Science Archive

Measures to curb greenhouse gas emissions from gas-fired power plants operating in the US probably won’t be finalized until November — after presidential elections. It’s a risky gamble for environmental groups pushing the Biden administration to take more time to tighten proposed regulations. If Donald Trump is elected, policies to tackle climate change could just go out the window like they did during his last stint in office.

AI eats up a lot of electricity, and that’s driving up data centers’ energy use. It’s also changing the physical footprint of data centers and making it harder for companies to hit their sustainability goals, the New York Times reports. With the AI-fueled boom in new data centers, sites under construction in North America could eventually use as much power each year as the San Francisco metro area, according to a real estate report published yesterday.

The blaze is still tearing through the Texas Panhandle after scorching 500,000 acres. The Smokehouse Creek Fire is now the second largest in state history, with 0 percent contained as of Wednesday morning. The facility responsible for disassembling a majority of the nation’s nuclear weapons shuttered briefly Tuesday night as flames drew near.

Warren has been urging federal agencies to scrutinize energy-hungry Bitcoin mines. But crypto groups secured a temporary pause on the Department of Energy’s survey of their electricity consumption.

The Department of Energy announced $366 million for 17 clean energy projects across 30 Tribal Nations and 20 states. All of them are connected to “disadvantaged communities that are disproportionally overburdened by pollution and historically underserved.” That includes off-grid solar and battery storage for the Hopi and Navajo Nations, aiming to give 300 rural homes electricity for the first time. More than one-fifth of Navajo homes and one third of Hopi homes lacks electricity, according to the DOE.

Yesterday, it responded after a roughly two-week lunar night — something that was possible, but not expected. Japan’s space agency cut off contact to protect it from mid-day lunar temperatures but did get pictures.

During a NASA press conference Friday evening, Intuitive Machines co-founder and CEO Steve Altemus showed the attitude of its lunar lander, the first from the US to reach the Moon’s surface in over 50 years.

Withings users can access the feature by pressing the “+” icon in the app’s Home tab and entering some basic questions about their period. You can also add tags for symptoms, and receive trends based on your last three cycles.