Who remembers the Cabbage Soup Diet? What about the Grapefruit Diet, or the South Beach Diet? Fad diets like these don’t pop up out of nowhere. They’re actually a big business. The U.S. weight loss industry, which includes everything from diet plans and cookbooks to behavioral coaching, is valued at more than $300 billion annually.

At the same time, what people eat is shaped by much more than willpower or the latest trend. The time people have to cook, their levels of income, the neighborhoods they live in, and whether there’s a grocery store nearby all influence what ends up on the dinner table. Public health experts call these factors the social determinants of health.

While food fads come and go, experts agree the best bet for nutrition and health is to be able to understand evidence-based nutrition science and apply it to daily choices. Clear, unbiased nutrition information can also help people make the most of the options and budgets they have. Still, shoppers can understandably become confused or overwhelmed by conflicting information about health and an ever-expanding list of options at the grocery store.

Confusion about how to access evidence-based nutrition guidance is what inspired the creation of Guiding Stars. The nutrition guidance program has been helping people make informed choices at the grocery store since 2006, evolving from a retailer initiative to a trusted program used by grocers, schools, hospitals and workplaces across the United States.

As Guiding Stars celebrates 20 years, we’re taking a look back down memory lane at the food fads that flared up and fizzled out and the ways science-backed nutrition guidance has advanced based on real evidence.

2000s: The Low-Carb Craze

The fad: Dr. Robert Atkins first popularized avoiding carbohydrates in favor of fats and proteins with his 1972 book “Dr. Atkins’ Diet Revolution.” The book sold millions of copies in the 1970s, but peak low-carb popularity came decades later when the fad saw a mainstream resurgence of public interest in the 2000s.

The Atkins Diet calls for limiting carbohydrate intake while emphasizing high-fiber vegetables, proteins and fats. In 2003, Miami cardiologist Dr. Arthur Agatston released his own spin on low-carb eating with his bestselling book “The South Beach Diet,” which emphasizes limiting simple carbs with a “high glycemic index” while emphasizing complex carbs such as beans and whole grains along with lean proteins and non-saturated fats.

The science: While millions of Americans were counting carbs, evidence-based nutrition guidance continued to recommend a balanced diet based on ingredient diversity and nutrient density rather than restriction. The 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommended choosing “a variety of nutrient-dense foods and beverages” from across the food groups, including fiber-rich fruits, vegetables and whole grains.

Even with clear and evidence-based guidance recommending a balanced, uncomplicated approach, people were understandably overwhelmed by diet trends presenting conflicting information and grocery shelves filling fast with new options.

In 2006, the International Food Information Council (IFIC) Foundation released the inaugural Food and Health Survey to capture the U.S. public’s understanding about health and their rising levels of anxiety and confusion over the daily choices that support their health long-term. Only a third of respondents to the landmark survey believed the health information they received was consistent, and many reported avoiding foods the Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommended because trends led them to believe they were not healthy.

Though they weren’t always sure what to look for, most people said they used the labels on food packages to help them decide what to purchase. Nine out of 10 respondents consulted at least one element of the package before tossing an item in the cart.

Findings like these inspired Guiding Stars to launch what is now the longest running on-shelf nutrition rating program in the United States. An independent scientific advisory panel started developing the system’s patented rating algorithms before the program first hit store shelves in 2006.

The algorithms leverage the latest nutrition science and standards from leading national and international health organizations to rate tens of thousands of products in a consumer-friendly system that helps shoppers make informed choices that support good health.

Under the program’s current criteria, food and beverage products are scored based on attributes to encourage (such as fiber, whole grains and Omega-3 fatty acids) and attributes to limit (such as added sugars, chemical preservatives and artificial colors). Products that meet transparent nutrition criteria earn one, two or three stars, indicating “good,” “better” or “best” nutritional value.

The program expanded quickly, and in 2009 the U.S. Surgeon General cited Guiding Stars as improving nutrition at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) inaugural Conference on Obesity Prevention.

Early 2010s: The Juice Cleanse Boom and the Rise of ‘Ancestral Eating’

The fad: Dieters pivoted to “eating like cavemen” by cutting out grains and legumes. The so-called paleolithic (or paleo) diet focused on foods that would have been available before early systems of agriculture, emphasizing meats, fish, nuts and seeds, and non-starchy vegetables.

While some were eating like our ancestors, others dabbled in cold-pressed juice cleanses. Though healthcare professionals repeatedly warned that juice cleanse crash diets could be harmful, the allure of a trendy quick fix dominated social media for years at the time.

The science: The Dietary Guidelines for Americans are updated every five years based on a systematic review of the latest nutrition science. The 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans encouraged people to increase their intake of whole grains, fruits and vegetables, seafood, and low-fat milk products while cutting back on sodium, saturated and trans fats, added sugars, and refined grains.

Accompanying the new guidelines was a transition from the MyPyramid, or “food pyramid,” guidance to a new system called MyPlate. The MyPlate graphic is divided into four sections (vegetables, fruits, grains and protein), with the aim of providing a simple visual reminder to build half of every plate with fruits and vegetables in alignment with the federal dietary guidelines.

As nutrition science and dietary recommendations evolved, so did the Guiding Stars program. Algorithms are regularly reviewed by Guiding Stars’ independent scientific advisory panel based on changes in dietary guidelines, nutrition policies and new evidence. In the 2010s, the advisory panel amended the Guiding Stars algorithm to have more conservative limits for added sugars based on guidance from global health authorities.

“Throughout the three years that Guiding Stars has been in the market, the algorithm has been reviewed and adjusted as needed to ensure that we remain consistent with the most current nutrition recommendations,” dietitian Leslie Fischer, PhD, a member of the Guiding Stars scientific advisory panel, said at the time. “Guiding Stars was designed with the public’s health in mind and these algorithm changes will help consumers choose more nutritious foods for themselves and their families.”

Evidence supporting Guiding Stars’ simple translation of nutrition science was also building. In 2013, research from the U.S. Department of Agriculture published in the journal Food Policy found that Guiding Stars’ front-of-pack and shelf-tag nutrition scoring significantly shifted consumer demand toward more nutritious food choices.

Mid to late 2010s: The Plant-Based Meat Craze

The fad: The novelty of upstart plant-based meat brands took the world by storm, with curious diners lining up to give them a go. While a steady subset of consumers still choose plant-based options often, the mass-market allure of alt-meat faded.

In a 2019 survey from the International Food Information Council, over 70 percent of Americans who tried plant-based meat said they did it because they like to sample new foods or they “were curious after hearing a lot about them.”

The science: The 2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans aimed to tackle the rising rates of chronic disease in the United States with a notable shift. Rather than focusing primarily on individual food groups or nutrients to encourage or limit, the 2015 guidelines aimed to take into account overall eating patterns and their food and nutrient characteristics.

By focusing on balance, variety, nutrient density and portion size, the guidelines aimed to create an “adaptable framework” that can be tailored to personal preferences and fit within a range of budgets.

The corresponding updates to Guiding Stars’ algorithm changed how the rating system scored dietary cholesterol and Omega‐3 fatty acids. By now, Guiding Stars was the largest nutrition guidance program in North America, covering 2,450 stores in 22 U.S. states and parts of Canada. Research in both the United States and Canada further shows that Guiding Stars ratings positively impact consumer behavior toward more nutritious choices.

2020s: Keto, Gut Health and GLP-1s

The fad: As we made our way through the 2020s, the high-fat ketogenic diet evolved into a focus on gut health, fermented foods and the cultural rise of GLP-1 receptor agonists like Ozempic and Mounjaro. Even as food fads pass at breakneck speed in the social media age, Americans by and large are becoming more health-conscious and paying closer attention to the nutritional value of what they eat.

The science: The United States is at a critical moment with respect to health. More than 60 percent of Americans have at least one chronic disease, and 40 percent have two or more. Making better choices about diet and nutrition can have a transformative effect on preventing and managing chronic disease, potentially improving the health of millions of Americans.

Even as the fads had their 15 minutes before slowly fading, Guiding Stars has continued to keep pace with the latest advances in nutrition science — launching a beverage algorithm in 2022 and releasing algorithm updates in 2023, 2024 and 2025. The scientific advisory panel has started its standard review of the most recently updated Dietary Guidelines for Americans and will amend its algorithm as needed to align.

