Barcelona problems grow in feisty Champions League draw with Napoli
في Barcelona came from behind to earn a 1-1 draw with Napoli in the Champions League on Tuesday as Antoine Griezmann netted a vital away goal in the round-of-16 first leg.On a difficult evening for Barca, Napoli took the lead on the half-hour mark when Dries Mertens curled a superb effort past Marc-Andre ter Stegen from outside the box.The finish saw the Belgium international become the joint-highest scorer in Napoli history with 121 goals — level with Marek Hamsik.The home team frustrated Barca for much of the first half, but the visitors equalised on 57 minutes when Nelson Semedo crossed for Griezmann to finish a well-worked move in clinical fashion.What had been a feisty affair ended with Barca’s Arturo Vidal receiving two yellow cards at once to be dismissed and teammate Gerard Pique being substituted after sustaining an ankle injury.
Pique’s potenial absence could be especially crucial with Sunday’s La Liga Clasico against Real Madrid looming.”We’ll see what problem he has, then we can confirm if he’ll be available [against Real Madrid],” said Barcelona coach Quique Setien.As a result of his sending-off for fouling Mario Rui and then butting heads with the defender, Chile international Vidal will miss the second leg against Napoli at the Camp Nou, as will fellow Barca midfielder Sergio Busquets, who was also booked.On Vidal’s sending off, he added: “I didn’t see precisely what happened, but perhaps the referee was a bit harsh.”A yellow card for the foul is one thing, but the second is too much. There are moments of tension that players who experience the game with his temperament can have.”Napoli goalscorer Mertens’ presence in the second leg is also in question after the forward limped off in the second half.Lionel Messi was making his 141st appearance in the Champions League, taking him joint-fifth on the list for most games played in the competition, alongside Manchester United’s Ryan Giggs.The game — which was the two sides’ first meeting — also marked the first Champions League knockout fixture in which neither manager had previously coached in the competition.Napoli coach Gennaro Gattuso was left frustrated at the result after his well-drilled defence largely stifled a quiet Messi and co.”I think they barely grazed us tonight, they hardly had a single shot on goal,” he told Sky Sport Italia.”They could’ve been there all night and not scored, but we conceded after one single error. They didn’t hurt us, it barely tickled.”
Bob Iger
في
Disney Drops a Bombshell — Bob Iger Steps Down
After one of the most successful runs in corporate history, Disney’s CEO is handing the reins to successor Bob Chapek.
Danny Vena(TMFLifeIsGood)Feb 26, 2020 at 7:00AMAuthor BioAfter orchestrating the media and entertainment company’s move into streaming, Disney (NYSE:DIS) dropped a bombshell Tuesday afternoon, announcing that revered CEO Bob Iger would step down as CEO — effective immediately — handing his duties over to Bob Chapek, who most recently served as chairman of Disney’s parks, experiences, and products segment.Iger isn’t abandoning ship just yet, however. He will assume the role as executive chairman and will direct the company’s “creative endeavors” while continuing to lead the board until his current contract expires at the end of 2021.BOB IGER LEAVES A POWERFUL LEGACY. IMAGE SOURCE: DISNEY.
Iger was an instrument of change
Iger assumed the role of CEO in 2005 and immediately put his stamp on the company that would be his legacy. Iger is credited with engineering the Pixar buyout in 2006 for a whopping $7.4 billion, which not only added a successful animation studio but also helped revive the company’s own Disney Animation segment, which was floundering at the time. The ink on the deal was barely dry when it was followed in swift succession with the game-changing acquisition of Marvel Entertainment in 2009 and Lucasfilm for $4 billion in 2012.Iger’s leadership was instrumental in turning Disney into a media powerhouse. One of his most ambitious moves was orchestrating the $71.3 billion acquisition of the numerous movie and television assets from 21st Century Fox, a deal that closed early last year. This brought Disney a host of content to help feed its streaming ambitions, as well as giving it operational control of top-string streaming service Hulu.The announcement comes fresh on the heels of Disney’s own entry into the streaming video market, with the highly successful debut of the company’s flagship offering Disney+. The service launched to much fanfare in early November, and earlier this month the company’s quarterly earnings report revealed that Disney+ had attracted a massive 28.6 million subscribers by early February.In the 15 years since Iger took charge of Disney, the stock has risen over 400%, more than 1.5 times the 155% gains of the S&P 500 — not bad for a stodgy blue-chip stock.
