Canary Media

This analysis and news roundup come from the Canary Media Weekly newsletter. Sign up to get it every Friday. The Trump administration is bankrolling the restart of two shuttered nuclear plants in hopes of reviving the industry. Those endeavors are moving along — but without federal funding, plans to build new…

Canary Media’s “ Electrified Life ” column shares real-world tales, tips, and insights to demystify what individuals can do to shift their homes and lives to clean electric power. Want to claim thousands of dollars in federal tax credits for electrification upgrades that slash emissions, reduce air pollution, and…

See more from Canary Media’s “Chart of the week” column . Gas cars are sputtering, stuck in the slow lane — and battery-powered vehicles are gaining on them fast. A massive shift has occurred in less than a decade. At their all-time high, in 2017, global sales of pure internal combustion vehicles hit 79.9 million…

The startup Sortera Technologies has raised fresh funding to expand its tech-driven recycling operations — with an eye toward meeting rising U.S. demand for low-carbon aluminum. Sortera uses advanced sensors and artificial intelligence to sort different types of aluminum found in old car parts and appliances. On…

Brookfield Renewable Partners has signed yet another deal to power a tech giant’s data centers with one of its existing hydroelectric plants, heralding a potential lifeline for America’s aging dams. In its quarterly earnings call with investors this month, Brookfield said it had signed a 20-year contract with…

The Trump administration has ordered the J.H. Campbell coal-fired power plant in Michigan to stay open for the next 90 days, citing an energy “emergency” that state utility regulators and regional grid operators say does not exist. It’s the latest move in the administration’s expanding agenda to force aging and…

On a dry, rocky patch of his family’s farm in Door County, Wisconsin, Dave Klevesahl grows wildflowers. But he has a vision for how to squeeze more value out of the plot: lease it to a company that wants to build a community solar array . Unfortunately for Klevesahl, that is unlikely to happen under current state…

Due north of Chattanooga, a power line runs through a wooded tract called Sale Creek before it dead-ends at the Tennessee River. On Oct. 8, this line lost power. But the lights stayed on for nearly 400 customers because Sale Creek has a new tool to neutralize outages. Chattanooga’s municipal utility, EPB, had…

Surging power demand from new data centers is reaching unprecedented — and potentially unrealizable — heights. Over the next five years, U.S. utilities expect to see new electricity demand equal to 15 times New York City's peak load, the majority of which will come from data centers. So finds a report released…

Restrictions on solar and wind farms are proliferating around the country, with scores of local governments going as far as to forbid large-scale clean-energy developments. Now, residents of an Ohio county are pushing back on one such ban on renewables — a move that could be a model for other places where clean…

Steel is one of the world’s most traded commodities, with roughly one-third of the global supply crossing borders. That makes decarbonizing the carbon-intensive sector a challenge when different companies or governments rely on disparate criteria to determine the amount of emissions to attribute to a ton of steel. …

As the 20th century ended, the National Academy of Engineering chose the top 20 engineering achievements of the past 100 years. At the top of the list was electrification, which beat out space travel, automobiles, computers, and the internet. The 21st century may also be defined by electricity. The future unfolding…

The data-center boom is pushing electricity costs to the breaking point for PJM Interconnection — the country’s biggest grid operator, serving more than 65 million people from the mid-Atlantic coast to Illinois — and that’s fueling a popular backlash. Democratic gubernatorial candidates pledging to combat rising…

New York just slammed the brakes on rules that would’ve prohibited fossil fuels in new homes and businesses. The Empire State was on the precipice of fully enacting the All-Electric Buildings Act that Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul signed in 2023. The first-in-the-nation standard requires most new buildings to install…

This analysis and news roundup comes from the Canary Media Weekly newsletter. Sign up to get it every Friday. Back in May of 2021, Ford’s F-150 Lightning debuted with star-spangled flair. Then-President Joe Biden visited Ford’s sparkling new Rouge Electric Vehicle Center in Michigan, where the company displayed…

See more from Canary Media’s "Chart of the week” column . Representatives from all over the world are currently meeting on the edge of the Amazon rainforest in Belem, Brazil, to try and advance the global transition away from fossil fuels. The occasion is this year’s annual United Nations climate summit, known as…

Electricity is getting more expensive — and Americans are getting worried. Just look at last week’s election, when Democratic candidates who put a spotlight on energy affordability won key races in Virginia , New Jersey , and Georgia . Fortunately, state and local lawmakers, including those just elected, have the…

Massachusetts lawmakers have advanced an energy-affordability bill that opponents say would undo years of work on policies to fight climate change and promote energy efficiency, all without actually saving consumers much money. “The bill is retreating from a couple of decades of climate progress in Massachusetts,”…

DALLAS — Past gnarly live oaks, behind a barbecue joint and a brewery in a suburb north of Dallas, a white-washed brick commercial building extruded its own wispy cloud into the Texas sunlight. Inside, the startup Skyven Technologies was running a mechanical apparatus dubbed Arcturus, which turns waste heat into…

Many households in rugged and rural southwest Virginia are already struggling to make ends meet. But they pay some of the highest electric rates in the nation, with prices that have risen at more than three times the pace of inflation over the last decade and a half. Last week, residents of the Appalachian region…