On Wednesday night in Washington, D.C., Heatmap hosted an evening of discussion on energy innovation and security, featuring special guest Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. Guests at Heatmap's discussion on energy innovation and securityMariah Miranda Photography We’re … | Continue reading
President Trump has introduced yet another round of tariffs that could upend the car industry. The newest volley in his trade war promises to slap an extra 25% tax onto any automobile imported into the U.S. It’s a measure meant to sound like a safeguard for American industry agai … | Continue reading
People say they can still taste the metal from the Moss Landing fire. But no one in the local, state, or federal government is able to say why. The story of Moss Landing got little attention compared to the scale of the disaster. On January 16 — days before Trump reentered office … | Continue reading
People say they can still taste the metal from the Moss Landing fire. But no one in the local, state, or federal government is able to say why. The story of Moss Landing got little attention compared to the scale of the disaster. On January 16 — days before Trump reentered office … | Continue reading
New documents obtained by Senate Democrats on the Environmental and Public Works Committee this week shed more light on the inner workings of EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin’s attempt to shut down hundreds of climate- and environmental justice-related grants. Senators Sheldon Whiteh … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Between 10 and 15 inches of rain fell across parts of South Texas, triggering severe flooding • Firefighters made progress containing some of the large wildfires burning in South Korea • It’s -7 degrees Fahrenheit at Greenland’s Pituffik Space Base, which Vice … | Continue reading
Today’s Q&A is with Frank Maisano, one of the most sought-after energy lobbyists in Washington. Maisano, a Beltway veteran who has worked in Congress as well, has a long history with me that goes back to the earliest days of my environmental reporting career. So when I helped aut … | Continue reading
Dear Mr. Trump, What can I say? You astound me. You enthrall me. I am, in short, very impressed! Why? Well, earlier this month, I sent you an open letter in which I confessed that I finally understood your secret plan. It’s true, I wrote, that you campaigned as a scourge of clima … | Continue reading
1. Bristol County, Massachusetts – The state of Massachusetts is abandoning plans to build an offshore wind research center in New Bedford, a fishing town that has also hosted protests against Vineyard Wind. According to media reports, a local attorney gathered more than 260 sign … | Continue reading
The artificial intelligence industry is experiencing another TD Cowen shock. The whole spectrum of companies connected to artificial intelligence — the companies that design the chips, that supply the power, that make the generation equipment — shuddered Wednesday when the broker … | Continue reading
As recently as last month, some electric vehicle buyers were running into roadblocks when they tried to claim the EV tax credit on their 2024 returns. Their claims were rejected, it turned out, because the dealership where they bought their EV never registered the sale with the I … | Continue reading
Current conditions: South Korea’s massive wildfires have doubled in size in 24 hours • Fires are also spreading in North and South Carolina, consuming nearly 18,000 acres • A year’s worth of rain could fall over the next few days along the Texas Gulf Coast. THE TOP FIVE 1. Trump … | Continue reading
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has hired a new general counsel who was, until recently, pursuing legal challenges to offshore wind farms on behalf of the fishing industry, Heatmap has learned. NOAA’s Fisheries division, also known as the National Marine Fishe … | Continue reading
Mano Nazar spent nearly 40 years working in the atomic energy industry — first at Duke Energy, then at American Electric Power before his capstone years as the chief nuclear officer at NextEra. Now a semi-retired investor, he’s turning his attention to a resource he thinks can he … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Phoenix saw record high temperatures on Tuesday for the second day in a row • A freak hail storm turned a city in the south of Spain into a winter wonderland • Widespread bleaching has been recorded at Australia’s two World Heritage-listed coral reefs after an … | Continue reading
The electric vehicle company Rivian is known for products that are, well, large: pickup trucks, SUVs, and delivery vans. But for the past three years, it has been stealthily designing the technology platform for a slew of much smaller, yet-to-be-revealed electric vehicles — think … | Continue reading
