About a decade ago, India’s government began subsidizing the purchase of liquid petroleum gas, or LPG, to promote greater adoption among its lower-income citizens. Switching to the gas was considered a safer and more reliable alternative to burning wood and coal for cooking at home, which families in resource-strapped rural...
Data centers are straining the grid. Can they be forced to pay for it?
Last month, President Trump sat alongside executives of the largest tech companies in the country as they pledged to pay a fair share of the energy costs of their data center buildout. “Data centers … they need some PR help,” Trump said at the gathering. “People think that if the...
Forest Service overhaul sows confusion and concern
On March 31, the U.S. Forest Service announced plans to move its headquarters from Washington, D.C., to Salt Lake City, Utah. It will also close or repurpose all nine of its regional offices, create 15 state offices, and shutter research and development facilities in more than 30 states. According to a...
Climate experts say spring is coming earlier. How will that affect agriculture and ecosystems?
As a row crop farmer in St. Joseph, Missouri, Joe Lau said he’s noticing more extreme weather these days. Warmer seasons throughout the year. Quarter-inch predictions of rain stamped out by storms that bring 3 inches. Increased pressure from pests on his corn. He’s also noticed that spring is coming...
One acre, one vote: The bizarre election that could decide Arizona’s energy future
In a country characterized by antiquated systems for regulating how electricity is produced and transported to homes and businesses, one utility in Arizona may be the most outdated. In 1903, almost a decade before Arizona became a state, a group of landowners around Phoenix secured a federal loan for a...
What does $164M buy Big Oil? Inupiat land and a broken promise.
In 2023, when Rosemary Ahtuangaruak, Iñupiaq, was mayor of Nuiqsut, a federally recognized village of 500 residents on Alaska’s North Slope Borough, a gas leak from a nearby oil operation left her community waiting for answers. “It was only 8 miles from our village. We watched industry evacuate their personnel...
Solar was poised to help Puerto Ricans survive blackouts — until Trump axed nearly $1B in funding
María Pérez lost power for about three months after Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico in September 2017. Her home in Salinas, on the island’s southern coast, sits near a river. As the hurricane knocked out the island’s grid and sent rainwaters surging down from the mountains, Perez’s house flooded with...
Pocket gardens: The tiny urban oases with surprisingly big benefits
It’s not just easy to miss, but often downright hard to notice. A simple patch of greenery in a city may seem like a blip in the concrete jungle, but it’s an extremely powerful way to solve a bunch of problems at once: Studies have shown that green spaces improve...
Trump’s ‘God Squad’ blocks endangered species protections in the Gulf of Mexico
The Endangered Species Act is the bedrock law that protects threatened plants and animals in the United States, and in the 50 years since it became law it has prevented thousands of resource-extraction projects — oil drilling, mining, and logging — from moving forward. The law is difficult to circumvent,...
These maps show exactly where the West might burn this summer
Every state in the West is expected to face an above-normal threat of wildfire this summer, according to the latest projections, released Wednesday by the National Interagency Coordination Center. The government-run center publishes monthly reports predicting fire risk for the four months ahead, and the change since the March outlook...