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Mekong River Commission (MRC) Announces Laos Intentions to Build “Fourth Dam” on Mekong River
CHIANG RAI – The Mekong River Commission (MRC) announced yesterday that Laos has formally notified the Commission of its intention to construct the Pak Lay dam on the mainstem of the Mekong River. The notification triggers commencement of the Prior Consultation procedure under the MRC’s Procedures for Notification, Prior Consultation and Agreement (PNPCA). Pak Lay is the fourth Mekong mainstream dam to be submitted to the procedure.
“The MRC and the government of Laos have failed to address outstanding, significant concerns associated with dams previously submitted for Prior Consultation. Proceeding with this dam is a clear distraction from existing obligations,” said Pianporn Deetes, Thai Campaign Director at International Rivers. “The project is expected to add to already significant transboundary impacts on communities in Thailand and throughout the Mekong River Basin, in addition to impacts on local communities in Laos that continue to go unaddressed.”
The proposed 770 MW Pak Lay dam is located in Xayaboury Province of Lao PDR. The dam is located downstream of the Xayaburi dam, which is now nearing completion, and approximately 100 kilometres from the Thai border.
“I’m really concerned about the project’s potential impacts on Mekong River ecology, especially on Kaeng Kud Ku rapids, a well-known tourist attraction that boosts the local economy in Chiang Khan district,” says Channarong Wongla of the Rak Chiang Khan Conservation Group in Loei province, Thailand. “We are affected every year by fluctuating water flows from Chinese dams upstream, and if the Pak Lay Dam is built, it will create huge impacts on the livelihoods of local people living along the Mekong River in northeastern Thailand.”
“Mekong villagers in Thailand have been waiting over five years for a decision in a landmark lawsuit challenging the decision-making for the Xayaburi dam. The Pak Lay dam downstream threatens to compound the impacts and dissolve any hope of accountability,” says Pianporn. “The MRC and the government of Laos are incapable of seeing the whole river; they simply want to divide it into sections to exploit. We are witnessing the unfolding of a social and ecological disaster.”
The notification for the Pak Lay dam follows, most recently, the Prior Consultation procedure for the Pak Beng Dam in 2017, the third dam on the lower Mekong mainstream, and the Xayaburi and Don Sahong dams preceding it. While the Pak Beng Prior Consultation process was an improvement over earlier consultations, quality of information and consultation remained inadequate. In addition, the Lower Mekong governments have failed to make good on commitments agreed to during the process. The governments agreed to develop a Joint Action Plan (JAP) to address unresolved concerns over the impacts of the project, however the JAP is yet to be publicly released. The Prior Consultation process for the Pak Beng Dam is also the subject of an ongoing lawsuit in Thailand’s Administrative Court.
In February, the MRC released its ‘Council Study’, which was initiated in 2011 to complement the Prior Consultation procedure with a cumulative, basin-wide assessment of proposed dam projects. The Council Study cost USD 4.7 million and took seven years to complete. The Council Study findings show that the series of eleven large hydropower dams on the Mekong River’s lower mainstream and 120 tributary dams pose a serious threat to the ecological health and economic vitality of the region.[1] These impacts will drastically reduce food security and agricultural productivity, and increase poverty levels and climate vulnerability in many areas of the lower Mekong basin.
The lower Mekong governments have yet to formally recognize or endorse the Council Study findings or explain how the study will inform decision-making on Mekong dams.
“Mekong governments and their Development Partners have spent millions on a study to find that impacts of hydropower are severe and alternatives need to be seriously considered. Proceeding with the construction on this dam without serious consideration of alternatives is a waste of public funds,” says Maureen Harris, Southeast Asia Program Director at International Rivers. “Despite many promises for an improved consultation process, commitments to further studies and improved consultations have yet to produce a meaningful impact on decision-making, leaving communities vulnerable.”
The notification for the Pak Lay Dam states that the 770 MW project is not expected to commence construction until 2022. While electricity from the project is anticipated for sale to Thailand, no power purchaser or developer for the project is identified in the notification.
In March, Thailand’s EGAT confirmed that a decision on the power purchase from the Pak Beng Dam is delayed pending completion of a review of Thailand’s Power Development Plan (PDP), which is scheduled for completion in September. The electricity reserve margin in Thailand is very large – over half the energy currently being produced, indicating little need for new installed capacity. The current PDP review was spurred in part by the emergence of new technologies in the Thai energy sector and recognition that renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar, are swiftly becoming mainstream in the global energy market.
In a key recommendation, the Council Study report urges MRC member countries to give serious consideration to the impacts and of proposed dams and examine emerging energy technologies as increasingly viable and sustainable alternatives to planned hydropower development.

