2024 holds the current record, beating 2023. Now, there’s an 80 percent chance that at least one of the next five years will take the title, according to a recent forecast from the World Meteorological Organization.
Unless countries can transition to carbon pollution-free energy like wind and solar power, greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels will keep on heating up our planet.
The Environmental Protection Agency is crafting a plan to eliminate greenhouse gas pollution limits on coal and gas-fired plants, the New York Times reports. Power plant emissions account for about a quarter of the nation’s planet-heating emissions.
He signed a series of executive orders today meant to revive the nuclear energy industry in the US, which has struggled to compete with cheaper sources of electricity. The president could also hit the Nuclear Regulatory Commission with layoffs as part of a broader reorganization of the agency.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins claim to have developed a solid-state refrigeration tech that could increase efficiency by 70 percent compared to traditional thermoelectric materials.
The thin-film material called “controlled hierarchically engineered superlattice structures” (CHESS for short) is a thermoelectric material that could be used to make super-energy-efficient, super-slim fridges. And they might come from Samsung.
Samsung Research was part of the project, and the electronics giant just launched a new line of fridges with a thermoelectric Peltier module.
Updated May 22nd to clarify the efficiency comparison.
The Empire Wind project off the coast of New York can restart construction, about a month after the Trump administration abruptly issued a stop work order. The project was reportedly bleeding $50 million a week during the pause as President Trump waged his war against windmills.
The company building it had considered taking legal action against the Trump administration; it already had federal and state permits in place and construction is roughly 30 percent complete.
Microsoft, TikTok, and other big names have signed deals with Climeworks, a company developing technologies to filter CO2 out of the air, as a way to try to clean up some of their planet-heating pollution. But Climeworks hasn’t even been able to capture enough CO2 to offset its own carbon footprint yet.
The climate tech company announced layoffs as it faces “a challenging time” that includes uncertainty around the future of its projects in the US.
[heimildin.is]
Teen Vogue points out the irony of turning to water-intensive and energy-hungry generative AI in a recent op-ed. The rush to build massive new AI data centers is driving up electricity demand, prolonging the use of fossil fuels, and hitting nearby communities with more pollution.
New wind farms are still being built, but they’ll have to weather the storm of the Trump administration.
House Republicans proposed cutting crucial Biden-era tax credits for wind, solar, and geothermal energy even though Republican districts have the most to gain from investments in renewables.
The company announced a new agreement with project developer Elementl Power to prepare three different sites for next-generation nuclear power plants. Google and other tech giants are putting their faith — and capital— in new nuclear technologies they hope can provide enough electricity for AI data centers.
The company announced the grant last week, which is supposed to support an effort to train 100,000 electrical workers and 30,000 apprentices across the US. A shortage of electricians has hampered efforts to add new, clean energy to power grids. And Google and other tech giants need more electricity for energy-hungry AI data centers.
In April, Google shared plans to use AI to speed up the process of connecting new power sources to the grid.
The Trump administration reportedly plans to shutter the program that certifies products for energy efficiency and slaps the recognizable blue Energy Star label on refrigerators, washers, dryers, LED bulbs, and more. CNN and E&E News report that Energy Star is on the chopping block as part of a “reorganization” planned at the Environmental Protection Agency that would end key initiatives on climate change.
It paves the way for the startup to partner with OpenAI on energy deals in the future, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Oklo is developing a next-generation nuclear reactor meant to be smaller, cheaper, and easier to deploy than a traditional nuclear power plant. Altman and other tech leaders are bullish about advanced nuclear reactors one day powering energy-hungry AI data centers, with Google and Amazon recently inked agreements with other companies developing small modular reactors.
That’s more than triple the total clean energy investments canceled over the past 30 months, according to a report from nonpartisan think tank E2. Economic uncertainty and proposals to rollback tax credits for renewables under the Trump administration are already taking a toll.
Despite those headwinds, however, companies still managed to announce $1.6 billion in investments in new solar, EV, and power grid facilities this March.
[technologyreview.com]
The company announced $99 million in new funding, part of its goal of transitioning its supply chain to entirely carbon pollution-free energy by 2030. This marks the second phase of the China Clean Energy Fund that Apple launched in 2018, AppleInsider reports.
[appleinsider.com]
Donald Trump continues to push his trade war with Canada, saying in a Truth Social post that he’s adding an extra 25 percent tax on steel and aluminum imports — doubling what he announced on Monday. These additional tariffs are in retaliation for a surcharge on electricity coming into the US that Ontario implemented (which itself was retaliation for previous Trump tariffs).
Ontario added a 25 percent surcharge on electricity flowing from the Canadian province to the US in response to the Trump administration’s tariff threats toward Canada. The province generates electricity for 1.5 million customers across Minnesota, New York, and Michigan.
”If the United States escalates, I will not hesitate to shut the electricity off completely,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said at a press conference, the Associated Press reports.