While the science behind the Guiding Stars system advances, the apple icons with highlighted stars above remain simple enough to inform consumers in a single glance — not only on grocery store shelves, but also on product packaging, on the Guiding Stars website, and in the Guiding Stars app — simplifying everyday nutritious food choices based on the latest science.

TriplePundit]]> Tina Casey https://triplepundit.com/?p=71774 2026-10-23T20:29:26Z 2026-10-23T20:29:24Z

While polling shows Gen Z is pessimistic about their ability to sway public policy, recent surveys also suggest a boost in turnout exceeding even the 2024 presidential cycle.

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All eyes are on Generation Z as the U.S. midterm elections near. This cohort of voting-eligible teens and younger adults aged 18 to 29 now numbers 50 million, making it one of the most powerful voting blocs in today’s electorate. But the raw numbers hide a more complex truth. Historically, young people vote the least among all age groups and face disproportionate barriers to the ballot box. To predict whether this longstanding pattern will continue in 2026, it’s helpful to understand why more young people don’t vote and the issues that most shape their opinions.

Why don’t more young people vote?

It’s common knowledge that younger adults tend to vote less. Though the young vote is credited with swinging the 2024 election toward U.S. President Donald Trump, over half of eligible voters between 18 and 29 didn’t even cast a ballot. Less than a third voted in the last midterm election in 2022.

Voting rights advocates say it isn’t indifference that keeps many young people away from the polls, but the logistical barriers that can often fall harder on younger voters.

The transience of youth means voting-age teens and 20-somethings are often on the move. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the average American moves residences about 12 times over their lifetime, mostly before age 45. With each change of residence, a voter has to re-register, which can be simpler or more difficult depending on the scenario.

For example, many young people away at college, in military service, or traveling on gap years still use their childhood home as their permanent address for government documents, including drivers’ licenses. Depending on state requirements, this can make it harder to register in their city of residence.

Thirty-six states require voters to show photo identification at the polls, with about two dozen of them refusing to accept out-of-state drivers’ licenses. While some voter ID states allow students to use their college IDs to vote in the cities where they go to school, a growing number are restricting the practice, with New Hampshire and Florida among those having banned the use of college IDs to vote ahead of this year’s midterms.

Some states go further to require proof of citizenship, such as a birth certification or passport, for voter registration. While it may sound simple for a U.S. citizen to prove their citizenship, voting rights advocates argue that not having these documents readily at hand can prevent millions of eligible people from voting.

Young people are the most likely to be without citizenship documents readily available, according to research from the University of Maryland’s Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement. Veterans, young people of color, those from low-income backgrounds and youth aging out of the foster care system are even less likely to have access to the documents they need.

Researchers including voting rights scholar Jonathan Becker, acting president of Bard College, argue that election laws too often leverage these common circumstances to make it harder for young voters to reach the polls.

“Some of the systems used to exclude African Americans [from voting] have been used on young people,” Becker told students at Emerson College last month, from gerrymandering districts to stringent registration requirements. “Many of the most conflictual moments happened just when there was intense political competition, and at those moments, the targeting of young people grew.”

Gen Z says they’re fed up with the high cost of living, immigration crackdowns and rising discrimination, and many plan to vote

While right-wing podcasters like Joe Rogan are credited with motivating young voters beyond expectations in 2024, surveys show America’s youth feels increasingly disenfranchised by the democratic process.

The majority (83 percent) of Gen Z voters expressed “dissatisfaction with the country” in a 2026 poll from the organization Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity and HIT Strategies.

Respondents expressed high levels of concern over economic stability and being able to afford their basic needs, with 81 percent saying they are “very” or “somewhat motivated” to vote in the midterms. When asked what makes them feel less motivated to vote, the majority (49 percent) pointed to the outsized influence of corporations and the ultra-wealthy on elections and government.

Aside from clear concerns about economic and power disparities, 83 percent of Gen Z voters are also concerned about abortion restrictions, with 77 percent worrying they or a loved one will be personally impacted by limits on abortion and other forms of reproductive care.

A similarly overwhelming majority of Gen Z voters express concern about federal immigration tactics (80 percent), discrimination against immigrants in general (79 percent), the end of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies among institutions and the private sector (78 percent), and discrimination against transgender people (78 percent).

While most surveys indicate Gen Z adults are pessimistic about their ability to sway public policy, they also point to a boost in turnout exceeding even the 2024 presidential cycle.

For example, almost two-thirds of young people aged 18 to 22 say their opinion “doesn’t matter” to their elected representatives, according to September polling from UNICEF USA. Even so, more than 6 in 10 of those respondents who are eligible to vote said they plan to cast a ballot in the midterm elections, a 15-point increase over 2024.

In contrast to the slim youth turnout in the 2022 midterms, another recent survey from Tufts University found 56 percent of voters under 30 were “extremely likely” to vote this year.

Of course, excitement in polls doesn’t always translate into numbers at the ballot box, particularly when young people face more barriers to voting. Along with documentation and residency challenges, some jurisdictions have restricted or outright closed polling places on college campuses. In one prominent example, hundreds of students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, a historically Black college, went viral last week for marching over 40 minutes to the nearest polling place on the first day of early voting after they were denied an early-voting site on campus.

They’re not alone: Voting rights advocates are sounding the alarm about the shuttering of polling sites across the country, with low-income communities and communities of color being the most affected.

As Gen Z prepares to vote this year, their opinions also appear to have changed. Barely a year into Trump’s second term, polls already showed Gen Z support for the president falling off a cliff, from +10 in early 2025 to -32 at the start of this year, a 42-point drop.

“Youth aren’t disengaged — they’re unconvinced,” UNICEF USA summarized in September. It will soon become more clear who — or what — convinces Gen Z to head to the polls and overcome the obstacles that stand in their way.

Featured image: Getty Images/Unsplash

TriplePundit]]> Andrew Kaminsky https://triplepundit.com/?p=71735 2026-10-22T17:46:53Z 2026-10-22T17:46:51Z

Organizations across the U.S. want to clean up abandoned mines, but federal laws could hold them liable for centuries-old pollution if they try. The new Good Samaritan Act shields them from legacy abandoned mine liability issues, but will it be enough?

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This article is part of our series on responsible mining solutions. The push for clean energy is fueled by a growing demand for minerals, but conventional mining has a track record of harmful social and environmental impacts. A law that supports abandoned mine cleanups could be part of the solution.

The United States Bureau of Land Management estimates that 500,000 mines sit abandoned across the country, and many of them are polluting waterways and exposing communities, plants and animals to health risks. 

Environmental organizations and state agencies want to clean up this mess, but they’re often stalled by a daunting legal problem. If they try to clean up an abandoned mine, they could be held responsible for the centuries-old environmental damage the mine has caused due to longstanding federal laws.

“We found that if we stepped in to clean up abandoned mines, we would be treated under federal law as if we were the ones who created the pollution to begin with,” said Corey Fisher, public lands policy director at the conservation organization Trout Unlimited. “All we want to do is make it better.”

Lawmakers and advocacy groups, including Trout Unlimited, have worked for decades on a good Samaritan law to provide some legal protection for well-intentioned groups. And the Good Samaritan Remediation of Abandoned Hardrock Mines Act was eventually passed in 2024. 

The effort faced opposition from environmental groups worried that a liability exemption might allow mining companies to reprocess mine waste for profit, so the act is undergoing a trial run. After seven years and a maximum of 15 pilot projects, the law will expire and undergo review to seek permanent approval. 

Bodie Mine gets first Good Samaritan Act approval

In September 2026, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a permit to Trout Unlimited to move forward with a restoration project at the abandoned Bodie Mine in Okanogan County, Washington, under the Good Samaritan Act. It’s the first project to be authorized by the new law.

The size of the Bodie Mine cleanup makes it ideal as the first pilot project under the new law. At 790 tons of tailings set to be removed, it is a very small project by mining standards. Larger abandoned mines can easily contain millions of tons of toxic waste, presenting far greater environmental and liability risks.

Trout Unlimited expects the cleanup to prevent 104 tons of tailings that include arsenic, lead and mercury from eroding into nearby Toroda Creek each year by removing contaminated sediment and soil from the stream and streambank. The project’s estimated price tag of $500,000 will be funded by different public and private initiatives as well as the organization’s membership base.

