Good morning. A blackout in Europe left millions unable to buy food, gas and medicine – more on that below, along with Conservative Party tension and an Arctic ice quest. But first:

• Trump praises Carney and says the Prime Minister will visit the White House within a week
• Ukraine signs a deal to give the U.S. access to its minerals in a bid for more military aid
• Evidence entered in the Hockey Canada sex-assault case includes texts and videos allegedly from one of the player’s cellphones

When Spain and Portugal plunged into one of Europe’s worst blackouts earlier this week, people found themselves stuck in places I very much wouldn’t want to be. I’m not even talking about the elevators, subway cars, and high-speed trains with their suddenly useless automated-door bathrooms. I mean the window cleaners in Madrid trapped off the side of Spain’s highest skyscraper. Or the Grenada skiers who spent four hours in a gondola before rappelling to the ground.

But for many of the 55 million folks caught without power for close to a day, the trouble was more mundane, if still pretty urgent: They didn’t have any cash. With banks closed, ATMs down, and digital payment systems offline, people couldn’t purchase groceries, medicine, gas, batteries, radios or flashlights. One woman in Seville told NPR she had to crack into her daughter’s piggy bank.

Follow the money

The move away from physical currency is relatively recent. Fifteen years ago, Canadians still used cash for the majority of our retail transactions. But the ease and ubiquity of bank cards, digital wallets and apps like Apple or Google Pay – coupled with an early-pandemic aversion to handling money – accelerated the number of us who tap and go. According to the Bank of Canada’s most recent statistics, cash now accounts for about 21 per cent of all transactions. Aside from the occasional cheque (it happens!), everything else is conducted by card or electronically.

As Canadians increasingly go cashless, so do the places where we might want to pay. If you’re watching the Leafs play the Senators at Ottawa’s Canadian Tire Centre tonight, you’ll need to use a card for concessions or parking – just like you will if the Leafs blow a 3-0 advantage and send the series back to Scotiabank Arena. University campuses across Ontario, including Guelph and Toronto, are now completely cashless. That’s also the case at Osheaga, Canada’s largest music festival; coffee shops, restaurants and retailers are following suit.

But there are millions of Canadians who don’t use bank cards. Community action group ACORN Canada estimates that 3 per cent of the country has no access to banking institutions, while 15 per cent rarely use their accounts. Cash doesn’t discriminate based on age, location, income, immigration status, domestic situation or financial literacy. Unlike some U.S. states, however, there’s no law in Canada requiring businesses to accept bills and coins. There’s no law in Britain, either, and yesterday the Treasury Committee said that could result in a “two-tier society.”

Stockholm syndrome

A decade ago, Scandinavia went all in on cashlessness. Sweden had launched its digital payment system, the delightfully named Swish, and Norway introduced its equivalent, the still-pretty-delightful Vipps. Uptake was enormous: This year, Sweden’s payment market is almost entirely digital. Its central bank also said that, as a percentage of GDP, Sweden and Norway have the lowest amount of cash in circulation in the world.

Only now they’re not as wild about the prospect. Some of that can be chalked up to concern for those unable to use bank cards; much of it has to do with the fear of Russian cyberattacks. Last summer, Norway passed legislation that mandated the right to pay with cash, citing the rise in “global instability with war, digital threats and climate change.” And in November, Sweden’s defence ministry asked people to keep a week’s supply of cash on hand in various denominations to “strengthen preparedness.” This advice was laid out in a brochure, sent to every home in the country, called “If Crisis or War Comes.”

Canada is not there yet – I’m eyeing the southern border – but everyone benefits from reduced friction to paying with cash. Maybe our newly minted Prime Minister Mark Carney will prove sympathetic to the cause. After all, it’s his signature on a whole bunch of our bills.

Glaciologists in the High Arctic are on an ambitious quest to retrieve the longest-ever ice core collected from the region – which could reveal 10 to 20 thousand years’ worth of climate history. Read more here about the mission to drill through a 600-metres-thick ice cap.

At home: The premiers of Ontario and Nova Scotia called on Pierre Poilievre to mend fences among fellow conservatives after the election campaign exposed tensions between the federal and provincial parties.