By John Timmer  , arstechnica.  Excerpt: On Tuesday, the US Energy Information Administration released full-year data on how the country generated electricity in 2025. It’s a bit of a good news/bad news situation. The bad news is that overall demand rose appreciably, and a fair chunk of that was met by additional coal use. On the good side, solar continued its run of astonishing growth, generating 35 percent more power than a year earlier and surpassing hydroelectric power for the first time. Overall, electrical consumption in the US rose by 2.8 percent, or about 121 terawatt-hours. Consumption had been largely flat for several decades, with efficiency and the decline of industry offsetting the effects of population and economic growth. There were plenty of year-to-year changes, however, driven by factors ranging from heating and cooling demand to a global pandemic. Given that history, the growth in demand in 2025 is a bit concerning, but it’s not yet a clear signal that ...

By Aarian Marshall , Wired.  Excerpt: This week, the US Department of Transportation released new interim guidance for the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program. These rules advise states on how to spend $5 billion in funding for new electric-vehicle fast chargers, with the goal of creating a nationwide highway network of some half a million public chargers. The NEVI program was first established in 2021 by the  Biden administration’s infrastructure bill , with the goal of doing away with one of  car buyers’ biggest electric-vehicle fears : that they’ll run out of charge. But the program came under fire in the first weeks of Donald Trump's administration, part of a push to nix what the president has called an “electric vehicle mandate.”  The DOT “paused” the program for months , halting some payments to the states. (The department was forced to restart funding in some states after a handful of blue ones  won cases in court .). ...The agency als...

By Patrick George , The Atlantic.  Excerpt: Last year, Ford CEO Jim Farley commuted in a car that wasn’t made by his own company. In an effort to scope out the competition, Farley spent six months driving around in a Xiaomi SU7. The Chinese-made electric sedan is one of the world’s most impressive cars: It can accelerate faster than many Porsches, has a giant touch screen that lets you turn off the lights at your house, and comes with a  built-in AI assistant —all for roughly $30,000 in China. “It’s fantastic,” Farley said about the Xiaomi SU7 on a podcast last fall. “I don’t want to give it up.” ...Chinese EVs can be so cheap and high tech that they risk outcompeting  all  cars, not just electric ones. In the rest of the world, traditional automakers are already struggling as Chinese cars hit the market. In Europe, Chinese brands  now have roughly as much share of the market as Mercedes-Benz ....  Full article at https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/arch...

By Umair Irfan , Wired.  Excerpt: Making sure there are always enough generators spooled up to send electricity to every single power outlet in the country requires precise coordination. And while the amount of electricity actually used can swing drastically throughout the day and year, the grid is built to meet the brief periods of  peak demand , like the hot summer days when air conditioning use can double average electricity consumption. Imagine building a 30-lane highway to make sure no driver ever has to tap their brakes. That’s effectively what those who design and run the grid have had to do. But what if you could just hold onto electricity for a bit and save it for later? You wouldn’t have to overbuild the grid.... You could smooth over the drawbacks of intermittent power sources that don’t emit carbon dioxide, like wind and solar. ...Back in 2011...a  wind farm in West Virginia ...was...the world’s largest battery energy storage system...to provide 32 megawatts o...

By Michael Levenson , The New York Times.  Excerpt: For 19 years, Richard Burton, a letter carrier in Athens, Ga., drove the classic boxy mail truck, with only a fan on the dashboard to keep the cabin cool in the sweltering summer months. ...about two months ago, Mr. Burton, 46, became one of the first letter carriers in the United States to get a long-awaited upgrade: a new electric mail truck with air-conditioning, a 360-degree camera and a sliding cargo door on the side that allows the unloading of packages directly onto the sidewalk. ...The new mail trucks — 10 years in the making — have started rolling into American neighborhoods, and the early reviews from letter carriers are positive. Many have complained for years that the mail trucks they have been driving, which were introduced in the 1980s, break down frequently and are stiflingly hot, as climate change pushes temperatures to greater extremes. The rear cargo space is so small, they say, that they have to crouch inside to...

By Emily Conover , Science News.  Excerpt: Last week, both Google and Amazon announced agreements with companies that are developing small modular reactors. Last week, both Google and Amazon announced agreements with companies that are developing small modular reactors. ...Commercial reactors in the United States typically produce around a billion watts of electrical power. Small modular reactors would produce less than a third of that. ...Commercial reactors in the United States typically produce around a billion watts of electrical power. Small modular reactors would produce less than a third of that....  Full article at https://www.sciencenews.org/article/small-modular-nuclear-reactors-amazon .  See also Youtube video The Canadian Reactors that can Burn Nuclear Waste and The Big Lie About Nuclear Waste . 

By Jijo Malayil , Interesting Engineering.  Excerpt: Researchers have developed a sustainable method to efficiently extract lithium from seawater, addressing the growing demand for renewable energy. The Solar Transpiration-Powered Lithium Extraction and Storage (STLES) device harnesses sunlight to extract and store lithium from brine. ...According to researchers from Nanjing University and the University of California, Berkeley, the approach offers a cleaner alternative to traditional lithium mining, which often involves harmful chemical processes and significant land disruption. The work is similar to research  done  by a University of Chicago team using iron phosphate particles to efficiently extract lithium from seawater, groundwater, and flowback water. ...Long-term tests have shown the device’s stability, compatibility, and scalability. Operating passively without extra energy input, the system is both cost-effective and eco-friendly. It can also integrate with exist...

