Interesting Ideas

The US state of Oklahoma is Exhibit A in the case for the renewable energy transition. Oklahoma has done a good job of exploiting its wind energy resources, but its deep roots in the oil and gas industry keep popping up to haunt its people with polluted air, water, and ... [continued]

The post The Oilfield Binge & Purge: Another Reason To Ditch Fossil Fuels appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Looking at sales data year by year, or month by month, it can be hard to really notice significant long-term trends. However, stepping back and looking at a chart that covers several years, you can spot some quite interesting things. I recently did this with regards to auto brands’ share ... [continued]

The post Huge Changes in Auto Group Share of European EV Sales appeared first on CleanTechnica.

BMW has filed a patent that could be a huge deal. Though, it would need to be implemented, and it would also need consumer buy-in. Here’s a shocking statistic for you: Approximately 30% of deaths caused by traffic accidents in the US each year involve drunk drivers. That was 12,429 ... [continued]

The post BMW May Finally Do What Auto Industry Has Needed For Decades appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Fast-moving fires in parched urban fringes have residents on edge, and no one needs a reminder of how bad things can get

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It was 3am Sunday when Robin and Paul McLean received the text. A fire was encroaching on their Lake Macquarie home and it was too late to leave.

Their adult daughter, who lives with them, is confined to her bed due to disability and has her own evacuation plan that includes calling an ambulance if they reach a “watch and act” alert level – the second of three alert levels, between “advice” and “emergency warning”. But suddenly there was no time.

One of our data-tracking, EV-focused readers, Madan Rajan, notified me this weekend of a big milestone. Cumulative plugin vehicle sales have surpassed 75 million units. He points out that we were at 74.3 million cumulative plugin vehicle sales at the end of October 2025, and with 1.3 million plugin vehicles ... [continued]

The post Plugin Vehicles Pass 75 Million Cumulative Sales! appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Scientists in Kansas believe Kernza could cut emissions, restore degraded soils and reshape the future of agriculture

On the concrete floor of a greenhouse in rural Kansas stands a neat grid of 100 plastic plant pots, each holding a straggly crown of strappy, grass-like leaves. These plants are perennials – they keep growing, year after year. That single characteristic separates them from soya beans, wheat, maize, rice and every other major grain crop, all of which are annuals: plants that live and die within a single growing season.

“These plants are the winners, the ones that get to pass their genes on [to future generations],” says Lee DeHaan of the Land Institute, an agricultural non-profit based in Salina, Kansas. If DeHaan’s breeding programme maintains its current progress, the descendant of these young perennial crop plants could one day usher in a wholesale revolution in agriculture.

As with any “new tech,” there’s a lot of hype and dreams and enthusiasm about what kind of wonderful future the tech can bring. However, there are also inevitably negative ramifications, side effects, and bad things people and companies will end up doing with the tech. In the case of ... [continued]

The post OpenAI Pushing Propaganda Over Research, Researchers Who Quit Argue appeared first on CleanTechnica.

A collision between AI data centers being built—in the current AI bubble and with full throated support by the Trump Administration—and aluminum smelters for electricity is no longer theoretical. Utilities across the United States are facing binding constraints on generation and transmission. When presented with competing requests for hundreds of ... [continued]

The post Electricity Scarcity Meets Aluminum Tariffs, and American Citizens Pick Up the Bill appeared first on CleanTechnica.

The watershed summit in 2015 was far from perfect, but its impact so far has been significant and measurable

Ten years on from the historic Paris climate summit, which ended with the world’s first and only global agreement to curb greenhouse gas emissions, it is easy to dwell on its failures. But the successes go less remarked.

Renewable energy smashed records last year, growing by 15% and accounting for more than 90% of all new power generation capacity. Investment in clean energy topped $2tn, outstripping that into fossil fuels by two to one.

The rush to build more and bigger data centers to power the AI revolution is getting pushback from an array of opponents in the US.

The post Data Center Opponents Push Back Against “Superhuman” AI appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Still rare only 20 years ago, the charismatic animals are in almost every UK river and a conservation success story

On a quiet Friday evening, an otter and a fox trot through Lincoln city centre. The pair scurry past charity shops and through deserted streets, the encounter lit by the security lamps of shuttered takeaways. Each animal inspects the nooks and crannies of the high street before disappearing into the night, ending the unlikely scene captured by CCTV last month.