An old hand
Iger noted that Chapek will be the seventh CEO in Disney’s nearly 100-year history, saying in a statement: “[H]e has proven himself exceptionally qualified to lead the Company into its next century.” The heir to the Disney throne has been with the House of Mouse for nearly three decades, running the parks and resorts business, heading Disney’s consumer products division, and also acting as president of distribution at Walt Disney Studios. “With the successful launch of Disney’s direct-to-consumer businesses and the integration of Twenty-First Century Fox well underway, I believe this is the optimal time to transition to a new CEO,” Iger said. “I have the utmost confidence in Bob and look forward to working closely with him over the next 22 months as he assumes this new role and delves deeper into Disney’s multifaceted global businesses and operations, while I continue to focus on the Company’s creative endeavors.”
Investor takeaway
While the timing of this announcement is somewhat surprising, it was inevitable that Iger would eventually step down, after having postponed his retirement on at least four separate occasions prior to this announcement. Earlier this year, Iger joked, “I was going to say ‘and this time I mean it,’ but I’ve said it before,” referring to his famous last words uttered before his most recent extension.Change is never easy, but investors should rest easy in the knowledge that Iger hand-selected his replacement and will still be around to provide guidance for nearly two more years.
10 stocks we like better than Walt Disney
When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.* David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the ten best stocks for investors to buy right now… and Walt Disney wasn’t one of them! That’s right — they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.
CDC: Prepare for coronavirus to spread in U.S
في
CDC: Prepare for coronavirus to spread in U.S.
“This is all part of waking up to the fact that we have to be ready and respond,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of CIDRAP at the University of Minnesota.Earlier in the week, Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, gave his own warning of the need to prepare in a New York Times op-ed. “We are going to be hit. We’re going to be hit hard here. We’re going to see transmission that surely can rival what we saw in parts of China and we need to be prepared for that,” Dr. Osterholm said. A study from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention that was published in The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) looked at more than 72,000 COVID-19 cases in China. Of the 44,672 confirmed cases, there was a 2.3% case-fatality rate. The study found COVID-19 to be less deadly than SARS or MERS but more transmissible, like the flu. “With seasonal influenza in a bad year, it’s about 0.1%. This (COVID-19) is running about 2%, almost 20 times higher than what we see even with a bad flu year. So this still, while not like SARS or MERS… because of its potential to affect many, many, many more people is going to really cause us some real problems,” Dr. Osterholm said.
