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To reduce science’s carbon footprint, researchers in France reinvent work practices

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By Elisabeth Pain , Science.  Excerpt: Since 2019, the Institute of Biology and Chemistry of Proteins (IBCP) in Lyon, France, has retrofitted the building for greater energy efficiency, raised freezers’ temperatures 10°C, and reduced the need for autoclaving by 1 month’s worth of cycles per year. The institute increasingly orders consumables in bulk, recycles polystyrene packaging, and gets small lab equipment repaired rather than replaced. Every year it also organizes a contest for researchers to clean out their freezers so it doesn’t have to buy new ones. Thanks to these efforts and more, IBCP reduced its carbon footprint by about 13% between 2019 and 2023. ...These grassroots efforts are part of a larger movement across France. At its forefront is  Labos 1point5 , a collective of some 600 researchers who believe science should lead by example when it comes to reducing society’s carbon footprint. ...more than half of the carbon footprint of most French research laboratories ...
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2025 Breakthrough of the Year

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By Tim Appenzeller , Science.  Excerpt: This year, renewables surpassed coal as a source of electricity worldwide, and solar and wind energy grew fast enough to cover the entire increase in global electricity use from January to June,  according to energy think tank Ember . In September, Chinese President Xi Jinping declared at the United Nations that his country will cut its carbon emissions by as much as 10% in a decade, not by using less energy, but by doubling down on wind and solar. And solar panel imports in Africa and South Asia have soared, as people in those regions realized rooftop solar can cheaply power lights, cellphones, and fans. To many, the continued growth of renewables now seems unstoppable—a prospect that has led  Science  to name the renewable energy surge its 2025 Breakthrough of the Year....  Full article at https://www.science.org/content/article/breakthrough-2025 . 
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Pumped Hydro Energy Storage Is Having a Renaissance

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By Chris Baraniuk , WIRED .  Excerpt: ...workers began adding a secret, light brown powder to water as they mixed up a special fluid that can store energy.... Their goal was to achieve a mixture 2.5 times denser than water. ...Pumped hydro first emerged in the late 19th century . During subsequent decades, countries including the US and UK built lots of large plants, though construction had waned by the 1990s . The tech was originally designed to complement fossil fuel power plants, making use of excess energy they produced. But today grid operators increasingly value pumped hydro plants as workhorses able to mediate highly variable wind and solar assets. They can fill in shortfalls in electricity generation or soak up surplus energy within minutes, and store it for short or long periods....  Full article at https://www.wired.com/story/pumped-hydro-energy-storage-is-having-a-renaissance/ . 
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Trump administration moves to break up leading U.S. climate and weather center

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By Hannah Richter , Science.  Excerpt: NEW ORLEANS— Alarm spread fast today among climate scientists here at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU): President Donald Trump’s administration, they learned, was going to try to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), one of the world’s premier climate and weather research centers. The news, delivered last night via a post on X from Russell Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, had come with no prior warning from the White House or from NCAR’s funder, the National Science Foundation (NSF), says Antonio Busalacchi, president of the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), a consortium that manages NCAR. Vought’s  post  asserted that NCAR is “one of the largest sources of climate alarmism,” and said the center’s “vital activities,” such as weather research, would be moved to another entity or location....  Full article at https://www.sc...
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Amid the Arctic’s Hottest Year, Arctic Science Faces a Data Deficiency

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By Grace van Deelen , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: The 20th annual Arctic Report Card reveals new highs in temperature and new lows in sea ice, as well as an uncertain outlook for the availability of federal data. ...After 2 decades of the U.S. government producing the annual report, however, datasets and resources used to create it may be under threat as federal science agencies lose staff and plan for funding uncertainties....  Full article at https://eos.org/articles/amid-the-arctics-hottest-year-arctic-science-faces-a-data-deficiency . 
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ERCOT’s Market is Transitioning Toward Storage and Solar

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By Arcelia Martin , Inside Climate News.  Excerpt: Capacity additions to the Texas grid continue to be led by renewables. Battery storage facilities and solar farms powered virtually all capacity growth in Texas’ electric grid throughout 2025, as the home of the nation’s oil and gas industry created almost twice as much new solar power as California. ...according to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), operator of Texas’ electric grid...Solar power accounted for the second-largest capacity addition, with more than 4,500 megawatts installed....  Full article at https://insideclimatenews.org/news/10122025/texas-electric-grid-transitioning-to-battery-storage-solar/ .
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The Government Wants These Clean Tech Companies to Die. Their Founders Say: Not So Fast

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By CHLOE AIELLO  AND  SAM BLUM , Inc.  Excerpt: Inside the fallout from the Department of Energy’s slashing of $8 billion in loans and grants, and how the companies affected aim to ‘Trump-proof’ their businesses. ...Jim Kesseli...was particularly rattled when one of Brayton’s hard-earned Department of Energy contracts was terminated last month. ...The research and development contract was issued by the DOE, and was initially meant to fund a three-year project researching various utility-scale energy storage solutions. ...Kesseli islooking to find new assignments for five people as a direct result of the contract’s cancellation. ... Nearly $8 billion in funding, cancelled ...Since Donald Trump was sworn into office again, U.S. energy policy has drastically veered toward fossil fuels—and away from renewables. The policy has left scores of clean energy startups on precarious financial footing, or scrambling to make up for projected revenue streams that have d...
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