If you care about decarbonizing the power grid anytime soon, you have to care about data centers. The AI boom and the ongoing growth of the internet have driven a big new cycle of data center construction in the United States, with tech companies trying to buy electricity on the … | Continue reading
In case you missed it: The Federal Emergency Management Agency has continued to withhold millions of dollars from states for disaster recovery, relief, and preparedness despite a district court’s order from March 6 calling on the administration to release the funds. Among the mor … | Continue reading
The Bureau of Land Management claims that Trump’s pause on solar energy permitting is no longer in effect — though no permits have yet come of it. President Trump paused permitting for solar as well as wind projects for 60 days via executive order on his first day in office. The … | Continue reading
In the labyrinthine organizational chart of the U.S. government, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration sits conspicuously within the portfolio of the Department of Commerce. Ocean research and weather monitoring have clear economic stakes, of course, but the respons … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Firefighters in South Korea are struggling to contain wildfires that have charred more than 36,000 acres • Reports of fire ant stings in Australia have exploded in recent weeks after torrential rain from Cyclone Alfred forced the invasive pests above ground • … | Continue reading
More than 100 clean energy companies, trade associations, and other industry stakeholders are descending on Capitol Hill this week to amplify an ongoing lobbying push to preserve clean energy tax credits in the upcoming budget reconciliation bill. Groups such as Clean Energy for … | Continue reading
Current conditions: A wildfire in New Jersey’s Wharton State Forest has burned 2,300 acres • An ancient Roman bridge collapsed in central Spain after extreme rainfall from four consecutive storms • Los Angeles could see record-breaking March heat today with temperatures nearing 9 … | Continue reading
Since Donald Trump was reelected president, the climate community has retained a kind of fragile optimism about the Inflation Reduction Act, the historic climate law enacted in 2022 that Trump has vowed to repeal. The oft-repeated mantra is that the IRA is stimulating billions of … | Continue reading
Officials at the Environmental Protection Agency remain closed-lipped about which grants they’ve canceled. Earlier this week, however, the office provided a written list to the Sierra Club in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, which begins to shed light on some of … | Continue reading
With the fate of the Inflation Reduction Act and its tax credits for building and producing clean energy hanging in the balance, the law’s supporters have increasingly turned to dollars-and-cents arguments in favor of its preservation. Since the election, industry and research gr … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Severe thunderstorms are expected across the Mississippi Valley this weekend • Storm Martinho pushed Portugal’s wind power generation to “historic maximums” • It’s 62 degrees Fahrenheit, cloudy, and very quiet at Heathrow Airport outside London, where a large … | Continue reading
Robust incentive programs to build out electric vehicle charging stations are alive and well — in Illinois, at least. ComEd, a utility provider for the Chicago area, is pushing forward with $100 million worth of rebates to spur the installation of EV chargers in homes, businesses … | Continue reading
The symbol of the American battery backlash can be found in the tiny town of Halstead, Kansas. Angry residents protesting a large storage project proposed by Boston developer Concurrent LLC have begun brandishing flashy yard signs picturing the Moss Landing battery plant blaze, a … | Continue reading
1. Carbon County, Wyoming – I have learned that the Bureau of Land Management is close to approving the environmental review for a transmission line that would connect to BluEarth Renewables’ Lucky Star wind project. This is a huge deal. For the last two months it has seemed like … | Continue reading
Today’s sit-down is with Nikhil Kumar, a program director at GridLab and an expert in battery storage safety and regulation. Kumar’s folks reached out to me after learning I was writing about Moss Landing and wanted to give his honest and open perspective on how the disaster is i … | Continue reading
Crusoe Energy has always been a confusing company, whose convoluted green energy credentials raise some eyebrows. It started as a natural gas-powered Bitcoin miner, then became a climate tech unicorn thanks to the fact that its crypto operations utilized waste gas that would have … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Red flag warnings are in place for much of Florida • Spain is bracing for extreme rainfall from Storm Martinho, the fourth named storm in less than two weeks • Today marks the vernal equinox, or the first day of spring. THE TOP FIVE 1. Jury sides with pipeline … | Continue reading