Credit: Craig NorkusDr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.On Tuesday, U.S. health officials confirmed 53 cases in the U.S. But problems with a novel coronavirus test developed by the CDC have made it hard to expand testing. “Right now, besides CDC, only three labs in the whole country can test for this. We’ve only tested about 500 individuals in this country. A country like South Korea has already tested over 200,000,” Dr. Osterholm said. “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence and ours is really a function of having just not been able to test.” In the NYT op-ed, Dr. Osterholm said the most important thing we can do right now is prepare our healthcare facilities. “At the very, very top of that list is about protecting our healthcare workers,” Dr. Osterholm said. “We have to protect these people to be able to provide that care. That means they need the protective equipment… the kind of respirators, face masks, the suits that they need. Right now, that’s in terrible short supply around the world.”Dr. Osterholm said we also need to make sure we have enough hospital beds and enough drugs required for treatment. “It turns out that the vast majority of the critical, life-saving drugs we use in this country are actually made in China and those supply chains have been severely compromised. We’re working a lot on trying to make sure that we know which drugs are going to be short, when they’re going to be short and what we can do to provide substitutes, if possible, or how we’re going to handle patients,” Dr. Osterholm said. U.S. health officials also announced Tuesday that human trials testing a potential COVID-19 vaccine are expected to begin in six weeks. But Dr. Osterholm said he believes vaccines for this coronavirus are many years off, adding, “We don’t have any hope at all, none, that a vaccine is going to have any impact in the near future on what’s going to unfold.” The World Health Organization said it was too early to call it a pandemic but Dr. Osterholm disagrees. “Of course it is. We’re there. It doesn’t matter what kind of terminology you use. For some, calling it a pandemic denotes some kind of negative issue that they don’t want to go there with because it seems too scary. To me, pandemic is a mindset,” Dr. Osterholm said. “We can either use pandemic as a word that makes us all quake with fear or we can use it as a rallying cry to say, ‘This is what we’re going to do to fight it.'” RELATED: CDC warns spread of coronavirus in US appears inevitableRELATED: Bonds are up, stocks fall amid fears virus will hurt economies
Ash Wednesday’s changing tradition
في
Ash Wednesday’s changing tradition
By Francisco Guzman and Pete Burn, CNNUpdated 1210 GMT (2010 HKT) February 26, 2020 Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, a 40-day period of prayer, repentance and fasting for many Christians.(CNN)Are you ready to give up caffeine for 40 days? What about your social media accounts? While giving up those things may seem hard for you, Christians long ago used to give up a whole lot more. Ash Wednesday is today. It marks the first day of Lent in Western churches. The ashes symbolize penance and the dust from which God made people. When priests mark Christian’s forehead with the ashes they often say, “Repent and believe in the Gospel,” or “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
Raptors
في
Bucks 108, Raptors 97
Wednesday, February 26, 2020 3:44 a.m. CSTby Kelly Meyer
Milwaukee Bucks
TORONTO, ONTARIO (WHBL) – Giannis Antetokounmpo put up 19 points, 19 rebounds and eight assists to help lead the Bucks past the Raptors 108-97 in Toronto on Tuesday night. Khris Middleton scored 22 points and pulled down eight boards for Milwaukee, which has won four in-a-row and nine of its last 10 games. The Bucks are an NBA-best 50-8. Pascal Siakam posted 22 to pace the Raptors, who have split their last four games. Fred VanVleet finished with 14 points in the setback.The Bucks are back home to host the Thunder on Friday.
Ric Flair Talks WCW Wanting To Repackage Him, Turning Down WWE In 1988
في
Ric Flair Talks WCW Wanting To Repackage Him, Turning Down WWE In 1988