It’s not the first abandoned mine cleanup Trout Unlimited has done. The organization restored nearly 200 miles of streams and 200 acres of former mine lands across six western states.

“Technically, we could have done the Bodie Mine project without the Good Samaritan law, but it makes it a lot easier and a lot less costly to get those projects implemented,” Fisher said.

Until now, Trout Unlimited had to essentially negotiate legal settlements with the EPA for each mine project. It’s “a long, laborious legal process,” Fisher said. The Good Samaritan Act replaces that with a permit designed specifically for abandoned mine cleanups. 

So far, all of the organization’s cleanups were relatively low-risk projects like Bodie Mine. The Bodie project is considered a nonpoint source mine pollution cleanup. Eliminating nonpoint pollution sources, like waste piles that rainwater or streams run over, carries less liability risk because these projects do not usually invoke the EPA’s Clean Water Act provisions. 

“We’ve been able to handle those types of projects to either move the stream away from those contaminated tailings, or move the contaminated tailings away from the stream through what effectively is a legal settlement agreement with the EPA,” Fisher said.

The hope is that the Good Samaritan Act will allow organizations and state agencies to also conduct point source cleanups, which would invoke the Clean Water Act provisions, without facing major liability issues. Point source mine pollution cleanup — where the source of the pollution is singular and can be easily identified, like a leaking pipe or drainage ditch — requires water treatment and is subject to stricter regulation.

“Just like NGOs, state abandoned mine programs are mostly not able to do water treatment at hardrock abandoned mine sites right now because they may have to obtain National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits for those sites, which simply isn’t practical or economical in most cases,” said Ryan Ellis, director of legislative and regulatory affairs at the Interstate Mining Compact Commission. 

NPDES is the permit usually required for point source cleanups.

Can good Samaritans solve America’s abandoned mine problem?

Some experts question the ability for the Good Samaritan Act to clean up America’s abandoned mines.

“Cleaning up some of these smaller sites is not a bad idea, and we could learn some things,” said Mark Squillace, a professor of natural resources law at the University of Colorado. “It’s just that they’re really small potatoes in terms of the big problem that we have.”

Some experts say a lack of funding, more than liability protection, is what is really holding back cleanup efforts.

Cleaning up all physical and environmental hazards related to abandoned mines in the U.S. would cost about $60 billion, according to a report by the National Association of Abandoned Mine Land Programs. But government funding is scarce and patchwork at the moment. The federal Abandoned Hardrock Mine Reclamation Program was recently created to bridge the gap, but it has only received about $5 million per year in funding — falling well short of the billions needed.

“Everyone knows that the real solution is a funding source,” said Aaron Mintzes, deputy policy director at the environmental nonprofit Earthworks. “The United States of America is the only nation in the world that receives zero royalties from hardrock mining. As a result, there’s no polluter pay funding mechanism for abandoned hardrock mine cleanup.”

Trout Unlimited identified another abandoned mine in Montana that would be ideal for a pilot project, for example, but it needs $1.5 million to make that happen.

Proponents of an abandoned mine fund point to coal mining as an example. The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 applies a royalty on coal mines that goes towards a program to clean up abandoned mines.

In Pennsylvania, which holds the most abandoned coal mines of any U.S. state, organizations have used that fund to clean up abandoned sites, said Anne Daymut, watershed coordinator at the Western Pennsylvania Coalition for Abandoned Mine Reclamation. Pennsylvania enacted its own Environmental Good Samaritan Act in 1999. The state law does not protect good Samaritans against federal regulations, but it does provide liability protection against civil lawsuits. 

“The Good Samaritan Act is really just a supporting player. It’s a comfort layer for any groups that have some fear of the potential liabilities,” said Daymut, referencing the state-level law and adding that government funding was the main driver for launching abandoned mine cleanup projects in the state. Over 350 abandoned mine drainage treatment systems used to treat contaminated water in Pennsylvania were paid for by public money.

Good Samaritan Act may open the door for larger scale cleanups

While funding is a big piece of the puzzle, experts still say the importance of the federal Good Samaritan Act should not be overlooked. 

“Without good Samaritan legislation, you could have all the hardrock abandoned mine funding you need and still not be able to do water treatment projects, which is a significant impediment to the ability to restore waterways,” said Ellis of the Interstate Mining Compact Commission. “The good Samaritan program will allow states and third parties like environmental organizations to be more active in that respect.” 

As the act’s first project gets underway, Trout Unlimited hopes more organizations are able to follow in its footsteps. 

“The Good Samaritan Act isn’t a silver bullet, but we really feel like this is the opportunity to create the momentum to tackle this problem at the scope and scale it demands,”  Trout Unlimited’s Fisher said.

The EPA told TriplePundit in an email that it has not yet received any other applications for the remaining 14 pilot projects under the Good Samaritan Act, but it expects more applications in the coming months.

“Applicant interest in the program is rising and the EPA plans to have all 15 permits granted and implementing the cleanups in the field over the next two to three years,” said Mike Bastach, an EPA spokesperson.

TriplePundit]]> Sarah Walkley https://triplepundit.com/?p=71660 2026-10-15T19:54:44Z 2026-10-14T23:46:50Z

The International Sustainability Standards Board is inching closer to its goal of creating a global baseline for disclosing sustainability-related risks and opportunities that could impact company financial performance. 

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A single global standard for non-financial disclosures is a tough ask in the face of wildly different government priorities and regional sustainability challenges. But one option is slowly gaining ground.

The International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) set out the framework for general sustainability-related disclosures (IFRS S1) and for climate-related reporting (IFRS S2) with the aim to create a global baseline for disclosure of the sustainability-related risks and opportunities that could impact company financial performance. 

Since June 2023, close to 50 countries have taken steps to adopt the ISSB standards as the basis for mandatory reporting.

Adoption by stealth

ISSB’s success is down to its approach and independence from any regulatory authority. Established by the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation — the standards-setting board for financial reporting — it had credibility with investors from the outset. It proceeded to build on and supersede other established frameworks, making it easier to adopt than other regulations that introduced new processes. 

Regulatory developments over the past 18 months have helped strengthen support for the ISSB framework. The European Union’s efforts to simplify its Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) provoked widespread confusion about reporting requirements, while the United States experienced a full-scale roll-back. Both left the business community reaching for a practical, implementable framework, and the ISSB standards seemed to fit the bill.

In response, national governments have taken advantage of this wave of enthusiasm by endorsing a framework that has business support, but no political baggage attached. ISSB is not a U.S. framework or an EU one. It is perceived as a neutral technical standard that countries can adopt without appearing to favor a specific national or regional regulatory agenda. For many countries in the Middle East and Africa, validating the ISSB framework also serves to rapidly elevate local reporting requirements to international standards.

Not quite standard

Here’s the catch: While over 40 countries are on the path to ISSB adoption, they haven’t done so uniformly. Chile, Malaysia, Nigeria and Singapore, among others, transposed the standards unchanged. Elsewhere — including in Australia, China and the United Kingdom — regulators announced variations.

In the core standards, ISSB set out a timetable for adoption of key provisions, as so-called “transition relief.” For example, companies voluntarily adopting the ISSB standards should disclose their direct emissions (Scope 1 and 2) in the first year, expanding coverage to value chain emissions (Scope 3) in year two.

Regulators have commonly adjusted the timetable to adapt to the local situation, allowing more time to embed Scope 1 and 2 disclosures before mandating full emissions reporting. Meanwhile, the U.K. stripped out all transition relief when it endorsed the ISSB standards for voluntary use. The Financial Conduct Authority, which oversees public company reporting in the U.K., subsequently confirmed the framework would replace existing climate-based reporting rules on a “comply or explain” basis. Listed companies will have to report direct emissions from 2028, with value chain emissions following a year later and other sustainability-related disclosures in 2030. Any deviation from the U.K. version of the ISSB standards must be clearly justified.

There is also a degree of cherry-picking, with many countries taking a climate-first approach. In Jordan, IFRS S2 and the climate-related elements of IFRS S1 are mandatory from fiscal year 2026. All other aspects of IFRS S1 are optional. And Australia’s standards mirror the core framework, but any reference to industry-specific climate metrics was removed.