Thea Energy, one of the newer entrants into the red-hot fusion energy space, raised $20 million last year as investors took a bet on the physics behind the company’s novel approach to creating magnetic fields. Today, in a paper being submitted for peer review, Thea announced that … | Continue reading
The Chinese automaker BYD might have cracked one of the toughest problems in electric cars. On Tuesday, BYD unveiled its new “Super e-Platform,” a new standard electronic base for its vehicles that it says will allow incredibly fast charging — enabling its vehicles to add as much … | Continue reading
Current conditions: More than 2 million people are under blizzard warnings across the Midwest • A landslide is suspected of rupturing an oil pipeline in northwest Ecuador, triggering an environmental emergency • Beaches are closed in South Australia due to a dangerous microalgal … | Continue reading
Republicans in Washington are pushing for at least two big changes to the country’s car-related policies. In Congress, some lawmakers want to repeal the $7,500 tax credit that helps consumers buy or lease a new electric vehicle — as well as a matching tax credit that lets compani … | Continue reading
The carbon removal industry is in a rut. Last year, companies with climate targets purchased about 8 million tons of future carbon removal — an impressive 78% increase from the year prior, according to the sales tracking site CDR.fyi. And yet 80% of those purchases were made by t … | Continue reading
Canada’s carbon tax was supposed to be different. Unlike the proposed cap-and-trade scheme in the United States or the European Union’s carbon trading system, Canada’s program was not a kitty for green energy subsidies. The tax would be split into two pieces: a charge on large in … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Flash flooding in southern Spain forced evacuations • Tropical Storm Jude displaced thousands of people in Madagascar, Malawi, and Mozambique • Huge swathes of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri are under red flag warnings today as strong winds bring anothe … | Continue reading
There is never a good time for an earthquake. But as President Donald Trump and his government efficiency guru, Elon Musk, take a buzzsaw to the federal bureaucracy, they risk discovering whether there is such a thing as an especially bad time. The 700-mile Cascadia Subduction Zo … | Continue reading
Current conditions: Much of the southern Plains remain at risk for extreme fire weather today and tomorrow • A month’s worth of rain fell over six hours in Florence, Italy • It’s about 50 degrees Fahrenheit and cloudy in Dublin for the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade. THE TOP FIV … | Continue reading
The Trump administration just did something surprising: It paved the way for a transmission line to a solar energy project. On Friday, the Bureau of Land Management approved the Gen-Tie transmission line and associated facilities for the Sapphire Solar project, a solar farm sited … | Continue reading
This story is part of a Heatmap series on the “green freeze” under Trump. Following Donald Trump’s election in November, climate advocates self-soothed with the conviction that cities and states would continue carrying the banner in the absence of federal climate action. That’s w … | Continue reading
If you believe solely in the power of the stock market, then the world’s most important automaker is Tesla, whose soaring stock valuation reflects faith in Elon Musk and his AI dreams as much as it does the company’s EV sales. But if you care about selling cars, the real most imp … | Continue reading
Current conditions: A severe storm system this weekend threatens 30 states with extreme weather ranging from fires to blizzards to tornadoes • Schools are closed in Florence after heavy rain triggered floods in Italy • The La Niña weather pattern looks to be on its way out. THE T … | Continue reading
The Moss Landing battery fire now may be the storage industry’s East Palestine moment – at least in California. In the weeks since Vistra’s battery plant south of San Francisco caught fire on January 16, at least two lawsuits have been filed against Vistra, PG&E, and battery manu … | Continue reading
1. Nantucket County, Massachusetts – Welcome to the Vineyard Wind lawsuit 2.0. Fishermen represented by a conservative legal group – the Texas Public Policy Foundation – filed a petition to the Supreme Court this week asserting that the justices can now reconsider approvals for t … | Continue reading