By William Windsor | February 26, 202012Recently on Talk Is Jericho, AEW World Champion Chris Jericho shared a podcast he recording aboard Chris Jericho’s Rock ‘N’ Wrestling Rager At Sea: Part Deux with WWEHall Of Famer Ric Flair. Among many other things, Ric, who turned 71 on Tuesday, talked about his decision to leave WCW in favor of WWE in 1991.On the subject of leaving WCW for WWE in 1991, Ric claimed that WCW wanted him to cut his hair and repackage ‘The Nature Boy’ as ‘Spartacus’ “That was Jim Herd. He wanted me to… the worst thing I ever did was cut my hair. Like, I remember walking through the airport. Nobody knew me. I mean, I was frightened because he wanted to call me ‘Spartacus’. They wanted me to change my name and put in an earring. You know that story, Chris. They wanted to call me ‘Spartacus’. You saw that haircut. What other explanation could there be?” Ric added, “I looked like a 12 year old kid with a surfboard shoved up my butt. It was that bad.” Recommended videos Play VideoAccording to Ric, he turned down the opportunity to face off against the late great ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage at SummerSlam (1988). “[WWE] wanted me to come in ’88 to wrestle Savage at SummerSlam. And I said, ‘no’, and we didn’t have contracts back then. I just had a deposit on the belt and I was with Arn [Anderson] and Tully [Blanchard] and Barry [Windham] and we were selling out everywhere and I was happy. It was never about not going up there [to WWE] and having fun. A lot of guys that I was friends with were there. I just couldn’t bring myself to leave that circle of friends that I was with. And then, we had talks again and that didn’t do anything, so when I quit, I just called them and I said, ‘I’m here and by the way, I’ve got the belt.’ I tried to give it back. [WCW] said they wouldn’t take it. That’s the truth.” Ric recalled, “I said, ‘take it’ and he said, ‘shove it up your ass.'” Ric, who recently talked about his daughter Charlotte’s toughness, said his the greatest moment of his professional wrestling career was managing ‘The Queen’ as she defeated Nikki Bella at Night Of Champions to become WWE Divas Champion. “Oh gosh, that’s the hardest question to answer,” Ric reflected. “The greatest moment of my career is my daughter winning the title in Houston [Texas], [Night] Of Champions, against Nikki Bella.”Ric went on to name his all-time favorite opponents from his storied professional wrestling career. “I just can’t name one [favorite opponent],” Ric said. “Harley Race made me. Ricky Steamboat, Sting, Dusty [Rhodes], Hunter [Hearst Helmsley], Shawn [Michaels], Chris Jericho, Taker – the list of people – Wahoo McDaniel, I mean, Blackjack Mulligan, Ernie Ladd, Andre The Giant, I mean, Bret Hart. There’s nobody that I ever wrestled and I apologize to everybody… I’m making reference to Bret and I. Bret and I got into it and I don’t know why, but right now, Bret and I see each other and it’s very cool. And that’s the way it should be.” Check out the podcast here or via the embedded player below. If you use any of the quotations from this article, please credit Talk Is Jericho with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
Lakers Rumors: Free-Agent Dion Waiters to Meet with LA for 2nd Time After Buyout
في
Free-agent guard Dion Waiters is reportedly set to meet with the Los Angeles Lakers on March 2, according to Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports (h/t Marc Stein of the New York Times).The meeting would mark the Lakers’ second interaction with Waiters, as ESPN’s Brian Windhorst (h/t Real GM) reported that the Lakers met with him last week as well.Earlier this month, Waiters was sent from the Miami Heat to the Memphis Grizzlies in a three-team trade that saw the Heat acquire veteran wing Andre Iguodala. The Grizzlies waived Waiters shortly thereafter, making him a free agent.Waiters was suspended three separate times for a total of 17 games for conduct detrimental to the team this season while with the Heat, and it wasn’t until Jan. 24 that he made his season debut.In three appearances off the bench, the 28-year-old veteran was averaging 9.3 points, 3.7 rebounds and 1.0 assist per game prior to the trade.
