Firms manage $7.3tn in assets and could afford to transition away from fossil fuels yet invest in natural gas and coal-fired plants to power datacentersThe energy portfolios of 20 private equity firms produce 1.5bn tons of greenhouse gases a year, more than the annual emissions of any country except China, the US, India and Russia, according to a new report.Together, these firms manage $7.3tn in assets of all kinds, affording them the ability to shape the pace of the transition away from fossil
Firms manage $7.3tn in assets and could afford to transition away from fossil fuels yet invest in natural gas and coal-fired plants to power datacenters
The energy portfolios of 20 private equity firms produce 1.5bn tons of greenhouse gases a year, more than the annual emissions of any country except China, the US, India and Russia, according to a new report.
Together, these firms manage $7.3tn in assets of all kinds, affording them the ability to shape the pace of the transition away from fossil fuels. However their energy investments include significant fossil fuel assets including natural gas and coal-fired power plants to provide electricity to datacenters.
NATO fighter jets shot down a drone over Lithuania shortly after midnight on 15 September, the first time alliance aircraft have destroyed one over that country, LRT reported. The aircraft crossed in from Belarus and came down near a village in the center of the country, where military police sealed the site. Its type and operator have not been established.
Russia is fighting a war it has not confined to Ukraine, and NATO's eastern flank now absorbs the overflow — drones crossing the bo
NATO fighter jets shot down a drone over Lithuania shortly after midnight on 15 September, the first time alliance aircraft have destroyed one over that country, LRT reported. The aircraft crossed in from Belarus and came down near a village in the center of the country, where military police sealed the site. Its type and operator have not been established.
Russia is fighting a war it has not confined to Ukraine, and NATO's eastern flank now absorbs the overflow — drones crossing the border, sabotage inside Europe, and warnings from Western intelligence that Moscow could turn on the alliance within a year of the fighting in Ukraine ending.
What happened over Lithuania
Lithuania's National Crisis Management Center issued a yellow air alert after midnight, first for the capital and the districts around it, then for the Kaunas region further west. Italian Air Force Eurofighter Typhoons flying NATO's Baltic air policing mission from Šiauliai Air Base destroyed the drone with missile armament, Lithuania's Defense Ministry confirmed, and the army published the first images from the crash site.
Map showing Pratkūnai in Kaišiadorys district, Lithuania, where the drone came down. Map: Google Maps via LRT
The drone was over Lithuanian territory for about half an hour, crisis center head Vilmantas Vitkauskas told LRT radio. He said there is a high probability it carried an explosive charge, though the wreckage does not yet show whether it was a combat drone. Lithuania chose a yellow alert rather than red because red is used when a strike or a fall is unavoidable, he explained, and the drone was destroyed within seconds of the air defense crews reacting, over farmland with no homes nearby.
Debris from the drone destroyed over Lithuania, found near Pratkūnai, Kaišiadorys district, 15 September 2026. Photo: Lithuanian Armed Forces via Delfi
Military and civilian police are working at the site under the Shield security plan, and the area has been fenced off and guarded. President Gitanas Nausėda thanked the allied personnel for their swift response, saying that with Russia intensifying its aggression against Ukraine such readiness is vital for the region.
Lithuanian military police and police block the road to the site where a drone was shot down, Kaišiadorys district, Lithuania, 15 September 2026. Photo: Delfi
Whose drone it was
Nothing has been established beyond the direction it came from. The army has not commented on the drone's possible origin while the wreckage is still being collected, and the launch point also remains unreleased. Vilnius airport suspended operations during the alert, and flights from Türkiye and Iceland were delayed.
The same night as this incursion, Poland scrambled fighter jets and raised air defense readiness over Russian drone strikes on western Ukraine, and Romania did the same, with neither country recording a violation of its airspace. The day before, the Polish military recovered a drone from the Baltic Sea that its defense minister said preliminary inspection indicated was Russian and military.
A Romanian F-16 flying the same NATO mission shot down a Ukrainian strike drone over southern Estonia on 19 May, the first NATO drone shootdown in Baltic airspace. Ukrainian drones have been knocked off course into the Baltics by Russian electronic warfare, and Estonia's foreign minister has accused Russia of steering them into NATO territory deliberately.
Across the US, anti-datacenter organizers are harnessing community anger to win local electionsAfter four months of teach-ins and canvassing, Steven Kung helped Monterey Park, just east of Los Angeles, become the first US city to ban datacenter construction. Now, the organizer is running for city council – and he’s taking on an incumbent who supported the development of the sprawling facility.“The datacenter coming to my neighborhood turned my life upside down,” said Kung. “I saw that there’s a
Across the US, anti-datacenter organizers are harnessing community anger to win local elections
After four months of teach-ins and canvassing, Steven Kung helped Monterey Park, just east of Los Angeles, become the first US city to ban datacenter construction. Now, the organizer is running for city council – and he’s taking on an incumbent who supported the development of the sprawling facility.
“The datacenter coming to my neighborhood turned my life upside down,” said Kung. “I saw that there’s a dismantling of democracy at a local level.”