Web 57DHYAFZZFLWFYB May 21 2026 Iván Cepeda in Presidential Election in Colombia May 31st

In this Webisode       1A United States       Geothermal Energy        1B United States        Congress            Electric Vehicle Fees and Plug In Hybrid Fees to repair roads could depress sales           1C United States          RFK Junior              COVID 19 Vaccine         The FDA Analysis of Child Deaths After COVID Shot Released by Republican Senator Ron Johnson     Instead of Ten deaths   Five deaths are reviewed             1D United States         RFK Junior Fires Leaders of Key Health Task Force             1E United States            RFK Junior Taps Temp Surgeon General            1F United States         RFK Junior            The Political Purpose of MAHA            Why distrust in scientific agencies became politically useful to an administration seeking to weaken them       2A California              Tight Curves and Wide Horizons         The Return of Highway 1          2B California   and New York         Democrats in June Primaries          There is a San Francisco area Democratic Primary race for US House of Representatives for the seat now held by Nancy Pelosi     and a Race for the New York City Seat also           3 Colorado           The State of Colorado Charts Its Own Course on Vaccines Amid Federal Pullback          4 Michigan            Bernie Sanders backs climate activist in close Michigan congressional primary       5 New York           E Bikes used as Cargo Bikes by Amazon            6 Texas            The Tesla Newest Electric Vehicle Could Jolt the Trucking Industry           7 Colombia           Iván Cepeda runs for President May Thirty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six to continue environmental policies of President Gustavo Petro       Main Content         

1A United States           Geothermal Energy            Let us get caught up Worst case scenario revised down Largely because of the growth in renewable energy a committee of climate experts from around the world has revised down its projection of a possible worst case scenario for global warming     It is a small bit of good news but that did not stop Trump from weighing in on social media and arguing that Democrats have used climate activism to scare Americans and fund their bogus research programs    The bad news Even after the revisions the planet is still dangerously heating up increasingly the likelihood of disastrous effects    A few dozen people standing onstage clapping with NASDAQ and Fervo signs visible    Executives of Fervo and others celebrated the geothermal company IPO on the Nasdaq on May Thirteenth    The case for geothermal power         Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times         May Twenty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six            For more than a year President Trump and his allies have attacked wind and solar power while promoting fossil fuels    Yet there is one type of clean energy that has escaped their wrath geothermal    Last week Fervo a geothermal company based in Houston made its stock market debut raising One Point Eight Nine Billion Dollars in its initial public offering    It was the biggest clean tech IPO of all time giving Fervo a valuation of more than Ten Billion Dollars    Using techniques borrowed from the oil and gas industry companies like Fervo drill into the Earth tapping into natural heat that when mixed with water creates steam and powers turbines that make emissions free electricity    The appeal of geothermal is clear    America is in an energy crunch    Electricity demand is soaring thanks to data centers industrial activity and electric vehicles    New wind and solar projects are being slowed or canceled and there is a major backlog of natural gas turbines    And while the Trump administration has taken to extending the life of some coal plants  there is  still an enormous gap between energy supply and demand    The theoretical impact is huge    There is roughly Thirty Eight Hundred megawatts of conventional geothermal capacity in the United States    The International Energy Agency now estimates that geothermal could provide Fifteen percent of the energy needs of the world by Two Thousand Fifty with sufficient investment    Wood Mackenzie an energy research firm asked whether the industry could be the next North American gold rush     What is  more because geothermal can provide what the energy industry calls always on base load power it is a welcome compliment to intermittent sources of power such as solar and wind    The potential is very large and we need new kinds of supply that can balance an increasingly solar heavy grid said a director at RMI an energy consultancy    It looks like geothermal is sort of the perfect match for that    A growing market the Fervo valuation reflects investor enthusiasm for what could be a big new sector of the energy industry    For years geothermal companies struggled to gain traction and raise money    But that has changed recently as venture capital firms and corporations have spent billions backing a new generation of startups trying to tap into the subterranean heat of the Earth    Other companies including XGS Energy and Quaise Energy are also trying to break into the market    A Fervo geothermal drilling site in Milford Utah    Plus there is the political support    Even as the Trump administration has moved to cancel offshore wind projects and slow solar development the Department of Energy recently announced One hundred Seventy One million dollars for geothermal field tests    The obvious difference here is the connection to the oil and gas industry the Representative from RMI