claims are false. The same narratives that Bloomberg and Politico point out are wrong are parroted in the AP, but without any mention that Keystone’s cancellation doesn’t change anything, or that there are plenty of oil and gas leases already available so a moratorium on new leases doesn’t mean a thing for 2021 and 2022. 

Given that the AP's recent move to expand its climate reporting with philanthropic funding spurred a flurry of disinformation, they would do well to improve their disinfo reporting before they’re tricked into reporting false attacks on themselves. 

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