McCollum and the Blazers Snapped Postseason Losing Streak for “Jennifer”
Stars Invest in Plant-Based Food as Vegetarianism Sweeps NBA
The NBA Got Some Wild Techs This Season
Jarrett Allen Is One of the NBA’s Hottest Rim Protectors
Wade’s Jersey Swaps Created Epic Moments This Season
Westbrook Makes History While Honoring Nipsey Hussle
Devin Booker Makes History with Scoring Tear
29 Years Ago, Jordan Dropped Career-High 69 Points
Bosh Is Getting His Jersey Raised to the Rafters in Miami
Steph Returns to Houston for 1st Time Since His Moon Landing Troll
Lou Williams Is Coming for a Repeat of Sixth Man of the Year
Pat Beverley Has the Clippers Stealing the LA Shine
LeBron Keeps Shredding NBA Record Books
Young’s Hot Streak Is Heating Up the ROY Race with Luka
LeBron and 2 Chainz Form a Superteam to Release a New Album
Wade’s #OneLastDance Dominated February
Warriors Fans Go Wild After Unforgettable Moments with Steph
Eight Years Ago, the Nuggets Traded Melo to the Knicks
Two Years Ago, the Kings Shipped Boogie to the Pelicans
ASG Will Be Competitive Again If the NBA Raises the Stakes
Waiters was the No. 4 overall pick in the 2012 NBA draft by the Cleveland Cavaliers, and after spending parts of three seasons with the Cavs, he was moved to the Oklahoma City Thunderand then the Heat.This season notwithstanding, it can be argued that his greatest success came in Miami. Back in 2016-17, Waiters averaged 15.8 points and a career-high 4.3 assists and 3.3 rebounds per contest in 46 games, including 43 starts.His production dropped the next couple of seasons, though, to 14.3 points per game and then 12.0 points per game. Durability has also been an issue for Waiters, as he has not appeared in more than 46 games in a season since 2015-16.When healthy, however, Waiters can be a dynamic offensive player who owns career averages of 13.2 points, 2.8 assists and 2.7 rebounds per contest.The Lakers were quiet at the trade deadline, but they have already been a splash on the free-agent market since then by signing forward Markieff Morris following his buyout from the Detroit Pistons.LeBron James and Anthony Davis are running the show in L.A., but head coach Frank Vogel could use some reinforcements, especially in the backcourt.Avery Bradley, Danny Green, Alex Caruso, Rajon Rondo and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope make for a solid group, but Waiters is more explosive than any of them when he is on his game, and if LeBron and Co. are able to keep him in check, he could be a great fit as a depth piece for the top team in the Western Conference.
Coronavirus vaccine
في
Human testing of coronavirus treatment begins, vaccine prep progresses
The antiviral drug remdesivir, developed for Ebola, is being tested on a patient who was infected with coronavirus on the “Diamond Princess” cruise ship and brought to the US.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, is beginning tests of an antiviral drug on a passenger from the Diamond Princess cruise ship and preparing a new coronavirus vaccine for human testing, according to Time magazine.The antiviral drug remdesivir, developed for Ebola, is being tested on a patient who was brought to the US from the cruise ship after being infected with the virus. Others diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, will also take part in the study. Remdesivir showed encouraging results among animals infected with two related coronaviruses – those causing severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), according to Time.691 people were infected with the coronavirus on the Diamond Princessthat was docked south of Tokyo, according to Reuters. Four passengers died after being infected.Volunteers will be randomly assigned to receive either the drug or a placebo intravenously for 10 days and have blood tests and nose and throat swabs taken every two days to track the amount of the virus in their bodies. Even if the drug only shows some efficacy in keeping blood levels of SARS-CoV-2 from growing, it could help contain the spread of the virus.Moderna Therapeutics, a biotech company in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has shipped the first batches of its COVID-19 vaccine to the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) at the NIH, which will prepare the vaccine for human testing as early as April, according to Time.The new vaccine was made just 42 days after the genetic sequence of the virus was released by Chinese researchers using a new method allowing for production of the vaccine to be scaled up quickly. The vaccine is filled with mRNA – the genetic material that comes from DNA and makes proteins – that codes for the right coronavirus proteins, which then get injected into the body. Immune cells can process that mRNA and start making the protein in the right way for other immune cells to recognize and mark for destruction.
China seizes over 31 million fake face masks amid coronavirus outbreak
في
China has seized over 31 million fake or inferior face masks, the country’s public security authorities reported Wednesday, shedding light on the desperation brought on by the country’s mask shortage.Despite donations from numerous countries, the outbreak has caused a severe shortage of medical face masks in many parts of China as residents quickly snapped up inventories at both brick and mortar and online shops.The government responded in late January by strengthening efforts to crack down on vendors who sell counterfeit masks or engage in price gouging online.Some companies like Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., better known as Foxconn, an electronics manufacturer that previously had nothing to do with medical supply manufacturing, have responded to the shortage by purchasing new production lines to produce masks, according to China Daily.But as of Feb. 11, Chinese mask production capacity has been restored to 94 percent of normal levels, the country’s top economic regulator said, according to the state-owned media.So far, authorities have cracked down on 688 cases involving the production and sale of counterfeit and inferior protective materials and arrested more than 1,560 suspects, Du Hangwei, vice minister of the Ministry of Public Safety told a press briefing in Beijing on Wednesday, Xinhua News reported.
