NewsBytes

The Cabinet on Wednesday gave its go-ahead to a Rs 1,500 crore incentive scheme to promote recycling of critical minerals in the country. The decision was taken during the cabinet meeting held under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The scheme aims at developing recycling capacity in the country for the separation and production of critical minerals from secondary sources. These include e-waste, Lithium Ion Battery (LIB) scrap, and scrap other than e-waste & LIB scrap, such as catalytic converters in end-of-life vehicles. "The Union Cabinet...today approved a Rs 1,500 crore incentive scheme," the mines ministry said in a statement. This scheme is part of the National Critical Mineral Mission (NCMM), which is aimed at building the domestic capacity and supply chain resilience in critical minerals.  Earlier, the government approved a Rs 16,300-crore National Critical Mineral Mission, with a total outlay of Rs 34,300 crore spread over seven years, aiming to achieve self-reliance and accelerate India's journey towards green energy transition.

The UN nuclear watchdog's talks with Iran on how to resume inspections at sites including those Israel and the United States bombed cannot go on for months on end, its chief told Reuters on Wednesday, pushing for a deal as early as this week. The International Atomic Energy Agency has had no information from Iran on the status or whereabouts of its stock of highly enriched uranium since Israel launched the first attacks on its enrichment sites on June 13, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi confirmed in an interview. Tehran has now passed a law suspending cooperation with the IAEA and stipulating any future inspections will need a green light from Iran's Supreme National Security Council. Tehran and the IAEA are now in talks on how inspections can go ahead. Technically, inspections in Iran have resumed since IAEA inspectors recently carried out a mission at Bushehr, Iran's only operating nuclear power plant, but it is of so little concern from a proliferation perspective that it does not generally feature in quarterly IAEA reports on Iran.

The volatility on global economic and geopolitical landscape has made a "very compelling" case for India and Germany to expand ties and the proposed free trade deal between New Delhi and European Union should be firmed up soon as it will help stabilise the world economy, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Wednesday, against the backdrop of Washington's trade and tariff war. Following his talks with German foreign minister Johann Wadephul, Jaishankar also welcomed Berlin's resolve to double trade with India and said the focus of the deliberations was to boost bilateral cooperation in areas of trade, defence and security, green hydrogen, semiconductor manufacturing, future technologies, clean energy, education and mobility.

A climate-tech company here has claimed to have successfully conducted its first cloud-seeding operation at Jaipur's Ramgarh dam through drones equipped with an artificial intelligence-powered platform. According to a press release, Acce11, in partnership with regional partner GenXAI, deployed two "Make-in-India" drones, seamlessly integrated with advanced climate science and AI-driven seeding technology. The drones ascended to 850 metres above the dam on Monday, targeting clouds at 800 metres above sea level with a 0.8 km spread, dispersing seeding agents with precision, guided by predictive meteorology analytics. It enhanced cloud microphysics and increased the droplet size and concentration, triggering rainfall that surpassed expectations, measuring 0.8 mm against an estimated 0.6 mm, proving the operation's success, the release said. Rajasthan's Agriculture Minister Kirodi Lal Meena said the achievement was a leap toward sustainable water management.