While the standards remain unaltered in Mexico, companies must seek external review and assurance for their reports, which is not a requirement of the core ISSB framework. Brazil — one of the first adopters — rolled back from mandatory reporting in June 2026, shifting to a “comply or explain” basis. But the expectation remains that companies choosing to comply would have their reports independently reviewed.

Meanwhile, China deviated most significantly from the core ISSB framework, favoring double materiality over financial materiality. This encourages companies to consider the impact of their activities on people and the planet, as well as how sustainability risks and opportunities could shape their financial performance.

Materiality continues to matter

What happens in China will be watched with interest, not just because of the size of the market. It provides a test-case for marrying double materiality and the ISSB standards, which was ultimately a sticking point for the EU.

In April 2026, regulators floated a proposal for stronger alignment between CSRD and the ISSB framework, enabling companies to integrate disclosures within one report. They suggested this was possible as long as information about a company’s impacts does not obscure investor-focused disclosures on issues affecting financial performance. The Mouvement des Entreprises de France, the French Banking Federation, and others voiced concerns that this could lead to a two-tier system where financially material topics are given greater weight. Within weeks, the proposals were dropped.

The debate highlights a sketchy understanding of materiality — one that ignores the interconnections between a company’s impacts and its financial risks and opportunities. Over time, impacts can grow in importance and become financially material, just as climate change has. As a result, it would be unwise to allow key impacts to drop off the radar.

Advice for businesses considering alignment

Regardless of the materiality debate, global multinationals are most likely to benefit from the groundswell of support for ISSB, as it is aligning requirements across economies accounting for around 60 percent of global GDP.

But before deciding whether to use the ISSB standards, it’s important to check whether they are a requirement in your home market or soon will be. This will determine the speed of transition and the need to accommodate any local variations.

If the ISSB standards are not legally required, voluntary adopters should consider how the framework fits with existing regulatory requirements in their country or region. For example, CSRD takes precedence in Europe, but the ISSB framework is a complement that supports increased transparency in areas of interest to investors.

In the absence of mandatory requirements, the choice between ISSB and other frameworks comes down to the audience you want to reach. With its focus on financial materiality, the ISSB standards aim to provide investors with the information they need to make decisions about company performance. 

For all companies using the ISSB framework, alignment starts with evaluating the sustainability landscape to assess the risks and opportunities that could impact your business and understand the topics that are financially material. Mapping current disclosures against the ISSB framework enables you to identify reporting gaps that need to be closed.

Ongoing expansion

ISSB is eager to build on the momentum of recent years, noting that more than 50 countries could be on the path to adoption by 2027. Behind the scenes, it is working to make its standards the “global passport” for reporting.

Working with regulators, ISSB is exploring the experiences of countries adopting the framework to understand why they decided to adapt the standards. The passport initiative aims to iron out these issues, making it easier for countries to endorse the framework unaltered and further simplify reporting for businesses. To that end, ISSB expanded its Jurisdictional Working Group in 2025 covering more countries.

Further guidance is in the pipeline. The ISSB is currently working on a practice statement for biodiversity, ecosystems and ecosystem services reporting, closely modeled on the existing Taskforce for Nature-related Financial Disclosures framework. The first draft is due out this month.

ISSB is also responsible for the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board standards. Covering over 70 industries, the standards provide investor-focused guidance on the sustainability issues that likely pose material risks and opportunities for a sector. ISSB consulted stakeholders on the process for updating the first 12 standards. As yet, there is no timetable around the release of the updated guidance.

That said, it’s clear that the ISSB remains dead set on establishing a global baseline for sustainability disclosures to meet the information needs of investors. Companies juggling a vast array of reporting guidance, frameworks, and standards would welcome a more unified landscape, so long as regulators continue to support it.

Featured image credit: World Economic Forum/Flickr

TriplePundit]]> Oscar Lopez https://triplepundit.com/?p=71619 2026-10-13T19:06:59Z 2026-10-13T19:06:07Z

The Maya Train promised to bring tourism to lesser-known locations across the Yucatán Peninsula. Nearly three years later, locals say that promise has yet to materialize.

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Snaking through nearly 1,000 miles of jungle, past ancient pyramids and turquoise lagoons, Mexico’s Maya Train soars across the Yucatán Peninsula.

Connecting numerous tourist destinations, the train was envisioned as a means of encouraging travelers to venture further afield to lesser-known inland sites. The premise was that it would spur greater economic development in a region that is culturally rich but has long been mired in poverty. 

While officials claim the train is succeeding in driving economic growth and tourism, the facts on the ground tell a different story. Nearly three years after its inauguration in 2024, the promises of an economic boom have failed to materialize, according to experts, local residents and government data. 

The train, vastly over budget and built in record time, is running largely empty. And far from the promise of bringing economic development to under-resourced Maya communities, locals say it brought the scourge of organized crime and violence to previously peaceful hamlets.

“There’s a feeling of insecurity,” said Javier Becerril, an economics professor at the Autonomous University of Yucatán. “It didn’t used to be like that.”

Meanwhile, the project has left a trail of environmental devastation, the true costs of which are only just beginning to emerge.

“It’s messed up,” said Hector Hernández, an engineer who spent several years working on the rail line for the Maya Train. Locals “were led to believe that a change was actually coming — an economic boost — or that they would be able to work. Nothing of the sort has happened.”

Problems pile up

The Maya Train was announced by the former President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, with great fanfare just over a month after he won the presidency in July of 2018. “It is a monumental work,” López Obrador later crowed at its inauguration in December 2024. “We’re not exaggerating if we say that there is no other work like it in the world.”

The more than 900 mile track was set to join major hubs, like the giant resort city Cancún, to lesser-known attractions, like the smaller inland town of Palenque, which is home to one of the country’s most impressive and well-preserved ancient Mayan cities. 

Overseen by the military, the project was initially slated to cost around US$8.5 billion. By the time it was finished in 2024, the train’s budget had more than tripled to nearly US$30 billion, according to a study by political analysis firm IMCO. 

The construction may have brought an initial economic boost to the area. Quintana Roo state, home to cities like Cancún and Tulum, saw a 13 percent growth in economic activity in 2023, according to government data. But the boom was short-lived. By 2024, the state’s economy had fallen into recession, and in the first six months of 2025, it had declined by over 9 percent.

Most workers on the rail line came from other parts of Mexico, meaning there were few long-term employment opportunities or financial benefits for locals, said economics professor Becerril. 

“There was no economic spillover,” he said. “People who came from outside and received a paycheck sent the money back to their places of origin.”

The influx of well-paid outsiders also caused housing and food prices to rise, meaning the money they did spend drove up the cost of living for locals.

“Prices doubled or tripled,” Becerril said. “Instead of an economic benefit to the communities, there were losses.”

Now that the train is complete, only 1,200 jobs need to be filled on the railway itself, so the economic opportunity remains minimal, he added. 

As for the impoverished Maya communities along the train line, few if any have seen a boost to their economies. Some villages are still without power or running water despite government promises that community development would accompany the new train line. 

“Indigenous communities were promised everything they needed — from jobs, improved electrical and water infrastructure, schools, healthcare and housing,” said Pedro Uc, a Mayan community leader who lives near the city of Mérida on the northwestern side of the peninsula. “I don’t know of a single community that has received these benefits.”

The train did make villages more accessible to outsiders, but that led to an influx of organized crime, Uc said. 

Where Uc lives in the state of Yucatan, for example, crime increased by 50 percent in 2026 compared to the previous year. Uc links that rise, at least in part, back to the train. “It seems that what arrived in the train cars to the communities is insecurity, gunfire, bodies in bags, abductions, misery and fear,” he said. “It’s like a scene from a movie.”

What went wrong?

One of the project’s key flaws is that many stations originally designed to be built in downtown areas had to be moved to the outskirts of cities for numerous reasons. In some areas, such as Campeche, residents refused to be relocated to make way for the train. In others, like Mérida, building a station downtown would prove too complicated and time consuming.

“There was a lack of comprehensive planning to make this system more connected,” said Carlos Veloz, an urbanist in Quintana Roo, a state on the Yucatán Peninsula. “There wasn’t a proper assessment of the area you were going to pass through.”