Elizabeth Warren wants to ban mining on public lands — with one exception
في
Most of the Democratic presidential candidates have made their views toward public lands quite clear: Extractive industries, like drilling and mining, don’t have a future there. But recently, Elizabeth Warren signaled that she might be willing to make an important exception.At the Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas last week, the climate policy discussion took an unexpected turn when debate moderator Jon Ralston asked Warren how she reconciled her plan to ban drilling and mining on public lands with the fact that we’ll need more of certain metals, like lithium and copper, for renewable energy. Warren’s response? If a particular resource is mission-critical to our future, then perhaps she’d bend the rules.“So, look, I think we should stop all new drilling and mining on public lands and all offshore drilling,” Warren said. “If we need to make exceptions because there are specific minerals that we’ve got to have access to, then we locate those and we do it not in a way that just is about the profits of giant industries, but in a way that is sustainable for the environment.”It was a brief exchange, but a significant one. It’s rare for climate policy conversations to touch on the resources needed to transition away from fossil fuels. For the subject to come up during a presidential debate is even more unusual (it’s happened only the one time in this election cycle’s 10 debates to date). But the topic deserves more than a 10-second response, since it’s central to the world’s ability to stave off catastrophic climate change.That’s because the technologies humanity is staking the planet’s future on — wind turbines, solar panels, batteries, and fuel cells, to name a few — require dozens of different minerals, all of which are mined from the earth. The batteries inside electric cars are made of lithium, along with a mix of other metals that can include nickel, copper, cobalt, manganese, and graphite. The magnets that drive electric vehicle and wind turbine motors get their strength from the rare earth metal neodymium, and often a dash of its even rarer cousin, dysprosium. Solar panels rely on a cocktail of exotic minerals that can include cadmium, tellurium, germanium, and selenium, to transform sunlight into energy.As our appetite for clean tech grows, demand for these minerals is expected to skyrocket. A 2018 paper found that in order to limit global warming to less than 2 degrees C, the stock of minerals available for electric car batteries alonewill need to increase 87,000 percent. In that same scenario, the wind and solar photovoltaic industries will require 1,000 percent and 3,000 percent more resources, respectively, than they do today.“The sheer scale of the material needs are fascinating,” said Benjamin Sovacool, a professor of energy policy at the University of Sussex in the UK who authored a recent paper in Sciencediscussing this metallurgical challenge. “I was blown away by how much new stuff we’ll need.”At least some of America’s future demand for these minerals might need to be met with new domestic supplies if we don’t want access to a critical resource cut off during, say, a trade war with China. Warren’s willingness to alter one of her signature policy proposals when it comes to minerals demonstrates that she understands the messy, extractive politics of the green energy transition.“I think politically it’s a very astute answer,” Sovacool said.It’s no accident that Warren got a minerals question in Nevada. The state, which includes some 56 million acres of federally managed public land, accounts for a sizable fraction of the Bureau of Land Management’s active mining claims. It’s already home to the nation’s only operational lithium mine — the Albemarle mine at Silver Peak — and several companies are hoping to ramp up production of the coveted battery metal. These include Lithium Americas, which is currently seeking BLM approval to set up a large lithium clay mining operation on public land.But if Nevada is a state that would be eager to claim exceptions to Warren’s mining moratorium, it’s also a case study in the risks of a green tech–fueled mining boom. As Politico recently reported, one of the BLM’s Nevada offices has come under fire recently for allegedly disregarding environmental rules to fast-track mining projects, including a proposed lithium mine that could threaten a rare Nevada wildflower. Some environmental groups worry that the Trump administration’s recent push to shore up domestic supplies of “critical minerals” — a list that includes lithium, among other green-tech metals — will leave public lands even more vulnerable, particularly in states that resist federal oversight. Included in the administration’s critical minerals strategy is an explicit directive to “expedite” environmental reviews.With all this in mind, the second half of Warren’s response — that any new mining projects would have to place sustainability front and center — may be just as significant as the first. While there’s no such thing as impact-free mining, Sovacool said he’s seen mines for the very same minerals that are “10 to 20 times worse than other mines.”