Unlike the fox, the otter has been a rare visitor in towns and cities across the UK. But after decades of intense conservation work, that is changing. In the past year alone, the aquatic mammal has been spotted on a river-boat dock in London’s Canary Wharf, dragging an enormous fish along a riverbank in Stratford-upon-Avon, and plundering garden ponds near York. One otter was even filmed causing chaos in a Shetland family’s kitchen in March.

Neath, south Wales: This quarry built the abbey and the nearby terraced towns – and it’s different every time I visit

The way to Neath Abbey Quarry is a perfect stranger to me this morning. It’s been three years since my last visit, and the maze of the path has shifted; old tree trunks have turned to mulch and the brook carves a different channel. My companion and I shoulder big bouldering pads, poorly proportioned for tight manoeuvres, yet we bump, turn and pivot our way through. Thanks to the late sunrise, we’re gifted a lingering coda of the dawn chorus, coming from a holly thicket heavy with berries. A goldcrest fizzes around ahead of us, seeking bugs startled by our approach.

Like every old quarry, this place has been host to much change. Once it was just a plain old hill, then a source of building blocks for monks and their abbey. Much later, it was extracted again for the terraced towns of the south Wales coalfield. Once that need had faded, climbers found the place, hacking paths through the tangle and stringing ropes up its face.

Conservationists fear up to 11% of Tapanuli orangutan population perished in disaster that also killed 1,000 people

The skull of a Tapanuli orangutan, caked in debris, stares out from a tomb of mud in North Sumatra, killed in catastrophic flooding that swept through Indonesia.

The late November floods have been an “extinction-level disturbance” for the world’s rarest great ape, scientists have said, causing catastrophic damage to its habitat and survival prospects.

I recently dove into EV sales trends across auto groups and auto brands in 13 European markets (combined) using charts and data from EU-EVs.com. I’ve used the site off and on for years. I rely more on José’s comprehensive European EV sales reports, but there are ways of viewing data ... [continued]

The post Tesla’s 8-Year Model Sales Trends in 11 European Countries appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Jessica O’Bryan puts the $60,000 Musso EV through its paces in suburban Sydney and finds some pluses, some minuses – but no charging points

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When I am handed the keys to Australia’s first affordable fully electric ute, to say I feel nervous is an understatement.

I’ve been driving a 2014 Volkswagen Polo for the past four years, and before that, a Holden Astra that was older than me.

Announcement draws anger from Labour MP over refusal to remove tonnes of rubbish dumped near school in Wigan

The Environment Agency is to spend millions of pounds to clear an enormous illegal rubbish dump in Oxfordshire, saying the waste is at risk of catching fire.

But the decision announced on Thursday to clear up the thousands of tonnes of waste illegally dumped outside Kidlington has drawn an angry response from a Labour MP in Greater Manchester whose constituents have been living alongside 25,000 tonnes of toxic rubbish for nearly a year.

While it’s impossible to escape the emissions associated with flying, some travel methods are more carbon-intensive than others

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As the Australian summer gets under way, many of us are planning holidays.

When it comes to limiting emissions associated with travel, a staycation or local holiday – by train, bus or car – remains the lowest-impact option. But overseas travel by Australians has been increasing in recent decades, with Indonesia, New Zealand, Japan, the United States and China among the top destinations, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Yesterday, I covered Donald Trump’s latest effort to pretend he’s king and violate states’ rights, an AI executive order. (Apologies if he’s already tried to act like king in some other way and I’ve missed that.) The executive order tries to force fossil fuel pollution on more people, among other ... [continued]

The post Donald Trump’s AI Order Could Cost Iowans & Georgians Big Time appeared first on CleanTechnica.

In sprawling landfills, thousands of Argentinian families scavenge for survival amid toxic waste and government neglect, dreaming of steady jobs and escape

The sun rises over the plateau of Neuquén’s open-air rubbish tip. Maia, nine, and her brothers, aged 11 and seven, huddle by a campfire. Their mother, Gisel, rummages through bags that smell of rotten fruit and meat.

Situated at the northern end of Argentinian Patagonia, 100km (60 miles) from Vaca Muerta – one of the world’s largest fossil gas reserves – children here roam amid twisted metal, glass and rubbish spread over five hectares (12 acres). The horizon is waste.

I’ve said it for a decade — Hyundai and Kia develop great electric vehicles, but they don’t try hard enough to produce them at high volumes and market them aggressively. I’m by far from the only one saying this. Going back to the Kia Soul EV and Hyundai Ioniq (which ... [continued]

The post Hyundai & Kia Prove Me Right? Fall to China in Western Europe appeared first on CleanTechnica.