By Mathew Burciaga, Berkeley Rausser College of Natural Resources.  Excerpt: Utility companies in the United States could double electric transmission capacity by 2035 by replacing existing transmission lines with those made from advanced materials, according to a  new study published today  in the  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . ...the first-of-its-kind study details a faster and more cost-effective way to expand the grid and connect the more than 1,200 gigawatts of renewable energy projects awaiting approval....  Full article at https://nature.berkeley.edu/news/2024/09/advanced-conductors-provide-path-grid-expansion . 

By Nicolás Rivero , The Washington Post.  Excerpt: Norway is the first country in the world with more  electric vehicles  than gas-powered cars on the road, according to  vehicle registration data  the Norwegian road federation, known as OFV, released Tuesday. Of the 2.8 million passenger cars registered in the country, 26.3 percent are fully electric, just edging out the share of gas vehicles. Diesel remains the most common vehicle type, making up more than a third of Norwegian vehicle registrations. ...OFV Director Oyvind Solberg Thorsen ... predicted EVs will outnumber diesel cars by 2026....  Full article at https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2024/09/17/norway-electric-vehicles-exceed-gasoline/ . 

By Nadja Popovich , The New York Times.  Excerpt: America isn’t making electricity the way it did two decades ago. How the United States made electricity from 2001 to 2023 [state by state].  Full article at https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/08/02/climate/electricity-generation-us-states.html . 

By David Curran , SFGATE.  Excerpt: “They love it,” my neighbor Ali Schneider tells me of her two sons, ages 3 and 7. “And we do, too. They don’t mind cars, but they love the bike. Pretty much all the kids on the block really like it.” At least three other families on our block also use electric cargo bikes to transport their kids. ...In terms of competing with a car, the electric assist has allowed the cargo bike — first introduced in the U.S. by  Xtracycle  in 1998, Allen explains — to become a more mainstream product. And while the early years presented numerous challenges, a huge breakthrough came in 2015, when the German manufacturing giant Bosch produced a breakthrough battery for these bikes. ...“with this motor you could put two kids on a bike and climb any hill in San Francisco.” And that has made all the difference. In their first year with the Bosch-powered bikes, the number of e-cargo bikes the New Wheel sold jumped to 61, then to 221 in 2018. Last year, they ...

By Jack Ewing , The New York Times.  Excerpt: Electric cars are more expensive than gasoline models largely because batteries cost so much. But new technology could turn those pricey devices into an asset, giving owners benefits like reduced utility bills, lower lease payments or free parking. Ford Motor, General Motors, BMW and other automakers are exploring how electric-car batteries could be used to store excess renewable energy to help utilities deal with fluctuations in supply and demand for power. Automakers would make money by serving as intermediaries between car owners and power suppliers. Millions of cars could be thought of as a huge energy system that, for the first time, will be connected to another enormous energy system, the electrical grid, said Matthias Preindl, an associate professor of power electronic systems at Columbia University. ...Mobility House, a firm whose investors include Mercedes-Benz and Renault, ...buys power when solar and wind power is abundant an...

By Keith Bradsher , The New York Times.  Excerpt: Better batteries and falling costs underpin China’s push in electric cars. CATL, based in southeastern China and the  world’s largest manufacturer of electric car batteries , announced last week at the Beijing auto show that a 10-minute charge of its newest battery would give a range of 370 miles. A 30-minute full charge would give a range of 620 miles, the company said.... Full article at https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/01/business/china-electric-vehicles.html . 

By Delger Erdenesanaa , The New York Times.  Excerpt: To mark Earth Day (and to try to reach young, environmentally-minded voters) President Biden is  promoting a new national program  to train and employ people in climate-related jobs, and reminding voters of the clean-energy investments underway following the Inflation Reduction Act. ...Uruguay, a nation of 3.4 million people wedged between Argentina and Brazil, generates nearly all its electricity from renewable sources. In 2008, the  government set a goal  of transforming the electric grid, which had come to depend on imported oil. ...Between 2013 and 2018, wind generation grew sharply from almost nothing to about a quarter of Uruguay’s electricity mix. By the end of 2022, the most recent year data is available, Uruguay generated more than  90 percent of its power  from renewables, with wind and solar growing even as hydropower declined. ...Transportation is the second biggest source of greenhouse ...

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/09/climate/electric-grid-more-power.html By Brad Plumer , The New York Times.  Excerpt: One of the biggest obstacles to expanding clean energy in the United States is a lack of power lines. Building new transmission lines can take a decade or more because of permitting delays and local opposition. But there may be a faster, cheaper solution,  according to two reports released Tuesday . Replacing existing power lines with cables made from state-of-the-art materials could roughly double the capacity of the electric grid in many parts of the country, making room for much more wind and solar power.... 

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/17/climate/electric-vehicles-high-mileage-drivers.html By Brad Plumer , The New York Times.  Excerpt: A small share of motorists [who drive, on average, about 110 miles per day] burns about a third of America’s gasoline, a study found. If more of those drivers switched to electric vehicles from gasoline-powered models, it would make a major dent in greenhouse gases from transportation, which have so far been slow to decline, according to  a new analysis published on Wednesday  by Coltura, an environmental nonprofit group based in Seattle. While the average American driver travels about  13,400 miles per year , people who buy electric vehicles today  tend to drive them less than that , limiting the climate benefits of switching to a cleaner car. By contrast, the top 10 percent of motorists in the United States drive an average of about 40,200 miles per year and account for roughly one-third of the nation’s gasoline use. Persuading ...