Environment

The sales momentum for electric cars in the U.S. has slowed as a result of the policies of the current administration, but the auto industry clearly sees that EVs are the future and the industry is paving the way for that future.

This summer, wildfire smoke has impacted the Pacific Northwest, California, the Mountain West, and the Northeast. The western states experience direct, localized smoke from ongoing blazes whereas the midwestern and eastern cities suffer from unhealthy air because of wind patterns carrying smoke from Canadian wildfires. In July, 13 states issued air quality alerts because of more than 150 wildfires burning in Quebec.

Superhot geothermal energy is a new form of geothermal energy extraction that taps into deep, dry crystalline rock that maintains temperatures that can exceed 700 degrees Fahrenheit. By pumping water into these rock formations, superheated steam can be brought up to the surface, yielding 5 to 10 times more energy than conventional geothermal sources.

For decades, climate scientists have been warning about the effects of burning fossil fuels on global temperatures. They have been developing increasingly sophisticated climate models that simulate how the atmosphere, oceans, and land will respond under different emissions scenarios. But as the world has warmed and the effects of the warming increase, the models have not been taking into account additional sources of emissions that result from that warming.

The Great Salt Lake in Utah is the largest saltwater lake in the Western hemisphere. Nearly 80% of Utah’s population lives within the lake’s watershed and it contributes over $1.3 billion to the state’s GDP each year. It is rapidly disappearing and some estimates warn that it could collapse entirely within the next five years.

Removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere may become an important tool for slowing climate change. Climate models from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change show that limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius will require not only cutting emissions, but also removing hundreds of billions of tons of carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere.

The market for batteries has exploded in recent years. Demand has grown more than fortyfold since 2010. The major reasons for the growth are electric cars and energy storage for solar and wind. Sales of EVs hit 20 million last year and storage capacity for solar farms has grown twentyfold in just the past 5 years.

The city of Manchester in Connecticut, located in Hartford County, will soon open a brand-new public library, replacing one that has served residents for nearly 90 years. The new library will be the first net zero energy library in the state.

The heatwaves that keep happening this summer are a major strain on power grids. In some places, electric school buses are helping utilities to keep the lights on and air conditioners running.

Hawaii faces a growing plastic waste problem. Recycling is expensive and difficult on the islands, and discarded fishing nets (the largest source of Hawaii’s marine debris) continue to wash ashore and drift in surrounding waters. Researchers are now exploring an innovative way to tackle both challenges at the same time by turning discarded plastics into roads.