said    Another factor is that geothermal can produce sustained power and adjust its output to meet demand which addresses a main critique about technologies like wind and solar    The ability of geothermal to be both base load and load following is consistent with how Republicans have talked about the challenges of renewable energy    Long way to go         Geothermal will not satisfy the huge appetite of America for energy anytime soon    Analysts say that even with government support it will be many years before geothermal power is providing a meaningful portion of the power of the country    In order for that to happen Fervo and other geothermal companies will have to overcome several substantial hurdles    First is the matter of bringing operational plants online    The Fervo first commercial plant in Utah expects to start sending electricity to the grid this year    Even if other plants get built they will have to face the same challenges other energy producers do when trying to plug in to an antiquated grid that is badly in need of new investment    Then there is the price    Right now geothermal is more expensive than other energy sources including natural gas and solar    Big companies including Google have agreed to pay a premium for some power in a bid to support the nascent industry    In order for geothermal to scale analysts say it will have to be cost competitive with other power sources    RENEWABLE ENERGY         Clean hydrogen massive potential could be underground Outside the city of Thetford Mines Quebec in a region that once supplied the world with asbestos workers are drilling in search of an unusual and potentially vast new source of clean energy     A start up called Vema Hydrogen has drilled two test wells into the bedrock each One Thousand Feet deep and is starting to inject treated water into the iron rich rocks below    The goal is to trigger a chemical reaction that could eventually produce large quantities of hydrogen a clean burning fuel that may one day play a vital role in tackling climate change    

1B United States        Congress            Electric Vehicle Fees and Plug In Hybrid Fees to repair roads could depress sales           NUMBERS OF THE DAY One Hundred Thirty Dollars compared to  Thirty Five Dollars            Under a bipartisan bill introduced this week in Congress owners of electric vehicles would have to pay a One Hundred Thirty Dollar annual fee and plug in hybrid owners would have to pay Thirty Five Dollars    Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times     May Twenty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six            The money would go to cover their share of the cost to repair roads which could further depress sales of those models    Sponsors of the bill said the federal fee on top of any existing state fee would make sure that electric vehicle owners contributed to road maintenance which is partly funded by the federal gasoline and diesel taxes Jack Ewing writes     But auto industry and environmental groups said the fee was substantially higher than the average fuel taxes paid by owners of gasoline cars  

1C United States          RFK Junior              COVID 19 Vaccine         The FDA Analysis of Child Deaths After COVID Shot Released by Republican Senator Ron Johnson     Instead of Ten deaths   Five deaths are reviewed               Review was not exactly as described by former FDA leadership      Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          MedPage Today      May Nineteenth Two Thousand Twenty Six            Senator Ron Johnson Republican of  Wisconsin    released the FDA analysis on pediatric deaths tied to COVID shots that was touted by former FDA leadership but never made public    Last November former Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research Director Vinay Prasad MD MPH issued a memo to staff claiming that at least Ten children died due to a COVID shot    But the number in the analysis is lower and there is  much less certainty about the links between the vaccines and the deaths    Five deaths were possibly related to the shots and two were probably related according to the analysis which was dated December 5 Two Thousand Twenty Five    There were no deaths that were certain to be related to the shots    The review also noted that more than 95 million doses of the Pfizer Comirnaty and more than Forty Two million doses of the Moderna Spikevax had been given to kids under age Twelve by August Fourteen Two Thousand Twenty Five the cutoff date for the review    The author of the report is redacted but it states that officials reviewed reports to the FDA Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System VAERS turning up Ninety Six unique US pediatric death reports as of the August date  Seventy Nine after the Pfizer shot and Seventeen after the Moderna original shot    There were no reports related to the Novavax Nuvaxovid or the Moderna m Nex spike    Medical officers reviewed and discussed each individual case including any available medical records and autopsy reports    Causality assessment was based on group discussion and consensus using the WHO Uppsala Monitoring Centre system for standardized case causality assessment    Cases were classified as certain probable or likely possible or unlikely or conditional or un assessable    Autopsy reports were available for all seven possible or probable cases    The five possible and two probable cases involved cardiac events most were myocarditis 4 or myocarditis with stress cardiomyopathy 1    The other cases described cardiomyopathy without myocarditis 1 and cardiac arrhythmia 1    Five cases were males two were females and they ranged in age from Seven to Sixteen years    All events occurred after the Pfizer vaccine  six after the original monovalent shot and one after the bivalent shot  and the median time to symptom onset was Three days    The report noted that possible cases could also be explained by an alternative etiology and the probable cases are unlikely to be attributed to an alternative etiology but one cannot be ruled out    Of the remaining cases Sixty Two were classified as unlikely and Twenty Seven as un assessable or unclassifiable    The analysis described the findings as new safety information recommending potential safety labeling changes    