“There’s usually a race to the bottom to comply with the minimal regulations,” he said. “I think this gets to the heart of Warren’s response: There are ways to do this mining that would minimize environmental impacts.”All of the leading Democratic presidential candidates have promised a moratorium on new fossil fuel leases on federal lands, but few candidates have made explicit statements about other types of extraction. A spokesperson for Mike Bloomberg’s campaign told Grist that he would “make exceptions for mining on a case by case basis,” for instance, where mining is “critical to America’s role as a global leader in producing and manufacturing clean energy technology.” None of the other leading Democratic contenders’ campaigns responded to Grist’s request for comment on the matter.Opening new mines isn’t the only, or even the primary, way America will meet its rising demand for minerals, though. The reality, said Clare Church, a policy analyst at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, is that it can take years or even decades for new mines to begin producing. In the near term, that means the world is going to be relying more heavily on existing supply chains. Unfortunately, some of these trace back to mines in countries riven with violence, where protections for workers and the environment are weak to nonexistent.“With that said, we should be focusing our efforts not on avoidance but on responsible sourcing and transparency in the existing supply chains of these key minerals,” Church said.More recycling will also be key. As recently as 2011, less than 1 percent of rare earth elements were recycled. Today, fewer than 5 percent of lithium-ion batteries are. The processes for getting metals back out of dead devices like batteries are often complex, costly, and inefficient, but with increased investment in recycling technologies, that could change.“There are better ways to meet our growing mineral demand than new hardrock mining,” said Aaron Mintzes, senior policy counsel at Earthworks, adding that investments around the world have “spurred innovations in recycling and reuse of lithium and other metals.”“Clean tech companies, recyclers, and manufacturers have market power to demand responsibly sourced minerals and drive improvements in efficiency,” Mintzes continued.The need for better recycling technology and infrastructure has made its way into some candidates’ climate plans. Bernie Sanders’ Green New Deal plan, for instance, calls for building tomorrow’s wind turbines, solar panels, and electric cars with “as many recycled materials as possible,” and establishing a national recycling program to get the job done.However, as Saleem Ali, an environmental researcher at the University of Delaware noted, there isn’t a large enough stock of recycled metals on the market today to meet the projected growth in demand. Ultimately, he said, “some metal mining will still be needed for the foreseeable future to meet demand for a range of technologies needed for a low carbon transition.”Rising to the challenge of the climate crisis won’t be easy. It’s going to mean making hard choices about what sorts of extractive industries humanity can no longer afford — and which it can’t afford to lose. Hopefully, America’s next leader will be up to the task.
Sign up for our newsletter!
Never miss a beat! Sign up for The Beacon today. It’s your daily dose of good news coupled with all the latest environmental coverage from Grist. Stop freakin’ and sign up for The Beacon. You’re gonna love it.
BOB IGER LEAVES A POWERFUL LEGACY. IMAGE SOURCE: DISNEY.
Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, a 40-day period of prayer, repentance and fasting for many Christians.(CNN)Are you ready to give up caffeine for 40 days? What about your social media accounts? While giving up those things may seem hard for you, Christians long ago used to give up a whole lot more. Ash Wednesday is today. It marks
Jesus .com 