In the roughly hour-long stretch between the popular coastal destinations Cancún and Playa del Carmen, for example, the train was supposed to run along the highway, which would have given workers easy access to use the train to get to various hotels along the coast. But hoteliers protested that the disruption to the highway during construction would be bad for business, so the section was moved 5 kilometers inland.

Those stations are less accessible both to tourists and locals, providing little incentive to use the train when other, more convenient alternatives exist. In 2025, the train received an average of 3,320 daily users, according to government figures. That’s far below the 74,000 that were initially projected. Videos shared on social media often show mostly empty train carriages and desolate stations.

“The train travels practically empty,” said Hernández, the engineer who worked on the rail lines. “You spend a fortune to run the train, and the four passengers who board don’t even cover the cost of the fuel.”

The train’s ticket prices are also out of reach for many locals. A ticket between Mérida and Cancún for example costs MX$489, more than the daily minimum wage. And with so few tourists taking it, the economic boost promised by the federal government hasn’t materialized. 

“There are many rural communities in the center of Yucatán state that have never used the Maya Train — nor will they — due to the fares,” said economics professor Becerril. “And tourism doesn’t reach those corners.”

On top of the economics, the train had a serious environmental impact. According to government data, 7 million trees were knocked down during its construction.

“It’s devastating,” said Guillermo Christy, a local industrial engineer and environmentalist. “There’s no justification for it.”

That’s just the beginning. The bedrock of the Yucatán Peninsula is incredibly porous, creating one of the world’s largest underground river systems full of pristine caves and crystalline cenotes, Christy said. To build across this river system, the rail line drove giant pylons into many of these caves. Roughly 130 caves were filled in or perforated.

“With a forest, you can wait 10 or 15 years and it recovers,” he added. “But a cave that you fracture or fill up or perforate, well, there’s no way to recover that. They’re formations that are millions of years old, and now they’re lost.”

Many of the caves were also found to hold ancient animal and human remains that are thousands of years old, Christy said. Destroying the caves by perforating them with giant pylons risks damaging possible future archaeological finds.

“Let the experts do their job”

It may be too late for the Maya Train to ever amount to the boon it initially promised. “Unfortunately, it’s a white elephant of a project,” Christy said. “We have to keep pouring money into it just to keep it running, but in reality, it isn’t serving the community.”

Still, experts say important lessons can be drawn from the train’s failure. For one, the project’s overseers were too focused on speed and expediency and didn’t take the input from professional engineers into account enough, Hernández said. 

The trainline was built 600 percent faster than similar projects in other countries, according to the government.

“What can we learn? Let the shoemaker make shoes,” he said. “Let the experts do their job.”

Becerril said the government should have also spent more time consulting with locals as to what was actually needed — critical infrastructure like electricity, water and hospitals — rather than building a train line that served little use for impoverished communities.

The project was put to a popular vote, but the poll was conducted at a national level, rather than focusing on the voices of locals most impacted by the project. When Indigenous groups were consulted about the train in 2019, the United Nations found that the process had not yet met international human rights standards for prior, free, informed and culturally appropriate consultation and consent. The UN raised human rights concerns about the project again in 2022, calling on the Mexican government to allow Indigenous communities to meaningfully participate in the decision making and hold developers accountable with proper human rights due diligence processes. 

“When designing projects, it is very important to take a bottom-up approach — to ask ordinary people, using common sense, what their concerns and local needs are,” Becerril said. “Doing it in reverse — something coming from the federal government in a top-down manner —  fails to close the gap between the haves and the have-nots.”

Feature image credit: ProtoplasmaKid/Wikimedia Commons

TriplePundit]]> Tina Casey https://triplepundit.com/?p=71636 2026-10-09T20:59:59Z 2026-10-09T20:59:58Z

Federal immigration agents began targeting agricultural communities in Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas last month, leading livestock organizations to issue a joint public statement in protest. The farming and ranching advocates warned the violent arrests and deportations of working people will raise the price of beef and other staples.

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Farmers, ranchers and agricultural communities have been some of Donald Trump’s most avid supporters. Of the 444 counties classified as farming-dependent, almost 78 percent voted to re-elect him as president of the United States two years ago. But now that the administration’s harsh immigration policies have rippled into their business interests by depriving them of workers, their once seemingly unshakable faith in Trump is slipping.

Where are all the workers?

The Trump administration’s deployment of federal immigration agents in U.S. communities has been widely documented as violent and cruel, impacting documented immigrants and U.S citizens along with those who do not have legal status.

About a third of lawfully present immigrants said they avoided daily activities like going to work, seeking medical care or using public spaces in the first year of Trump’s second term, according to November polling from KFF and The New York Times. Around six in 10 people with legal immigration status are afraid they or a family member will be arrested and deported.

The administration claims this fear of being subjected to the cruel arrest, detention and forced deportation pipeline has motivated millions of immigrants to leave the U.S. of their own accord. The Department of Homeland Security boasts of “record-breaking” deportation numbers, topping 675,000 persons in 2025 alone, and credits its actions with motivating 2.2 million more people to leave voluntarily last year.

Though critics say these self-deportation figures are overinflated, with the Center for Migration Studies of New York calling them a “self-serving fantasy,” the dampening effect on the workforce has hit communities hard across the country.

Farmers clap back

It’s an open secret that the U.S. agriculture industry relies heavily on non-citizen labor, including undocumented workers and seasonal migrant laborers authorized under the H-2A visa program.

If the intent of ICE-inflicted pain and misery is to open up more jobs for U.S. citizens on American farms, it has failed miserably. Farmers advertised 415,000 positions last year but received only 182 domestic applications, the American Farm Bureau Federation reported this summer. Those figures support the common knowledge that most Americans simply don’t want to work on farms.

As their workforce is decimated by Trump’s immigration policies, advocacy groups like the Farm Bureau are seeking an overhaul of the H-2A guest worker program. “Unfortunately, the current guest worker program is inadequate to meet the demands on farms across the country,” Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall stated, somehow refusing to acknowledge the elephant in the room.

Still, farmers and their elected representatives have been reluctant to speak out directly against federal immigration policies, instead focusing on H-2A reforms, but recent events indicate a tipping point.

Despite Trump’s pledge to avoid raiding farms, federal immigration agents began targeting agricultural communities in Oklahoma, Kansas and Texas last month, leading three livestock organizations to issue a joint public statement in protest.

“Our organizations respect the responsibility of federal agencies to enforce the law. At the same time, cattle producers, feedyards, dairies, livestock markets, processors, and other rural businesses depend on a stable workforce,” the Kansas Livestock Association, Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association and Texas Cattle Feeders Association stated together on Sept. 25.

The advocacy and lobbyist organizations advise that Trump’s ferocious pursuit of undocumented people has delivered a shock to the documented workforce as well. “These ICE operations are having a massive chilling effect on the legal, documented, skilled workers that put beef on the table and keep the cattle supply chain moving,” they stated.

Though the rebuke was mild, and the word “immigrant” conspicuously absent, the message is significant as a rare public challenge by the agriculture industry that directly links Trump policies to the worsening affordability crisis. “These types of disruptions will lead to higher beef prices for consumers,” the three organizations stressed.

Farming advocates draw a straight line between federal immigration policy and the affordability crisis

While an AP-KFF survey indicates that rural voters have yet to make the connection, en masse, between Trump’s immigration policies and their household budgets, the affordability crisis is all too real among the wider population as Trump’s war of choice in Iran continues to push up gas prices at the pump.

“A new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that only 17 percent of U.S. adults approve of the Republican president’s handling of the cost of living,” the Associated Press reported last week.

Affordability pressures have also motivated some Republican officials to dial down their support for Trump in advance of the midterm elections on November 3. One notable example is U.S. Sen. Jim Justice of West Virginia, who sits on the Senate Agriculture Committee.

Back in January, Sen. Justice said ICE was “doing a great job,” but his stance changed following the statement from farming and ranching organizations. Referring obliquely to accusations that ICE agents lack proper training, Justice said: “All of a sudden, then you’re dragging people away that have lived on your street corner for 15 years. I don’t know that we need to be doing that stuff.” He added, “To get better, the first thing you got to do is admit you’re doing something wrong.”

