Texas
Exxon, Abu Dhabi's ADNOC to partner in delayed Texas hydrogen project
By Sabrina Valle
HOUSTON (Reuters) – Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) will acquire a 35% equity stake in Exxon Mobil Corp’s proposed low-carbon hydrogen project in Texas, with the companies announcing a one-year start-up delay until 2029.
ADNOC’s investment shows a sign of confidence in a multi-billion dollar project that Exxon has threatened to cancel if the U.S. government restricts tax credits for it. A final investment decision has been pushed into 2025, from 2024.
Exxon and ADNOC declined to disclose the value of the transaction.
“This is a very significant investment and the partners it is attracting give a sense for the momentum that’s building around this project,” Exxon President of Low Carbon Solutions Dan Ammann told Reuters.
TAX INCENTIVES
Exxon in 2022 disclosed plans to build the world’s largest low-carbon hydrogen facility at its refining site at Baytown, Texas. Hydrogen is a fuel that produces water when burnt.
The project would be powered by natural gas, with associated CO2 captured and buried underground. It was announced on the back of clean energy tax incentives proposed by the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden.
But the government limited incentives for natural gas-run facilities. Exxon CEO Darren Woods earlier this year said the project could be canceled without similar tax credits offered to hydrogen facilities powered by renewable fuels.
AMMONIA BOOST
The project’s estimated production has been revised since its initial announcement. It was initially set to produce 1 million tons of hydrogen annually.
Now, the goal is to produce 900,000 tons of low-carbon hydrogen and over 1 million tons of low-carbon ammonia, a well-established industrial product commonly used as fertilizer.
Ammonia, which has three atoms of hydrogen in its composition, is also used as a carrier for hydrogen, allowing it to be exported by ship in a liquid form.
Exxon earlier this year signed an agreement with JERA, Japan’s top power generator, to explore selling about 500,000 tonnes annually of low-carbon ammonia.
“The timing (for the hydrogen project) depends on supply, demand and supporting regulation coming together in sync,” said Ammann.
(Reporting by Sabrina Valle; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)
Concern over effectiveness of AMBER Alerts
For nearly 30 years, the AMBER Alert has helped locate hundreds of children, but one of its founders believes changes should be made to make the emergency alert system more effective.
Fox – 7 Austin
An AMBER Alert has been issued for a 13-year-old girl abducted from Louisiana who was last seen in North Texas.
Merlin Chirinos-Argueta was last seen around 7:10 p.m. May 7 in Allen, Texas, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. Authorities say the teen was abducted from Keithville, Louisiana, and may be traveling in Texas
Chirinos-Argueta is described as a 13-year-old Hispanic girl with black hair and brown eyes. She is about 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighs about 120 pounds, officials said.
The Caddo Parish Sheriff’s Office said Merlin was reported missing Thursday. May 7 from the 6200 block of Bain Boulevard in Keithville. Sheriff Henry Whitehorn Sr. said investigators are asking for the public’s help in locating the teen.
Investigators believe she may be with 18-year-old Daniel Vasquez Mejia, who has black hair and brown eyes.
Merlin has not been in contact with her family, which has raised concerns for her safety and well-being, authorities said. The investigation is ongoing.
Authorities say they may be traveling in a white Chevrolet SUV with Texas license plate VML6061. The vehicle is believed to have a skull sticker on the rear driver’s side back window and a “mojo” sticker on the passenger side rear window.
Anyone with information is urged to call 911 or contact the Caddo Parish Sheriff’s Office at 318-675-2170.
AUSTIN, Texas (KBTX) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has notified the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) that two Texas residents were passengers on the MV Hondius, a ship that experienced an outbreak of hantavirus while traveling in the Atlantic Ocean. The passengers left the ship and returned to the United States before the outbreak was identified.
“Public health workers in Texas have reached the two individuals, and they report they are not experiencing any symptoms and did not have any contact with a sick person while aboard the ship. They have agreed to monitor themselves for symptoms with daily temperature checks and contact public health officials at any sign of a possible illness,” the agency said on Thursday in a statement.
DSHS will not release additional personal details about the passengers to protect their privacy.
“This is not the next COVID, but it is a serious infectious disease,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, director of epidemic and pandemic preparedness at the World Health Organization. “Most people will never be exposed to this.”
More than two dozen people from at least 12 different countries left the ship without contact tracing nearly two weeks after the first passenger died on board.
Health authorities on at least four continents are now tracking down and in some cases monitoring the cruise passengers who disembarked on April 24, and trying to trace others who may have come into contact with them since then.
That includes two people in Georgia who are also being monitored, according to our affiliate WTOC.
Hantaviruses are usually spread through contact with wild rodent droppings or urine. The strain in the Hondius outbreak, Andes virus, can spread from person to person in limited circumstances. It typically requires close, prolonged contact with a person who is actively sick with the disease.
It is not known to spread through casual contact such as shaking hands or being in the same room for a few minutes. There have been no documented cases where a person without symptoms spread it to someone else.
Copyright 2026 KBTX. All rights reserved.
PORTLAND (WGME) – A Portland woman who has been held in a Texas ICE facility for more than six months is reportedly set to be released by Friday.
That’s according to Maine Congresswoman Chellie Pingree, who traveled to the facility this week to demand that ICE release 19-year-old Olivia Andre.
Pingree says a federal district court judge ordered Andre to be released no later than Friday.
Andre and her family were arrested by ICE when they were seeking asylum in Canada.
DHS previously said Andre is in the United States illegally but didn’t explain why the rest of her family was released and she wasn’t.
Pingree called the conditions at the facility inhumane, and Andre’s lawyer says her physical and mental wellbeing deteriorated from not having access to clean drinking water, palatable food and appropriate medical care.
“Olivia and her family should never have been detained. The federal court ordered her release because the Trump administration had no lawful basis for detaining her,” Pingree said. “She suffered in detention for six months in violation of federal law and the U.S. Constitution’s protections.”
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