1D United States         RFK Junior Fires Leaders of Key Health Task Force           The health secretary has undermined the work of the US Preventive Services Task Force over the past year                  Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times        May 20 Two Thousand Twenty Six               The Trump administration has fired two leaders of the U   S    Preventive Services Task Force an influential panel of experts who determine what medical screenings and procedures insurance companies must cover for millions of Americans at no cost    The two leaders Doctor John Wong and Doctor Esa Davis received letters notifying them of their firings on May Eleventh    In the letters Health Secretary RFK Junior wrote that he had directed a review of U S P S T F  appointments to ensure clarity continuity and confidence in the Department exercise of its appointment and supervisory responsibilities and to protect the integrity of the Task Force work    He goes on to say that the appointments of Doctor Wong and Doctor Davis are terminated effective immediately in order to avoid uncertainty that could jeopardize the validity of future Task Force actions    The task force assesses scientific evidence and makes recommendations on a wide range of medical services including mammograms colonoscopies depression screenings and more    Under the Affordable Care Act most insurance plans must fully cover services that it assigns an A or B grade    That gives the panel significant influence over the care Americans can afford    The letters say the terminations are not related to the performance of the leaders and that they are free to reapply for positions on the task force    Public health experts have been worried for much of the past year that RFK Junior would summarily remove members of the task force as he did last year with a panel that reviews vaccines    Aaron Carroll the president of Academy Health a nonpartisan group that promotes evidence based health policy and previously urged RFK Junior not to interfere with U S P S T F  said the credibility of the task force depended on transparent and rigorous procedures both for appointing members and for evaluating evidence    By firing its leaders before their terms had ended the Trump administration is tampering with the critical infrastructure that makes it possible for Americans to trust government health care systems Doctor Carroll said    Last month RFK Junior said he planned to reform the panel which he called lackadaisical and negligent    Over the past year RFK Junior has undermined the work of the task force by indefinitely postponing its last three meetings and not replacing members whose terms were scheduled to end in December    The committee issued fewer recommendations last year because it was unable to meet and it did not publish a legally mandated annual report to Congress on gaps in scientific evidence a report that helps guide what research the federal government funds    

1E United States            RFK Junior Taps Temp Surgeon General            Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          MedPage Today           May 20 Two Thousand Twenty Six           HHS Secretary RFK Junior tapped health official and family medicine physician Stephanie Haridopolos MD to temporarily take on the duties of the surgeon general         But the HHS leadership vacuum continues not just at FDA and CDC but also at NIH where Fifteen out of Twenty Seven institute directorate positions remain unfilled    HHS has started to convert hundreds of it senior employees to a new job classification that could make it easier to fire them and replace with political appointees    The federal government caps on student loans projected to affect nurses physician assistants and other healthcare workers are being challenged in court by Twenty Four states and the District of Columbia    Actor Noah Wyle who stars on the Pitt is expected to join lawmakers and hundreds of healthcare workers on Capitol Hill on Thursday to push for three healthcare bills    

1F United States         RFK Junior            The Political Purpose of MAHA            Why distrust in scientific agencies became politically useful to an administration seeking to weaken them       Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization           The New York Times         May 20 Two Thousand Twenty Six         This week it was reported that HHS will lay off another round of employees as the Trump administration continues its dramatic downsizing of the federal health workforce    The new notices come amid a historic downsizing of HHS that has eliminated roughly Twenty Thousand positions and shrunk the department by about Twenty Five Percent since the start of the Trump second term    Roughly Ten Thousand employees were laid off in Two Thousand Twenty Five while another Ten Thousand accepted deferred resignation offers or early retirement packages as entire offices and programs across agencies like the CDC NIH FDA and SAMHSA were eliminated or consolidated    At the same time