Justice is not on the ballot this year, nor is farming a particularly significant contributor to the West Virginia economy, though small family farms are commonplace. But with some of the lowest annual income levels in the United States, the affordability crisis is all the more hurtful for West Virginians.

Even as the clock ticks toward the midterm elections, federal immigration agents have reportedly stepped up their activities across states with large farming economies, including California, Oregon, Florida and New Jersey. If the Republican ticket does lose the farm vote, office seekers who fail to cut ties with the president before Election Day may do so at their own risk.

TriplePundit]]> Tina Casey https://triplepundit.com/?p=71602 2026-10-02T21:53:17Z 2026-10-02T19:41:19Z

Urban policymakers are struggling to keep pace with data center development. The consequences of the policy vacuum are evident in cities like Phoenix, the hottest major city in the United States and an area of high interest for new data centers.

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The data center construction boom has swelled into a high-level political issue in the United States with the approach of the 2026 midterm elections. Hundreds of jurisdictions are restricting data center construction, citing environmental and public welfare concerns. That includes major cities, which are particularly exposed to the contribution of large data centers to the urban “heat island” effect.

Urban data centers and the policy vacuum

Data centers have been a common feature in the urban landscape for decades. Developers are attracted by existing infrastructure like power lines, water services and road access. The size of these earlier facilities is relatively modest, and so is their impact on surrounding neighborhoods. Most local zoning codes historically treated data centers as any other light industrial activity, without specific regulation.

Now, a new generation of hyperscale facilities is rising to meet the demands of AI computing. A single AI data center can use as much electricity as a small city, putting strain on local power grids and raising new public health concerns.

Urban policymakers across the United States are now trying to catch up to a situation that critics say has already spiraled out of control. “The development of these data centers has proceeded at a pace and scale that utility planning frameworks, regulatory structures, local approval processes, and community engagement practices were not designed to accommodate,” the nonprofit Bipartisan Policy Center warned in a 2026 report.

Cities take action, with mixed results

The consequences of the policy vacuum are evident in U.S. cities like Phoenix. Until last summer, Arizona was among the states offering substantial tax incentives to attract data center development, with the Phoenix metro area being a particular focus of activity.

More than 100 data centers are already operating in Phoenix, with nine under construction and 36 in the planning pipeline, according to the U.S. Data Center Map tracker. Phoenix has a “very high” risk for extreme heat waves in Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) ratings and sits in a high water-stress area.

State policymakers passed a three-year moratorium on data center tax incentives beginning in July, but it touched off a sudden rash of applications before the effective date. State officials received 113 applications for tax incentives after the moratorium was signed into the state budget in June. In comparison, the same incentive program received a total of 123 applications in the previous 13 years.

Phoenix itself had no zoning ordinance specific to data centers until 2025 when the city council formally adopted new rules to establish zoning definitions and design standards. The rules require data center developers to obtain a special permit to build in certain districts, including consideration of noise limits and other performance standards.

Within months, Phoenix was faced with at least 11 landowners and developers demanding compensation for the lost value of their data center projects under Prop 207, a state law approved by voters in 2006 that allows landowners to sue cities or demand compensation if new zoning regulations harm their property values. The Arizona Republic calculated the total bill at $753 million. As a partial solution, Phoenix began negotiating waivers with some data center projects, enabling them to move forward.

The ordinance also does not impact projects in other cities in the metro area. The firm Aligned Data Centers, for example, acquired a property in Phoenix in 2022 but dropped plans for a data center there after the zoning ordinance passed. The company then filed plans with the nearby city of Peoria, less than 15 miles away, for a 95-acre data center in the city’s Legacy Point industrial zone, which allows warehouses, manufacturing, and large-scale water users without restriction.

The new Aligned facility will be Peoria’s first data center. City officials are now considering options for updating zoning rules and exercising some restrictions on new data centers, including larger setbacks from streets and property lines, landscape buffers, and third-party noise assessments. However, even if the new rules are approved, they would not necessarily apply retroactively to projects already in the planning stages.

The heat island factor

Due to their massive heat signatures, large-scale and AI data centers in the metro threaten Phoenix’s already precarious position as the hottest major city in the United States and a living example of the urban heat island effect.

“Phoenix has one of the largest urban heat island magnitudes in the world,” research from the climate office at Arizona State University finds. ASU researchers have been studying the urban heat island effect in Phoenix for nearly 30 years. Their most recent assessments found the temperature at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport within the city limits is 10 to 14 degrees Fahrenheit hotter on average compared to smaller cities and towns less than 50 miles away.

Urban heat islands are typically caused by structures and pavement absorbing massive amounts of solar energy during hot days and slowly releasing it as heat, making the city far hotter than surrounding suburbs and rural areas. The effects are particularly strong in Phoenix, where the UV index regularly exceeds 11 during summer, but cities from New York and New Orleans to Houston and San Francisco also experience severe urban heat islands.

A single data center can push those temperatures even higher. The waste heat produced by one data center is roughly equivalent to 40,000 households or more, 2026 research from ASU’s School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning shows. And that heat does not stay in place. It travels.

A data center can raise temperatures in the surrounding neighborhood by as much as 4 degrees Fahrenheit, the school’s peer-reviewed research found.

The implications of Arizona State University’s study on waste heat from data centers

The ASU study is particularly significant because it provides the first precise, ground-level data on waste heat that travels downwind from data centers.

Previously, rough estimates were only available through thermal imaging from faraway satellites and other remote sensors. ASU researchers used air temperature sensors to directly measure heat levels upwind and downwind from four data centers across the Phoenix metro which “reflect the typical design of ‘hyperscalers’ that house many thousands of servers and use primarily air-based cooling systems.” They found hotter air temperatures up to five city blocks away.

“Even if these data centers only contribute to an additional heat island magnitude of one degree or two degrees, that can still have a very significant impact on our lives,” said David Sailor, director of ASU’s School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning and lead author of the study, in a statement.

Sailor and his colleagues emphasize this level of impact from waste heat is a “previously undocumented urban thermal hazard demanding attention from the data center and urban planning communities.” They plan to study the effects further, gathering temperature data across a wider range of times and weather conditions.

The potential for previously unknown impacts is among the driving factors behind a wave of data center moratoriums across the country as regulators scramble to catch up to the pace of development. Local policymakers and citizens have also raised the alarm over air pollution from data center backup generators, as well as noise disrupting previously quiet neighborhoods and stress on municipal water systems. Increased power demand from data centers is also partly driving the rise in local electricity rates, adding to the stress on financially burdened households.

The firm Connected Capital is tracking 399 local data center moratoriums in various states of progress across 44 states, in addition to 32 bills among state legislatures.

The push for urban data center standards is global

In the absence of strong state or federal guidelines, ASU’s research further underscores the need for jurisdictions in the Phoenix metro to take stronger regional action on urban heat islands.

The need for regional collaboration is also evident in the many U.S. cities where permitting decisions are made by administrative staff relying on outdated zoning regulations, without a vote from elected officials. In Colorado, for example, a data center in the city of Aurora has been quietly winding its way through the permitting process. If successful, the new facility — including 28 emergency diesel generators — will be located within a residential area.

After the proposal came to public attention, Aurora residents mobilized to flood the city council meeting earlier this week. Residents aged 16 to 86 shared three hours of public comment on what would be the state’s largest data center.

“I’m here speaking for the other at-risk neighbors in the audience and at home, and surprisingly enough, I’m also speaking for your future,” Dan Bergander, a resident of a local senior housing community, told council members on Monday. “You on city council will one day settle into retirement and I certainly hope you’re not betrayed by developers and government officials.” The room broke out into applause as he finished, Sentinel Colorado reports.

U.S. cities are also reaching out to counterparts elsewhere around the globe to develop principles that guide urban data center development on a more sustainable path. The Global Urban Data Centres Pact, formed earlier this year in partnership with the urban advocacy organization C40, already includes 42 members around the world, including Phoenix and 20 other U.S. cities.

The Pact falls well short of halting urban data center development entirely. Instead, it operates as a clearinghouse for best practices and case studies that help city planners and residents set standards to shield communities from undue impact, citing the new Phoenix zoning ordinance as one example.

In addition to zoning upgrades, climate-safe solutions are an area of focus. The Pact calls for clean power, water conservation and waste heat recovery at data centers and challenges developers to invest in local infrastructure and engage with local communities.

