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US environment agency could end reporting of greenhouse gas emissions

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By Reuters. Excerpt: The US Environmental Protection Agency proposed on Friday a rule to end a mandatory program requiring 8,000 facilities to report their greenhouse gas emissions – an effort the agency said was burdensome to business, but which leaves the public without transparency around the environmental impact of those sources. The agency said mandatory collection of GHG emissions data was unnecessary because it is “not directly related to a potential regulation and has no material impact on improving human health and the environment”. “The Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program is nothing more than bureaucratic red tape that does nothing to improve air quality,” said Lee Zeldin, the EPA administrator. The rule responds to a day-one executive order issued by Donald Trump aimed at removing barriers to unleashing more US energy, particularly fossil fuels. ...The Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program requires 47 source categories covering 8,000 facilities and suppliers to calculate and submit ...
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Is Idaho the future of a new clean energy source? This company hopes so

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By Nicole Blanchard , Idaho Statesman.  Excerpt: Idaho could be the next frontier in clean energy, according to a startup that recently got approval to move forward in its exploration for the commodity. Koloma, a natural hydrogen company that does business in Idaho as Cascade Exploration, is looking for naturally occurring underground hydrogen gas in Canyon County. It has submitted applications for two test well locations near Notus. Sharla Arledge, a spokesperson for the Idaho Department of Lands said if the applications are approved, the company would then need to submit applications for drilling permits. ...Underground hydrogen was discovered by chance when crews were digging a well in Mali in the 1980s, according to reporting from Science. Kristen Delano, a spokesperson for Koloma, told the Idaho Statesman in an interview that the discovery shocked scientists, many of whom thought hydrogen molecules were too small to collect underground. ...Proponents say it could be a breakthr...
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First onshore wave energy project in the U.S. launches in Los Angeles

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By Hayley Smith , Los Angeles Times.  Excerpt: Along a rocky wharf at the Port of Los Angeles on Tuesday, seven blue steel structures bobbed in the gentle wake of a Catalina Island ferry. The bouncing floaters marked a moment for clean energy — the first onshore wave power project in the country. The floaters belong to  Eco Wave Power,  a Swedish company behind the pilot project located at AltaSea, a nonprofit  ocean institute  at the port. They harness the natural rise and fall of the ocean to create clean electricity 24 hours a day. The pilot project can generate up to a modest 100 kilowatts of power — enough for about 100 homes — but company officials said the ultimate goal is to install steel floaters along the port’s 8-mile breakwater to generate about 60 megawatts of power, or enough for about 60,000 homes. Such an achievement could be replicated along other parts of the U.S. coastline, according to Inna Braverman, Eco Wave Power’s co-founder and chief exe...
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Fossil-fuel firms receive US subsidies worth $31bn each year, study finds

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Full article at https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/12/environment-greenhouse-gas-reporting-end . By Dharna Noor , The Guardian. Excerpt: The US currently subsidizes the  fossil-fuel  industry to the tune of nearly $31bn per year, according to a new analysis. That figure, calculated by the environmental campaign group Oil Change International, has  more than doubled  since 2017. And it is likely a vast understatement, due to the difficulty of quantifying the financial gains from some government supports, and to a lack of transparency and reliable data from government sources, the group says. These handouts pose a massive barrier to decarbonization, says the new report, which experts have long warned is urgently necessary to avert the worst consequences of the  climate crisis . ...Another major support measure is a  tax credit for capturing carbon , which is often framed as a climate solution but is primarily used to extract hard-to-reach reserves i...
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Earth’s capacity to store carbon could max out surprisingly soon

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By Mohana Basu , Nature.  Excerpt: The planet’s capacity to store carbon-dioxide emissions in rock formations is much smaller than previous estimates suggest, and it could run out as early as 2200, according to a study 1  published in  Nature  today. To meet the goal of the  2015 Paris agreement  — limiting global warming to 1.5–2 °C above pre-industrial temperatures — vast amounts of CO 2  will need to be removed from the atmosphere. One way to do that is to  capture CO 2  produced by industry and store it deep underground. Researchers report that Earth can safely store around 1,460 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide (GtCO₂) — a number much lower than the 10,000–40,000 GtCO₂ often cited in previous studies 2 . At present, carbon capture and storage technologies remove only 49 million tonnes of CO₂ annually, with a further 416 million tonnes per year in planned capacity, say the authors of the study. But to stay within the Paris target, annual carb...
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Stalagmites reveal devastating droughts that helped spur Maya breakdown

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By Taylor Mitchell Brown , Science.  Excerpt: About 1200 years ago, social strife and upheaval shook the Maya world. Sites across southern Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala saw their populations dwindle. ...Scientists have long puzzled over the precise mechanisms behind this widespread collapse, citing everything from disease and warfare to deforestation from slash-and-burn agriculture. In a new paper published earlier this month in  Science Advances , researchers studied ancient stalagmites and contemporary local rainwater records to better understand how  climate may have influenced the falling populations . They found that droughts coincided with periods of population decline and political reorganization across Maya kingdoms, including one particularly extreme drought that may have irrevocably led the Maya to abandon some of their most famous cities....  Full article at https://www.science.org/content/article/stalagmites-reveal-devastating-droughts-helped-spur-maya-br...
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Global investments in renewable energy reach half-year record

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By Tim McDonnell, SEMAFOR.  Excerpt: Global investment in renewable energy reached $386 billion in the first six months of 2025, a half-year record in spite of headwinds for some sectors and regions. Investors are becoming more scrupulous about onshore wind and utility-scale solar projects, ... And investment across all renewable technologies fell precipitously in the US, down 36% compared to the second half of 2024 as the Trump administration and Congress raised numerous new barriers to construction. But those dropoffs were more than offset by the still-booming global market for small-scale solar, and a particular influx of capital to renewables projects in Europe.... But China still dominates, claiming 44% of new renewables investments so far this year....  Full article at https://www.semafor.com/article/08/26/2025/global-investments-in-renewable-energy-reach-half-year-record . 
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