we found out that the Trump administration is also moving to reclassify hundreds of senior federal positions in ways that would weaken longstanding civil service protections and make many career employees significantly easier to fire    This would ultimately give the administration far greater control over parts of the federal workforce that have historically operated with more insulation from direct political pressure    Together these actions reflect the broader vision outlined in Project Two Thousand Twenty Five  and repeatedly discussed before the election to shrink the federal workforce weaken the independence of federal agencies and consolidate more power under the executive branch    The MAHA movement did not just help bring additional voters and energy into the Trump coalition    It also helped amplify anti institutional distrust to audiences the traditional Republican political ecosystem could not have reached nearly as effectively on its own    Instead of talking primarily about deregulation executive power or shrinking the federal bureaucracy the message became something far more simple and emotionally resonant your children are sick because corrupt public health institutions allowed it to happen    Your food is poisoned because federal agencies are captured    You cannot trust the CDC FDA NIH or medical establishment because they are working for corporations rather than the public    Then after the Trump administration took power Russ Vought became director of the Office of Management and Budget and immediately began working to enact his ideological agenda and traumatize federal workers    This is ultimately why despite all of the rhetoric about making America healthy again this administration continues enacting policy after policy that actively undermines the things actually required to improve health in this country    Because despite what many everyday people within the movement genuinely believed or hoped for the MAHA movement was never about improving health    It was always a political tool for the Republican Party to carry out their agenda centered on advancing corporate and ideological interests consolidating more political control over the executive branch shrinking the federal workforce weakening independent federal agencies and dismantling parts of the public health infrastructure of the country    

2A California              Tight Curves and Wide Horizons         The Return of Highway 1          Once again travelers can drive the full length of the scenic road in California after it was severed by a series of landslides starting in 2023    A view from Highway 1         Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization           The New York Times          April Twenty Eighth Two Thousand Twenty Six        After 3  years Highway 1 was open again    As of February Fourteenth drivers can once again travel the full length of the iconic road after a series of landslides that began in Two Thousand Twenty Three severed the road One Hundred Ten miles north of here    By the time Highway 1 reaches the bucolic village of Carmel by the Sea  the landscape softens    Cliffs ease into rolling hills and the ocean retreats behind grassy fields streaked yellow and purple with lupines and poppies in the fading light    After three years I was grateful to have performed in rare solitude the ritual of one of the greatest road trips in America    But it is impossible to take anything for granted on this wild coast and that is part of its allure    

2B California   and New York         Democrats in June Primaries          There is a San Francisco area Democratic Primary race for US House of Representatives for the seat now held by Nancy Pelosi     and a Race for the New York City Seat also           Saikat Chakrabarti Connie Chan and Scott Wiener debated at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco           New York         Although tiny in size Manhattan and San Francisco loom large in the American psyche    These communities are known for the liberal views and feisty politics of their residents share another connection The elections in their core congressional districts the New York Twelfth and the California Eleventh are wide open with the retirements of the Democratic stalwarts Jerrold Nadler and Nancy Pelosi    Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times     May Twenty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six           The fiercely competitive primaries to succeed them are drawing national attention and could help shape Congress for decades to come    These districts comprise some of the wealthiest neighborhoods in New York the Upper East Side the Upper West Side and Midtown Manhattan and most of San Francisco excluding its working class pockets on the southern border    The winners in these two small districts will gain national name recognition and a base from which to influence the trajectory of the Democratic Party A Photo of Representative Jerry Nadler and Nancy Pelosi then the House speaker loomed large in their respective districts    Now that they are both retiring a fierce fight is on to replace them    Winning would also bring access to the huge wealth in these cities both of which sport Billionaires Rows and other prestige addresses    Donations can be extracted at Sight glass Coffee in San Francisco or at the Loews Regency Hotel in New York which claims to be the site of the first power breakfast    These are not normal congressional races    Nancy Pelosi at age 86 has represented San Francisco since Nineteen Eighty Seven and was the first female speaker of the House and arguably the most effective leader of the chamber    She pushed through