Today: High prices are spoiling MAHA's healthier food campaign; Waymo repurposes its old EV batteries for energy storage; startups are finding ways to circumvent China on rare earths.

Welcome back: Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s push to overhaul the food system is running into resistance from food companies and corners of the Trump administration itself, the Journal’s Jesse Newman and Liz Essley Whyte report.

White House and Trump administration officials have slowed progress on some of Kennedy’s hallmark initiatives—including efforts on ingredient oversight and ultraprocessed food—over concerns they could further drive up food prices, people familiar with the matter said.

Food-industry groups, representing companies such as PepsiCo and WK Kellogg, have been delivering a similar message to lawmakers, federal agencies and the White House, especially about policies being developed at the state level.

Kennedy’s rise to prominence and the birth of MAHA caught the U.S. food industry off guard. He vowed to strip some chemicals from the food supply and wage war on chronic disease. He has also urged individual states to pass laws tightening food regulation and has been a major proponent of regenerative agriculture, a farming practice which looks to avoid uses of pesticides and fertilizers in favor of more sustainable methods.

Alphabet’s Waymo is set to repurpose its old electric-vehicle batteries as storage for solar power.

The self-driving car company told WSJ Pro Sustainable Business's Clara Hudson it is partnering with B2U Storage Solutions in an effort to reuse thousands of its EV batteries, finding a new use for the old batteries as large-scale energy-storage systems that can stash power to shore up the electric grid.

Waymo isn’t the first car company to recycle its batteries with B2U, but its fleet of self-driving cars go through EV batteries far more frequently than regular electric vehicles because the autonomous ride-hail cars rack up more miles more quickly.

There is hope for escaping China’s grip on rare earths. That is the message from some companies that toil far from the public eye looking for ways to use fewer of the key minerals dominated by Beijing, Jason Douglas and Junko Fukutome report for the Journal.

Rare earths are used in jet-fighter engines and weapons, as well as in new green technologies like wind turbines and electric vehicles. However, almost the entire supply chain relies on China.  But, startups like Niron Magnetics’ magnets don’t use rare earths. Instead, they say the basic building blocks are just iron and nitrogen.

“The modern world runs on magnets,” says Jonathan Rowntree, who joined the company as chief executive in 2023. A car has around 75, in engines, braking systems and even windshield wiper motors. A smartphone has around 18, including in the microphone, camera and sensors.

“The number of magnets in the world needs to triple in the next 10 years. There’s not enough rare earths for it to double. We are in a crisis. We need a reliable and secure magnet supply,” Rowntree said.

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• Anthropic suggested that AI labs consider slowing development, citing rapid advancements and potential for recursive self-improvement. (WSJ)
   
• History shows that major events in the oil and gas markets can drive enduring changes to the global energy mix. (Bloomberg)
   
• Trump is using wartime presidential authority to hand $700m to coal-fired power plants in the US. (Guardian)
   
• The quest to mine the deep sea is ramping up, in a bid to find new sources of minerals. (NYT)
   
• Beef prices could be set to rise further after the USDA confirmed a flesh eating fly that feeds on cattle, was found in a calf in Texas. (Heatmap)
   
• General Motors-backed lithium industry start-up EnergyX is building a lithium iron phosphate cathode factory in east Texas. (FT)
   
• The Iran war has prompted Persian Gulf petrostates to invest billions in new infrastructure to bypass the Strait of Hormuz. (WSJ)

WSJ Pro Sustainable Business gives you an inside look at how companies are tackling sustainability. Send comments to bureau chief Perry Cleveland-Peck at perry.cleveland-peck@wsj.com and reporters Clara Hudson at clara.hudson@wsj.com and Yusuf Khan at yusuf.khan@wsj.com. Follow us on LinkedIn at wsjperry, clara-hudson and yusuf_khan.