As for effectiveness, the real power behind efforts like the Global Urban Data Centres Pact sits with the public. Here in the U.S., a sharp rise in grassroots activism has compelled some developers to revise their plans or cancel projects altogether, and the rising tide of anger and uncertainty has rippled into the 2026 midterm election cycle. With Election Day coming up on Tuesday, November 3, voters have an opportunity to change the direction of data center development, if not nationally then locally, in their own communities.

Featured image: Wikimedia Commons

TriplePundit]]> Tina Casey https://triplepundit.com/?p=71596 2026-09-16T21:34:57Z 2026-09-16T21:34:06Z

Election integrity advocates say misinformation and voter suppression efforts are rampant ahead of the U.S. midterm election. They’re fighting back in the court of law and the court of public opinion.

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It’s never a bad idea to double-check your voter registration status before an election. Americans interested in verifying theirs ahead of the U.S. midterms may have seen ads for an innocuously presented informational website called VoteSafe.org where they can confirm they’re registered, request an absentee ballot or sign up for election reminders. 

“VoteSafe” suggests a politically neutral voter education resource. There’s only one problem: The website isn’t run by a government agency, a nonpartisan voting rights organization, or even a community group. It’s run by America PAC, the personal political action committee of billionaire Elon Musk, the largest individual donor to U.S. President Donald Trump and the Republican party in the 2024 election cycle. 

Investigative reporter Judd Legum takes note of the copious personal and digital data collected by VoteSafe, which is then transmitted to a host of private tech companies, along with America PAC and other Trump allies for use in Republican get-out-the-vote operations. 

“The slick voter registration website, currently being promoted to millions of people, is a digital surveillance machine,” Legum wrote in breaking the story on Popular Information last week. 

America PAC spent over $180,000 in one week alone to promote VoteSafe.org on Meta platforms like Facebook and Instagram, Legum reported. Multiple outlets have since picked up the story, including Snopes, which verified VoteSafe’s collection and sharing of users’ personal information as factual. 

Beyond the topline message of “don’t use this website,” it’s important to remember the U.S. electorate still has access to impartial election information. 

U.S. voters can find accurate registration information through their local elections official. Although Trump has deliberately stripped the bipartisan Election Assistance Commission of leadership, the commission’s Vote.gov website still provides convenient state-by-state election information and links to local offices.

Beyond their connections to misinformation, the Trump administration has taken steps that watchdogs warn could undermine free and fair elections ahead of the midterms. Election integrity advocates are fighting back. 

As seeds of distrust threaten to bear fruit, election integrity advocates are fighting back

After Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden by over 7 million votes, Trump’s followers launched dozens of federal lawsuits challenging the outcome. Though all the suits failed, they fed election conspiracy theories that culminated in a deadly attempt to overthrow the U.S. government on January 6, 2021, with Trump himself egging on the mob.

Trump then spent the next four years complaining of widespread voter fraud without providing any evidence, setting the stage for another round of interference with the peaceful transfer of power. He returned to office in 2025 armed with new tools, deploying his political and executive power to spread suspicion and fear over the integrity of the elections process, particularly in regards to the virtually non-existent issue of illegal immigrants voting in U.S. elections. 

Trump’s administration backed the gutting of the Voting Rights Act earlier this year and has since taken new steps that have sown confusion and doubt ahead of the midterms. 

That includes demanding voter rolls from more than 30 states and threatening to prosecute election officials who refuse to comply, telling federal immigration agents to deploy at polling stations, and ordering the U.S. Postal Service to interfere with absentee ballots.

But concerned voters and election integrity advocates are pushing back against these brazen measures in the court of law and the court of public opinion. 

In the most recent example, a three-judge panel of the First Circuit Court of Appeals blocked the U.S. Postal Service from interfering with mail-in ballots, stating that the new USPS rules would “likely result in the disenfranchisement of millions of voters across the country while providing minimal — if any — gains in combating voter fraud.” The city of Denver and civil rights groups also sued to block immigration officials from polling places, citing the longstanding “troops at polls” law. 

In addition, new grassroots organizations have organized to advocate for voter engagement, with the No Kings organization being a particularly interesting example. When it emerged last year, No Kings initially focused on staging nationwide “day of action” consumer boycotts. Unlike the online-only #GrabYourWallet and Sleeping Giants boycott campaigns of the first Trump administration, No Kings also organized in-person rallies, which then became a springboard for organizing permanent, hyper-local advocacy groups that forge tight bonds with their communities.

Since the first day of action on February 17, 2025, the No Kings movement has steadily attracted more participants with each of its following rallies. However, No Kings has been quiet for the past six months. They did not organize a day of action over the summer. The last one gathered in March when local groups held block parties, fairs, marches, and other community engagement events in every congressional district across all 50 states, sending a strong message about the power of civic engagement.

But the quiet period is over. The No Kings coalition including labor unions, civil rights groups, and advocacy organizations like Voto Latino, Indivisible, and Public Citizen are gearing up to rally voters to turn out in massive numbers during the early voting period this year. 

Organizers are training volunteers on how to resist attempts at voter intimidation at local polling places and encouraging local groups to stage get-out-the-vote events on Saturday, October 17. 

“The time for sending a message is over,” Indivisible co-founder Ezra Levin told USA Today last week. “Now we are headed into an important point in a democracy, which is whether the people stand up and refuse to allow an authoritarian to consolidate power. And the way to do that in a democracy is by exercising your right to vote and by exercising your right to organize to prevent any sabotage in that election.”

Notably, platforms like No Kings offer grassroots voting rights advocates an alternative to corporate-sponsored voter engagement organizations like Civic Alliance, which counts the global oil and gas producer BP, the beleaguered retailer Target, and the Facebook and Instagram branches of Meta among its partners.

If anything, the message this year is for voters to trust themselves, not corporate brands or billionaire executives, when the peaceful transfer of power is at stake. 

Feature image credit: Getty Images/Unsplash

TriplePundit]]> Andrew Kaminsky https://triplepundit.com/?p=71586 2026-09-16T15:34:53Z 2026-09-16T15:34:51Z

Scientists have yet to figure out how to recycle old tires into new ones at scale, but they can still find valuable second lives in new rubber products. We took a peek behind the tire recycling curtain to find out what really happens to tires when they retire and where they go next.

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The advent of modern transportation comes with an unavoidable consequence: mountains of rubber tire waste. A billion tires are discarded each year globally. Beyond the obvious material waste challenge, old tires pose hazards if improperly discarded, from fire risk to creating an ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes in the summer.

Scientists have yet to figure out how to recycle old tires into new ones at scale, but they can still find valuable second lives in new rubber products. TriplePundit took a peek behind the tire recycling curtain to find out what really happens to tires when they retire and where they go next.

How is tire rubber collected?

Given the environmental and public health risks associated with improperly discarded tires, jurisdictions around the world have put laws on the books to incentivize tire recovery and recycling. Among those legislative models is individual producer responsibility, or IPR, a model unique to Ontario when looking across Canada at the more commonly employed systems of extended producer responsibility and stewardship. IPR is a more stringent version of EPR, and requires tire producers to ensure their products are disposed of responsibly or recycled.

Canada’s most populous province, Ontario, has some of the most stringent IPR requirements for tires globally. Producers are responsible for collecting and recycling the tires they sell in the province (by weight, not by brand), which requires an auditable record of where tires are collected and where they go in their subsequent lives.

The not-for-profit eTracks was established to help tire producers meet the needs of Ontario’s IPR laws. With a network of 5,500 tire collection sites like auto dealerships, repair shops and tire dealers, eTracks now collects and traces tires across the province, which spans an area 1.5 times the size of Texas.

eTracks tracks and traces about 13 million tires every year using its eSRP system, which digitally verifies tires from pickup at collection sites to drop-off at processing facilities.

Among those manufacturers is Northwest Rubber, a top global producer of rubber mats and one of eTracks’ largest manufacturing partners. Northwest uses recycled rubber for the majority of the products it makes, and all of that recycled rubber comes from end-of-life tires, a significant portion provided by eTracks, says CFO David Pruim.

The company even owns its own tire processing plant, Evolve Recycling in Brantford, Ontario, which has won eTracks’ processor award several years in a row. The plant recycles millions of tires every year and turns them into new products for sports, agriculture and industry.