Obamacare and climate change legislation and was a persistent antagonist to President Trump once ripping up the pages of his State of the Union address    Mister Nadler at age Seventy Eight has represented Manhattan since Nineteen Ninety Two as a leading liberal voice on Capitol Hill championing civil rights and the two impeachments of Trump    Who can replace these figures of the Democratic Party? Many are trying including longtime fixtures of local politics television personalities tech multimillionaires and even a Kennedy specifically Jack Schlossberg the grandson of President John F Kennedy     Jack Schlossberg had not even been born when Mister Nadler and Ms Pelosi were first elected    Four candidates have risen to the top of the crowded New York field all Democrats and all straight white men    They are Mister Schlossberg a social media influencer Micah Lasher a state assemblyman who has the support of Mister Nadler      Alex Bores another assemblyman with ties to the tech industry and George Conway a lawyer who was once married to Kellyanne Conway the Trump former campaign manager but is now a loud antagonist of the president    Four Democrats are also leading the pack to replace Ms    Pelosi and none of them are straight white men    They are Scott Wiener a state senator Saikat Chakrabarti an independently wealthy progressive Connie Chan a member of the board of supervisors and Marie Hurabiell who helped lead the successful recalls of the school board of the city and the district attorney    Scoring a win in either district where the voters are highly educated and engaged requires candidates to be present at local fixtures like Zabars the New York Upper West Side food emporium or the couches at Manny the civic engagement space in the Mission District in San Francisco    Ms Chan who shares the ties of Nancy Pelosi to organized labor said voters often ask in the same breath about the Great Highway a road along the Pacific Ocean that is newly closed to cars and the war in Iran    Is it a San Francisco race or is it a national race? she said    I say it is  both    The open primary system of San Francisco means the top two contenders almost certainly Democrats will face off in November    In New York where Republicans are sparse the June winner of the Democratic primary will most likely prevail in the fall    Several commuters recognized Mister Bores from automated text messages they had received attacking him for his past employment at Palantir a technology defense contractor that has aided the Trump immigration agenda    Those ads were paid for by a political action committee seeded with millions from technology executives many from the Bay Area who dislike how Mister Bores has sought to regulate AI companies in Albany    At the same time a cryptocurrency billionaire from California Chris Larsen recently said that he would spend Three point Five Million Dollars supporting Mister Bores    Both districts have been likened to ATMs for the Democratic Party    In the district of Ms Pelosi one in 20 households makes Nine Hundred Fifteen Thousand Dollars or more and in the district of Mister Nadler one in 20 brings in at least One point Three Million Dollars    In San Francisco Mister Wiener is supported by a PAC funded by Mister Larsen and Garry Tan another wealthy tech investor    They have paid for mailers blasting Mister Chakrabarti who made hundreds of millions at Stripe a payment processing company before working for the Senator Bernie Sanders presidential campaign and as chief of staff to Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez    The mailers argue that Mister Chakrabarti is a carpetbagger    He has responded by saying that Mister Wiener would be a typical politician not someone with revolutionary goals like himself    A recent environmental forum featuring Lasher Bores and Schlossberg was held at the old Upper East Side home of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt    Before the event Mister Schlossberg jumped up and down on the street with exuberant backers many of them young women chanting Jack! Jack! Jack! It was scene similar to a recent San Francisco congressional debate hosted by the public radio station KQED that drew Sixteen Hundred to a local theater    The real show was on the sidewalk    A supporter of Ms Hurabiell cruised past in a car fashioned to look like the Batmobile to suggest that she is the superhero that San Francisco needs    

3 Colorado           The State of Colorado Charts Its Own Course on Vaccines Amid Federal Pullback          KFF Health News       May Twenty First Two Thousand Twenty Six        Colorado Public Radio          Doctors lawmakers and other advocates are joining forces to promote recommended childhood vaccines    

4 Michigan            Bernie Sanders backs climate activist in close Michigan congressional primary       Will Lawrence an outspoken opponent of AI datacenters is running in swing district where three mega complexes loom        Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization           The Guardian           May Twenty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six              A prominent environmental organizer calling for a nationwide moratorium on datacenters as he runs for the Democratic nomination in a swing Michigan congressional district has secured an endorsement from Bernie Sanders     Will Lawrence co-founder of the youth led Sunrise Movement climate justice group was a key figure behind the campaign for a Green New Deal to battle economic and racial injustice while also fighting climate change    Now he is running for US Congress in a three way Democratic primary to represent the party in the Michigan