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Investment giant BlackRock issues a strong statement following the release of a statement by the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission in support of a Texas-led multistate lawsuit accusing asset managers BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street of using ESG investing to manipulate coal markets, calling the case “baseless,” and “based on an absurd theory.” The case, launched by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and joined by 10 other Republican states in late 2024, claimed that the asset managers acquired large shareholdings in major coal producers in the U.S., and used their combined influence to coerce the companies to cut…

U.S. refining giant Phillips 66, which will close its LA refinery later this year, will lay off in December most of the workers at the plant, Reuters reports, citing sources with knowledge of the plans.  Last October, Phillips 66 said it would shut down its refinery in the Los Angeles area in the fourth quarter of 2025, due to “market dynamics.”Approximately 600 employees and 300 contractors currently operate the Los Angeles-area refinery, Phillips 66 said when it announced the closure.“We understand this decision has an impact on our employees, contractors and the broader community,” Mark Lashier, chairman and CEO of Phillips…

  The Trump Administration has invited officials from allied nations in North Asia to Alaska to assess potential investment in an LNG project and a proposed 1,300km gas pipeline. Officials from Japan, South Korea and Taiwan may visit Alaska’s North Slope to see the location of the vast pipeline, two people familiar with the planning told Reuters. Governments in these countries are considering investments in the US in the hope of getting relief from President Donald Trump’s tariffs.   ALSO SEE: China’s Top Regulator Says it Will Help Tech Firms List Overseas   Trump’s energy czar, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, and…

Ford is continuing to scale back its electric car offensive: due to weak demand and high costs, the US car manufacturer is now apparently allowing its Japanese competitor Nissan to use Ford’s battery production in Kentucky. The plant is part of a joint venture with the South Korean battery manufacturer SK On. Ford and SK On founded their joint venture called BlueOval SK in 2022 and began building two battery factories in Glendale, Kentucky. These were to produce batteries for electric cars from Ford and its subsidiary brand Lincoln, each with an annual capacity of 43 GWh. According to a…

The U.S. Administration wants the EU to make unilateral cuts to its tariffs on American goods and abolish a proposed digital tax for trade negotiations to advance, sources briefed on the U.S. trade negotiators’ latest stance have told the Financial Times.The U.S. hit the EU with a 20% ‘reciprocal’ tariff in early April, but the Trump Administration later backtracked on the so-called reciprocal tariffs following a major market rout triggered by fears of recession. The United States has now left a baseline 10% tariff on all countries by July 8 as it is engaging in negotiations to secure trade deals. The…

Chemical compounds that efficiently remove CO2 from the air do not easily release it once captured, and compounds that release CO2 efficiently are not very efficient at capturing it. Optimising one part of the cycle tends to make the other part worse. Now, using nanoscale filtering membranes, researchers at MIT have added a simple intermediate step that facilitates both parts of the cycle. The new approach could improve the efficiency of electrochemical carbon dioxide capture and release by six times and cut costs by at least 20 percent, they said.   MIT researchers added…

INPEX Corp., Nippon Steel Corp. and Kanto Natural Gas Development Co. Ltd. have signed a consignment agreement with the Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC) ensuring the continuation of engineering and design works for a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project planned to serve industrial emitters in the Greater Tokyo Area. “In connection with this, JOGMEC commissioned a survey on the implementation of advanced CCS projects in 2023, and engineering and design work for advanced CCS projects in 2024, both of which were jointly undertaken by the parties”, INPEX said in an online statement. “Through these commissioned projects,…

Your newest work colleague might not be joining you at the water cooler or at the team’s next happy hour: AI agents are infiltrating the workplace, and one startup building those — aptly named Coworker — just cleared a big funding round to put “AI teammates” to work.Jeff Huber, managing director at Triatomic Capital, led Coworker’s $13 million seed funding round, which was announced on Tuesday. Ramtin Naimi of Abstract Ventures, Mallun Yen of Operator Collective, Tim Young of Eniac Ventures, and Clark Golestani, Ken Hausman, and Jack Greenfield of K2 Access Fund also participated in the raise.Based in San…

Google made literally 100 announcements at I/O this week, a clear sign that the tech giant intends to dominate every aspect of AI, from its overhaul of Search to its latest AI models and wearables tech.The event was packed and, at times, felt electrifying. Google showed impressive stats about how its AI has taken off. It had plenty of far-out goals, too, like building a universal AI assistant and extended reality glasses that give directions in real time.I/O also showcased Google’s vulnerabilities. Some releases clearly overlapped, while arch-rival OpenAI upstaged Google on Wednesday with a big announcement of its own.With…

In a statement posted on its website recently, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) announced the release of a new U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) assessment “identifying significant undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and gas resources in the Mowry Composite Total Petroleum System”. The DOI noted in the statement that the assessment estimates the presence of 473 million barrels of oil and 27 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. It pointed out that these are resources “that could help bolster domestic energy supply and fuel local economies”.  A fact sheet posted on the USGS website stated that the USGS “assessed undiscovered, technically recoverable…