Follow the crumb trail: How end-of-life tires become new products

When tires arrive at the Evolve Recycling plant, they’re separated into their three basic components: steel, fibers and rubber.

Once separated, the rubber is sent through powerful grinding machines that crush it into small fragments. Then comes cleaning: Magnets and air-suction systems are used to extract any remaining steel wire, textile fibers and debris from the rubber.

The clean rubber fragments that remain are processed again in secondary grinders to create uniform pellets called crumb rubber, which is ready to use as a raw material in new products.

Different sizes of crumb rubber are best suited for different purposes. Coarser crumbs are widely used for sports surfaces, for example, but specialized products like Northwest Rubber’s often require additional processing.

“If you’ve played soccer or football on an artificial turf field, the same rubber pellets that you see on that surface is what we get,” said Pruim of Northwest Rubber. “We then put that in the press, along with a couple of other ingredients, and we produce rubber flooring.”

Since its founding nearly 60 years ago, Northwest has turned more than 160 million tires into new products. Northwest brand Animat, for example, specializes in manufacturing recycled rubber matting for livestock and equestrian facilities to improve animal welfare.

The mats increase comfort for horses and cows inside barns and transport trailers, reducing incidence of injury. For the dairy industry in particular, increased cow comfort has been linked to increased milk production in studies that compare rubber flooring to standard concrete.

Northwest also makes sporting floors for hockey rinks and fitness gyms, anti-fatigue mats for commercial kitchens, auto mats for cars and trucks, and landscaping and construction materials, among other common items — all from recycled tire rubber.

The tire industry is becoming more circular, but not quite there yet

Some jurisdictions consider tires recycled once they have been transformed into rubber crumb at a recycling depot, but in Ontario, tires are only considered recycled once that rubber is sold onward for some beneficial purpose. When Northwest Rubber receives rubber crumb, it’s logged in the eSRP platform to help tire manufacturers comply with their IPR requirements.

“For us, it’s critical that we know where the material comes from in Ontario and where it ends up,” said Melissa Carlaw, VP of communications and sustainability for eTracks. “A tire isn’t truly recycled just because it’s been shredded. It has to become part of something useful again.”

While Ontario’s IPR laws reduce tire waste and the need for virgin rubber feedstocks, they don’t ensure the products made from that rubber are collected and reused a second time. “It could be done,” Pruim said of recycling Northwest’s mats. “We just don’t have another mechanism in the market to recover those used mats, clean them and grind them up. It’s more of a logistical challenge, frankly, than anything else.”

The industry, however, is rolling in the right direction with producer responsibility laws that advance circularity and organizations like eTracks and Northwest Rubber that give new life to used tires.

TriplePundit]]> Stephanie Amoako https://triplepundit.com/?p=71573 2026-09-11T23:33:08Z 2026-09-11T23:33:07Z

The World Bank Group is in the midst of an accountability crisis of its own making. The institution needs to change course to ensure that cutting accountability is not mistaken for efficiency.

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Recently, the World Bank Group’s Board of Directors made the unprecedented decision to overrule its own independent accountability mechanism: the Office of the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman. Independent accountability mechanisms at development finance institutions address complaints from communities experiencing harms ranging from environmental damage to gender and sexual violence.

Normally, when investigating non-compliance with institutional policies, the board approves an action plan to address the non-compliance and remedy the harm. As advocates for communities harmed by development finance, we have seen the transformative impact that this accountability process can have, if followed. This is not what happened in June.

In response to a 2022 complaint, a Compliance Advisor Ombudsman investigation found that the International Finance Corporation (IFC) — the private sector wing of the World Bank Group — violated its own sustainability framework in its investments in six microfinance institutions in Cambodia. These investments enabled predatory lending practices that led to the loss of land and livelihoods, hunger, increased suicide risks and threats of retaliation.

Instead of following the process required by the accountability mechanism policy, the board invalidated the findings and allowed IFC to create a “special” action plan that does not fully address the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman’s recommendations and the harmed communities’ demands. Moreover, the board is preventing the office from addressing any other microfinance complaints. As a result of this massive overstep, Compliance Advisor Ombudsman Director General Janine Feretti resigned, and over 100 civil society organizations and experts have called on the bank to reverse course. 

Microfinance excluded today. Something else tomorrow

The decision argues that microfinance, which has well-documented shortcomings that the World Bank acknowledges, is not governed by IFC’s Sustainability Framework. Microfinance experts disagree. The controversy points to a larger issue plaguing the institution: the false choice between efficiency and accountability. 

Increasing global challenges and shrinking bilateral commitments to development aid have pushed multilateral institutions like the World Bank to demonstrate that they can do development more efficiently. Three years ago, the bank underwent a self-proclaimed “evolution” to become a “bigger and better bank” with a redoubled focus on “impact, speed and efficiency.”

But the institution has increasingly seen accountability to project-affected communities as inefficient, rather than recognizing that it is necessary for effective development. Although the board’s response in the Cambodia case is unprecedented, it is only the latest in a string of problematic decisions limiting accountability. 

Recently, the World Bank entered a series of Full Mutual Reliance Frameworks with other development finance institutions. These agreements allow certain co-financed projects to apply only one institution’s environmental and social standards. Unfortunately, they also limit harmed communities’ access to only that financier’s independent accountability mechanisms, barring them from using the other lender’s mechanism despite the project being supported by both institutions. This is a problem because independent accountability policies vary in the rights afforded to complainants, making a difference for the outcomes communities can expect.

Similarly, the board kicked off 2026 by approving a hydroelectric power project in Bhutan co-financed by the World Bank’s public and private sector arms that stripped affected communities’ access to its Compliance Advisor Ombudsman office. The bank celebrated this project as emblematic of an efficient, “One World Bank” approach.

Accountability is not inefficient

Independent accountability mechanisms allow institutions to hear directly from harmed communities and course correct, protecting themselves from reputational damage. They also legitimize international financial institutions’ operations in-country and are often the sole pathway to remedy for project-related harm when local accountability channels — such as courts — are inaccessible or function poorly. Without these independent mechanisms, international financial institutions would not have a legitimate claim to legal immunity. 

In the Cambodia case, reports claim that the institution wanted to limit the World Bank’s Compliance Advisor Ombudsman’s jurisdiction over microfinance to prevent a flood of complaints, since IFC is one of the largest international funders of the microfinance sector. If IFC is afraid of receiving many complaints, wouldn’t that indicate that its current microfinance activities aren’t efficient and effective? In the future, will other sectors be excised from accountability because they are “too big to fail?” 

Rather than shrinking the scope of what the bank can be held accountable for, the institution should focus on preventing and addressing harm so that development is sustainable. Restricting communities’ ability to spotlight harm is counterproductive. 

Next steps for World Bank accountability

The Cambodia case saga is happening while the bank is integrating its Compliance Advisor Ombudsman with other independent accountability mechanisms that cover the institution’s public sector investments. While the board committed to the principle of “no regression” from the protections that communities enjoy under the existing independent accountability policies, recent events undermine trust in that commitment.

To us, “no regression” primarily means not diluting the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman policy, which has strengths recognized by several board-commissioned external reviews. 

But there are signs that dilution is already happening. The bank has launched a recruitment process for the leader of the new independent accountability mechanism that does not include civil society stakeholders on the selection committee, falling short of past recruitment processes. In another departure, current World Bank staff are not prevented from applying for the position, potentially undermining the mechanism’s independence.

Here’s what the World Bank needs to do to restore trust:

Ensure the new independent accountability mechanism covers all the institutions’ activities. Any investment, regardless of sector or type, can contribute to harm. Creating accountability “carveouts” only allows harm to continue and prevents the institution from learning lessons. 

Commit to a strong independent accountability policy and better delivery of remedy. The integration of the bank’s independent accountability mechanisms should build on the principle of non-regression by taking the best policies and practices from each. The new policy should increase its accessibility and independence. It must also contain an explicit remedy mandate, as an accountability mechanism that does not facilitate remedy is of little use to communities.  

The World Bank Group must stop mistaking accountability for inefficiency. Effective development is impossible without strong accountability to impacted people. 

Feature image credit: UKinUSA/Wikimedia Commons

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