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Meanwhile in North America, Canada's VIA is operating on a shoestring and being further threatened ... and in the last 50 years the US has pulled up most of the rails that were installed in the previous century. We're stuck with airplanes, hybrid metro-transit, and what's left of Greyhound. But, hey, we've got a world to police!

CARB could finally regulate methane emissions from the state’s huge dairy farms and eliminate the special treatment dairy biogas gets via its clean fuel program. Or not.

In 2013, Chinese mining company Chinalco (中国铝业集团有限公司) sparked an international conversation about extractive impacts with the news it had successfully relocated an entire Peruvian town of 5,000 residents to clear space for a copper mine. At the time, the relocation project in Morococha, central Peru, was touted as a solution to protect villagers from pollution and environmental degradation as a result of mining practices, and as a potential template for Chinese overseas investment in Latin America.

Ten years later, experts describe the move as a “tragedy.”

[...]

Many residents and environmental activists argue that the company has failed to honor its promises. A 2019 study by the National University of Central Peru revealed that most of the population of New Morococha believes their economy, job stability, and access to social benefits promised by Chinalco have not been fulfilled.

[...]

Since 2013, 96 percent of the residents in Old Morococha have been compelled to relocate to a flood-prone wetland area, which is also isolated from the central highway. The situation is even worse for some 20 families who have refused to resettle.

“The remaining families in Old Morococha are facing daily harassment from the Chinese mining company Chinalco,” Borda said. “Every day, they are destroying the few houses of the settlers, until the last brick disappears.”

[...]

According to the Geological, Mining, and Metallurgical Institute of Perú (INGEMMET) 2017 report, the city of Old Morococha faces an “imminent, non-mitigable danger” due to severe risks, including visible structural damage, proximity to mining waste and tailings, and ongoing seismic hazards exacerbated by active mining operations. The combination of these factors renders any mitigation efforts ineffective, underscoring the extreme vulnerability of the area.

[...]

[The Ingemmet report] concluded that frequent floods and liquefaction of soils caused by earthquakes may affect the safety of residents living in buildings of New Morococha, where most urban facilities, including schools, religious temples, and health centers, were built within 26 months between 2010 and 2012. The report said the company has not yet informed residents of what they would do to mitigate those risks.

[...]

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A second Trump administration would be expected to shred climate polices. California officials are devising ways to insulate its environmental regulations.

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In recent days, Brazilian climate experts have mulled why. Some city council and mayoral candidates are financially supported by activities that profit from deforestation, such as logging and mining, Agência Pública reported. Reporters found that in several areas with high deforestation—and thus wildfires—leading politicians tended to be silent about forest stewardship.

Brazil’s largest political parties generally do not tout climate consciousness as a top issue. The party that appears the closest to doing so is the ruling Workers’ Party. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has promoted forest protection and green energy in international forums. But Lula governs in a coalition with centrist and conservative parties and has embraced fossil fuel exploration domestically.

To Angelo, a former science editor at Brazil’s newspaper of record, Folha de S. Paulo, climate was discussed so little in the campaign in part because “mainstream media tries to replicate the conversations that are happening on social media,” rather than journalists trying to orient the news cycle around policy questions.

As storms, droughts, wildfires and other extreme weather events strike with greater frequency and intensity, repairing and rebuilding has grown more costly, too.

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