purple seventh district    I learned at Sunrise just how important it is who is in office Lawrence a Lansing native said    The group made headlines in Two Thousand Eighteen when it stormed the office of the then House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi demanding a swift end to fossil fuels and a jobs guarantee    Voters in the seventh district of Michigan voted for Donald Trump in the Two Thousand Sixteen Two Thousand Twenty  and Two Thousand Twenty Four  US presidential elections and also elected Republican Tom Barrett to Congress in Two Thousand Twenty Four    But the district has been labelled a tossup ahead of the November midterm elections and is a key target for Democrats    On Thursday morning Bernie Sanders the influential independent US senator from Vermont threw his support behind Lawrence    In a statement Sanders praised Lawrence as an accomplished organizer who will demand real accountability for big tech and AI companies as gargantuan datacenters are constructed across the US     AI is at the heart of the race to represent this tight congressional district    Datacenters put a tremendous unprecedented and unexpected burden on the grid to increase overall demand said Lawrence    And there is just no plan to do that in a clean way    

5 New York           E Bikes used as Cargo Bikes by Amazon            How Do You Stop Amazon From Double Parking? E Bikes    Small companies that handle the final delivery are relying on them to skirt New York City traffic    Amazon plans to try the bikes elsewhere too    Photo of Battery powered cargo bikes leaving an Amazon warehouse in Brooklyn    Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times          May Nineteenth Two Thousand Twenty Six         A young man called Q has the driver license so in theory he could be steering an Amazon van around New York City delivering parcels    Instead he does his deliveries with an Amazon cargo bike out of a hub on the Lower East Side of Manhattan    With vans it can be hell finding parking especially in the narrow streets the Twenty One year old man said       These bikes they are better    Amazon dark blue battery powered pedal assist cargo bikes are now common in parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn    They have four wheels and an enclosed container on the back that can hold over One Hundred parcels    It takes the bikes two trips to make roughly the same number of deliveries as a van and they cost significantly less to operate    declined to say what share of home deliveries in New York are made by the bikes but the company director of global fleet and products said they were proving to be more efficient than vans on certain routes    We are optimistic that this is a delivery mode that is  here to stay she said    After a recent expansion Amazon has over Three Hundred cargo bikes doing same day deliveries in Manhattan    This month the company announced a pilot program for the bikes in Washington DC and a spokesman said it was planning pilots in other American cities for this year    E commerce has increased the number of trucks and vans on the New York streets    In Two Thousand Twenty Four     Two point Five million packages were delivered a day in New York City up from One point Eight million five years earlier according to a report from the New York city comptroller    The report also found that the number of traffic crashes and injuries increased in areas near the logistics hubs from which home deliveries are made    Safety is one of the reasons that the Mayor Zohran Mamdani administration supports the use of cargo bikes    Last year New York City started charging a toll on vehicles that enter Manhattan below Sixtieth Street    Asked whether the cargo bikes helped Amazon avoid the toll a company spokesman said its use of the bikes predated it    Despite the greater use of the cargo bikes and electric vans the carbon emissions from Amazon have been rising primarily from its logistics network according to its most recent sustainability report     Seeking to show that it is making some progress Amazon often cites another metric emissions per package delivered    The use of electric delivery vehicles cargo bikes included has helped bring that number down    In Two Thousand Twenty One UPS said it was looking into using cargo bikes in New York a UPS spokesman declined to comment on the status of that effort    DutchX a delivery company operating in New York sorts packages for other companies at a facility in Red Hook then puts them on a boat that makes a voyage of under Twenty minutes to Pier Seventy Nine in Manhattan    At the pier the packages are loaded onto cargo bikes for delivery in the borough    Currently DutchX mostly uses e bikes that pull a low lying trailer a vehicle that Amazon also uses for grocery deliveries    But Marcus Hoed a co-founder of DutchX said the company was going to start adding more of the cargo bikes that have containers on the back    A recent order from Honda cost about Twenty Five Thousand Dollars he said    There are areas of New York where the bikes make far more sense than bigger vehicles    A van in the financial district is the biggest disaster he said contending that the vehicles block the narrower streets there and get held up in traffic    With a bike you create much more efficiency    