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Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding, But Still Accounting 48% Search Revenue

Google is so closely associated with its key product that its name is a verb that signifies “search.” However, Google’s dominance in that sector is dwindling.
According to eMarketer, Google will lose control of the US search industry for the first time in decades next year.
Google will remain the dominant search player, accounting for 48% of American search advertising revenue. And, remarkably, Google is still increasing its sales in the field, despite being the dominating player in search since the early days of the George W. Bush administration. However, Amazon is growing at a quicker rate.
Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding
Amazon will hold over a quarter of US search ad dollars next year, rising to 27% by 2026, while Google will fall even more, according to eMarketer.
The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the forecast.
Lest you think you’ll have to switch to Bing or Yahoo, this isn’t the end of Google or anything really near.
Google is the fourth-most valued public firm in the world. Its market worth is $2.1 trillion, trailing just Apple, Microsoft, and the AI chip darling Nvidia. It also maintains its dominance in other industries, such as display advertisements, where it dominates alongside Facebook’s parent firm Meta, and video ads on YouTube.
To put those “other” firms in context, each is worth more than Delta Air Lines’ total market value. So, yeah, Google is not going anywhere.
Nonetheless, Google faces numerous dangers to its operations, particularly from antitrust regulators.
On Monday, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Google must open up its Google Play Store to competitors, dealing a significant blow to the firm in its long-running battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games. Google announced that it would appeal the verdict.
In August, a federal judge ruled that Google has an illegal monopoly on search. That verdict could lead to the dissolution of the company’s search operation. Another antitrust lawsuit filed last month accuses Google of abusing its dominance in the online advertising business.
Meanwhile, European regulators have compelled Google to follow tough new standards, which have resulted in multiple $1 billion-plus fines.

Pixa Bay
Google’s Search Dominance Is Unwinding
On top of that, the marketplace is becoming more difficult on its own.
TikTok, the fastest-growing social network, is expanding into the search market. And Amazon has accomplished something few other digital titans have done to date: it has established a habit.
When you want to buy anything, you usually go to Amazon, not Google. Amazon then buys adverts to push companies’ products to the top of your search results, increasing sales and earning Amazon a greater portion of the revenue. According to eMarketer, it is expected to generate $27.8 billion in search revenue in the United States next year, trailing only Google’s $62.9 billion total.
And then there’s AI, the technology that (supposedly) will change everything.
Why search in stilted language for “kendall jenner why bad bunny breakup” or “police moving violation driver rights no stop sign” when you can just ask OpenAI’s ChatGPT, “What’s going on with Kendall Jenner and Bad Bunny?” in “I need help fighting a moving violation involving a stop sign that wasn’t visible.” Google is working on exactly this technology with its Gemini product, but its success is far from guaranteed, especially with Apple collaborating with OpenAI and other businesses rapidly joining the market.
A Google spokeswoman referred to a blog post from last week in which the company unveiled ads in its AI overviews (the AI-generated text that appears at the top of search results). It’s Google’s way of expressing its ability to profit on a changing marketplace while retaining its business, even as its consumers steadily transition to ask-and-answer AI and away from search.
Google has long used a single catchphrase to defend itself against opponents who claim it is a monopoly abusing its power: competition is only a click away. Until recently, that seemed comically obtuse. Really? We are going to switch to Bing? Or Duck Duck Go? Give me a break.
But today, it feels more like reality.
Google is in no danger of disappearing. However, every highly dominating company faces some type of reckoning over time. GE, a Dow mainstay for more than a century, was broken up last year and is now a shell of its previous dominance. Sears declared bankruptcy in 2022 and is virtually out of business. US Steel, long the foundation of American manufacturing, is attempting to sell itself to a Japanese corporation.
SOURCE | CNN
News
2024 | Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case

