US President Donald Trump and Congress are moving to overturn Joe Biden’s 20‑year mining ban on more than 225,000 acres of Superior National Forest in northern Minnesota, using the Congressional Review Act after Interior officials argued the ban was not properly filed in the Congressional Record. If lawmakers reject the ban within 60 days, the Trump administration could reissue long‑contested federal leases for Antofagasta’s Twin Metals underground copper‑nickel‑cobalt‑PGM project, located in the Duluth polymetallic belt. The mine would be Minnesota’s first underground operation since 1967 and the next major US nickel producer as the country’s only existing nickel mine nears closure.

A coalition of UK environmental professionals is calling for natural capital – including rivers, wetlands, soils and urban green space – to be formally designated as critical national infrastructure (CNI). The group argues that assets providing flood attenuation, coastal protection and urban cooling deliver system-level resilience comparable to power, water and transport networks, and should therefore receive similar statutory protection and long-term funding. For civil and geotechnical engineers, this would push nature-based solutions such as floodplains, saltmarsh and sustainable drainage systems further into core infrastructure planning and asset management.

MPs have sharply criticised Thames Water’s performance in a Commons debate, with one MP saying she “wouldn’t trust Thames Water to run a bath” as they examined the company’s financial stability and pollution record across London and the Thames Valley. The session scrutinised the utility’s remediation plans for sewage discharges into the River Thames and its ability to fund long-term upgrades to ageing sewers and treatment works under its current debt-laden structure. For civil and water engineers, the outcome could reshape investment timing, regulatory requirements and delivery models for major network rehabilitation schemes.