6 Texas            The Tesla Newest Electric Vehicle Could Jolt the Trucking Industry           Screens on either side of a the Tesla Semi steering wheel provide a view of the traffic around the vehicle    The writer of this article rode in a Tesla Semi transporting goods from the Port of Long Beach to Ontario Calif     Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The New York Times       May Nineteenth Two Thousand Twenty Six          Tesla has not had a blockbuster new product since the Model Y sport utility vehicle went on sale in Two Thousand Twenty    But early reviews of the Tesla Semi an electric heavy truck suggest that it could be a much needed hit for the company    And it could shake up the staid business of truck manufacturing in the same way that The Tesla cars upended the auto industry    After years of delays Tesla has begun taking orders for the Semi which is expected to cost around Two Hundred Ninety Thousand Dollars for the version that can travel up to Five Hundred miles on a charge much less expensive than heavy duty electric trucks sold by Daimler Volvo and other companies which usually sell for at least Four Hundred Thousand Dollars according to estimates by the International Council on Clean Transportation    Tesla has said the Semi will also have a more affordable model that can travel Three Hundred Fifty Miles between charges    Both options would travel farther than trucks from other suppliers    Cost and range are two of the main reasons that many logistics and delivery firms have been reluctant to buy electric trucks which cost at least twice as much as diesel models and account for only a sliver of heavy truck sales    The problem with the technology that is  out there right now is their range is limited    They are quite heavy and they are very expensive said the owner of a Trucking company in Long Beach California which has ordered Twenty Tesla Semis    This is something new coming to the market that kind of answers all those problems    Demand for the Semi appears strong    California trucking firms have asked the state government for subsidies to help them buy more than Twelve Hundred Tesla trucks    That is  more than all the applications for other electric trucks since the California incentive program began in Two Thousand Nineteen    A Tesla Semi driver had trouble getting a charger to work at a truck stop in Ontario California last month    But after a colleague reported the problem Tesla quickly fixed it    From the comments    Companies doing shorter hauls in California have been waiting for an electric heavy truck that is reasonably priced and has decent range    It will be interesting to see if the Semi prompts Daimler Volvo and other competitors to respond with less expensive and more capable trucks    

7 Colombia           Iván Cepeda runs for President May Thirty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six to continue environmental policies of President Gustavo Petro            The former environment minister Susana Muhamad says that if we do not win our country will be another in Latin America aligned with Trump   The climate crossroads in Colombia     Trumpism casts shadow over presidential battle      Colombia is a global leader in climate activism    Could US influence drag country to a future of mining and fracking? Excerpts edited by Residents Against Wood Smoke Emission Particulates a 501C3 nonprofit organization          The Guardian        May Twenty First  Two Thousand Twenty Six         Several hours after dark in a quiet Caribbean neighborhood a cluster of environmental activists gather on plastic chairs between a mango tree and a courtyard wall emblazoned with the words Colombia respira! Breathe Colombia    So many people have turned up that some have to stand    The May 2026 presidential election will decide whether Colombia remains a global leader on the climate and exemplar of popular environmentalism or whether it switches to the side of fracking mining and other forms of fossil fuel extractivism    In other words whether it will change from green to grey    The movement is braced for a struggle    President Gustavo Petro  of Pacto Historico is constitutionally barred from serving a consecutive second term so the party has selected Iván Cepeda to run for president and continue his policies    The far right candidate Abelardo de la Espriella and the center right candidate Paloma Valencia are both enthusiastic about reopening the oil spigot and fracking    US interference is a big concern with Donald Trump talking of military intervention in Colombia    Susana Muhamad a former environment minister tells the attenders We must win in the first round because the future of Colombia will be decided here in this very complicated international context    If we do not win our country will be another in Latin America aligned with Trump    We have to win    Otherwise everything we are talking about will be completely suspended for four years    Goodbye    Muhamad speaks of the progress Colombia has made in declaring its part of the Amazon rainforest a fossil fuel free zone how Petro has tried to curtail mining protect people from pollution and realize the potential of Colombia as a great power for life    She contrasts this to what is happening in Bolivia where the probusiness government has sold off tracts of the Junín River basin to a lithium mining company and to Ecuador where the far right president Daniel Noboa is trying to weaken Indigenous land defenders and open up protected lands for mineral exploitation and to allow a US military base on the Galápagos Islands    Francia Márquez the vice president of Colombia won the Goldman environmental prize for her campaign to halt illegal gold mining in her ancestral community of La Toma    Colombia plays an outsized role in the push for climate justice    In recent years Muhamad has become a familiar face on the international stage notably as a leading advocate for the transition away from fossil fuels at the Cop29 climate conference in Dubai and then as