Washington — Trump Media, The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will not hear an appeal from social media platform X about a search warrant acquired by prosecutors in the election meddling case against former President Donald Trump.
The justices did not explain their rationale, and there were no recorded dissents.
The firm, which was known as Twitter before being purchased by billionaire Elon Musk, claims a nondisclosure order that prevented it from informing Trump about the warrant obtained by special counsel Jack Smith’s team violated its First Amendment rights.
The business also claims Trump should have had an opportunity to exercise executive privilege. If not reined in, the government may employ similar tactics to intercept additional privileged communications, their lawyers contended.
Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case
Two neutral electronic privacy groups also joined in, urging the high court to hear the case on First Amendment grounds.
Prosecutors, however, claim that the corporation never shown that Trump utilized the account for official purposes, therefore executive privilege is not a problem. A lower court also determined that informing Trump could have compromised the current probe.
Trump utilized his Twitter account in the weeks preceding up to his supporters’ attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, to spread false assertions about the election, which prosecutors claim were intended to create doubt in the democratic process.
The indictment describes how Trump used his Twitter account to encourage his followers to travel to Washington on Jan. 6, pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to reject the certification, and falsely claiming that the Capitol crowd, which battered police officers and destroyed glass, was peaceful.
Supreme Court Won’t Hear Appeal From Elon Musk’s X Platform Over Warrant In Trump Case
That case is now moving forward following the Supreme Court’s verdict in July, which granted Trump full immunity from criminal prosecution as a former president.
The warrant arrived at Twitter amid quick changes implemented by Musk, who bought the company in 2022 and has since cut off most of its workforce, including those dedicated to combating disinformation and hate speech.
SOURCE | AP
News
The Supreme Court Turns Down Biden’s Government Appeal in a Texas Emergency Abortion Matter.

(VOR News) – A ruling that prohibits emergency abortions that contravene the Supreme Court law in the state of Texas, which has one of the most stringent abortion restrictions in the country, has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States. The United States Supreme Court upheld this decision.
The justices did not provide any specifics regarding the underlying reasons for their decision to uphold an order from a lower court that declared hospitals cannot be legally obligated to administer abortions if doing so would violate the law in the state of Texas.
Institutions are not required to perform abortions, as stipulated in the decree. The common populace did not investigate any opposing viewpoints. The decision was made just weeks before a presidential election that brought abortion to the forefront of the political agenda.
This decision follows the 2022 Supreme Court ruling that ended abortion nationwide.
In response to a request from the administration of Vice President Joe Biden to overturn the lower court’s decision, the justices expressed their disapproval.
The government contends that hospitals are obligated to perform abortions in compliance with federal legislation when the health or life of an expectant patient is in an exceedingly precarious condition.
This is the case in regions where the procedure is prohibited. The difficulty hospitals in Texas and other states are experiencing in determining whether or not routine care could be in violation of stringent state laws that prohibit abortion has resulted in an increase in the number of complaints concerning pregnant women who are experiencing medical distress being turned away from emergency rooms.
The administration cited the Supreme Court’s ruling in a case that bore a striking resemblance to the one that was presented to it in Idaho at the beginning of the year. The justices took a limited decision in that case to allow the continuation of emergency abortions without interruption while a lawsuit was still being heard.
In contrast, Texas has been a vocal proponent of the injunction’s continued enforcement. Texas has argued that its circumstances are distinct from those of Idaho, as the state does have an exemption for situations that pose a significant hazard to the health of an expectant patient.
According to the state, the discrepancy is the result of this exemption. The state of Idaho had a provision that safeguarded a woman’s life when the issue was first broached; however, it did not include protection for her health.
Certified medical practitioners are not obligated to wait until a woman’s life is in imminent peril before they are legally permitted to perform an abortion, as determined by the state supreme court.
The state of Texas highlighted this to the Supreme Court.
Nevertheless, medical professionals have criticized the Texas statute as being perilously ambiguous, and a medical board has declined to provide a list of all the disorders that are eligible for an exception. Furthermore, the statute has been criticized for its hazardous ambiguity.
For an extended period, termination of pregnancies has been a standard procedure in medical treatment for individuals who have been experiencing significant issues. It is implemented in this manner to prevent catastrophic outcomes, such as sepsis, organ failure, and other severe scenarios.
Nevertheless, medical professionals and hospitals in Texas and other states with strict abortion laws have noted that it is uncertain whether or not these terminations could be in violation of abortion prohibitions that include the possibility of a prison sentence. This is the case in regions where abortion prohibitions are exceedingly restrictive.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which resulted in restrictions on the rights of women to have abortions in several Republican-ruled states, the Texas case was revisited in 2022.
As per the orders that were disclosed by the administration of Vice President Joe Biden, hospitals are still required to provide abortions in cases that are classified as dire emergency.
As stipulated in a piece of health care legislation, the majority of hospitals are obligated to provide medical assistance to patients who are experiencing medical distress. This is in accordance with the law.
The state of Texas maintained that hospitals should not be obligated to provide abortions throughout the litigation, as doing so would violate the state’s constitutional prohibition on abortions. In its January judgment, the 5th United States Circuit Court of Appeals concurred with the state and acknowledged that the administration had exceeded its authority.
SOURCE: AP
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