president of the biodiversity Cop Sixteen in Cali Colombia    Muhamad is by no means a lone voice for the environment in the Pacto Historico government    Francia Márquez the vice president of Colombia won the Goldman environmental prize for her campaign to halt illegal goldmining in her ancestral community of La Toma    The environment minister Irene Vélez Torres has just cochaired the first conference in the world on transitioning away from fossil fuels involving an alliance of countries that want to accelerate the energy transition rather than be held back by the consensus based UN system and the vetoes of big oil producers    Petro demonstrated his commitment at that conference in Santa Marta with a call for Colombia to set an example of how to mobilize the population to overcome the suicidal economics and fascistic politics of the fossil fuel industry    Irene Velez Torres the Colombia minister of environment and sustainable development champions transitioning away from fossil fuels     The leadership demonstrated by the Petro government has moved the phaseout of oil gas and coal from the margins into the center of global diplomacy according to the founder and chair of the Fossil Fuel Treaty Initiative     As a result she said the May 2026 presidential ballot will make international waves    The implications of this election reach far beyond Colombia    At a moment of escalating climate disasters and geopolitical instability the world is watching whether this leadership continues or whether political pressure from the fossil fuel industry succeeds in pushing countries backward    Environmentalists in Colombia believe the national commitment draws its force from grassroots activists    Colombia is one of the deadliest countries in the world for environmental defenders    As Juan David Amaya a Nineteen year old climate activist and founder of the pan Latin American youth organization Life of Pachamama  put it the main difference between activists in Colombia and those in Europe is that there they do not kill you    After a campaign against oil palm plantations in his home region of San Carlos de Guaroa Amaya has received numerous death threats    In Colombia doing this is an act of rebellion born from hope born from love    But it also comes at a very high cost he said    Governments like Panama Mexico Brazil and Colombia stand out Paula Andrea Hernández a Pacto Historico campaign manager says We call it popular environmentalism because it comes from peasants and fishermen    We have suffered severe extractivism often arm in arm with illegal militias for so long that people realize the fight for territory and environment needs to be about power    Figures wearing the helmets of miners confront a line of police Bolivia rocked by protests as US warns of coup d état         Domestically climate and environment are rarely mentioned directly in campaign debates but shape the context of hot button issues such as security and health drug trafficking often overlaps with illegal mining and forest clearance and shortcomings in medical provision are shown up by water contamination rising temperatures and floods    The environment has become a central issue observed Leon Valencia a political analyst    It is not straightforwardly binary There are sectors on the left that favor oil exploitation and sectors on the right that defend conservation and green markets    What both sides have agreed upon is that the relationship with nature has become a strong political identity       Colombia is experiencing a progressive environmentalization of public opinion    Some campaigners complain that the Petro government rhetoric is not always matched by actions    Deforestation of the Amazon has slowed since the Pacto Historico came to power but it continues and illegal gold mining is widespread    Many parts of Colombia are virtually ungovernable because they are controlled by armed groups    There has been political opposition in Bogotá the third highest capital city in the world where the business lobby in Congress has blocked the most ambitious moves  in Colombia to restrict mining    Rightwing commentators said the first leftwing government in Colombia would be an economic disaster especially when Petro promised to replace fossil fuels with avocados    In fact GDP growth has remained positive for the past four years    Group of Pacto Historico supporters on stage with Iván Cepeda         Polls suggest Iván Cepeda C R the Pacto Historico candidate will lead in the first round but fall short of the Fifty Percent needed for an outright victory    Julia Miranda a lower house deputy from the New Liberal party and an advocate for nature insisted the Petro administration had proved ineffective domestically        Miranda supports Valencia but on the question of phasing out fossil fuels she sees room for compromise    A victory for the Democratic Center party candidate Paloma Valencia would mark a return to an extra activist model say critics    With Ten days until the election on May Thirty First the outcome remains unclear    Polls suggest Cepeda  the Petro successor as the Pacto Historico candidate will lead in the first round but fall short of the Fifty Percent needed for an outright victory    If there is a runoff either one of his two rightwing challengers would be favorite    That would be an abysmal setback said Renzo García a biologist and congressman    A victory by Paloma Valencia or Abelardo de la Espriella would mark a return to an extra activist model where we hand the country over to the economic interests of the elites of the world and serve as a pantry for minerals oil and agribusiness without taking into account the rights of nature