Interesting Ideas

It’s time for another rundown of the most popular stories of the past week here on CleanTechnica. Take a look below at what grabbed people’s interest, and then also see the various CleanTechnica originals we published in the past week. Most Efficient Solar Module in the World — New Record ... [continued]

The post New Most Efficient Solar Panels, Turning Ocean Water into Drinking Water — Top Stories of the Week appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Washington, D.C. — According to reporting, Donald Trump is paying Invenergy $765 million to abandon its four offshore wind leases. This comes days after the administration voluntarily dismissed its own appeal in an ongoing legal challenge against Donald Trump’s executive order to ban wind development in the United States. The administration also issued ... [continued]

The post Trump Pays Off Energy Company in Grudge Match Against Offshore Wind appeared first on CleanTechnica.

More than half of Ayetoro – a Christian utopia founded in the 1940s – has been lost to the ocean, and its remaining people are running out of options

In the early hours of 15 February 2019, the Atlantic Ocean came for Arowo Victoria’s livelihood. The 60-year-old retired midwife was asleep when neighbours began banging on her door, shouting that the sea had started covering buildings along the nearby coastline.

By the time she got to her small shop, she discovered that the Atlantic had already swept it away, destroying the business she had built with borrowed money after retirement.

We are told the natural world is ‘breaking down’. But forests don’t work like aeroplanes or human hearts

• A version of this piece was originally published on Aeon as Why we need to think again about ecosystem failure

The Amazon rainforest, according to a 2021 study, is losing its capacity as a carbon sink and now emits more than it absorbs. In the tropics, marine scientists are reporting that coral reefs are in decline, threatening fish stocks. Equally concerning is research into the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (Amoc), a vast system of ocean currents that helps regulate the climate and is at risk of collapsing this century. The entire global ecosystem appears to be losing its ability to function.

We find this view in newspapers, magazines, technical reports and the journals of learned societies. But thinking about the environment in terms of its functions is also how many of us tend to understand the world. We may think that forests exist to produce oxygen, wetlands to filter water and bees to pollinate our crops.

Of special interest to humanity is the relationship of biodiversity to the variety of services provided by ecosystems and, in particular, to the stability of the flow of those services, such as the maintenance of the gaseous composition of the atmosphere, preservation of soils, recycling of nutrients and provision of food from the sea.

I’ve been covering the robotaxi debate for a decade. I still remember a discussion Chris DeMorro and I had 12 years ago about which would end up being a bigger deal — “Tesla D” or Tesla Autopilot — and a subsequent poll. I used to be much more bullish about ... [continued]

The post One Big Reason Robotaxis Won’t Replace Owning Cars appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Many small-scale landowners now include conservation measures alongside everyday farming. But progress is precarious, and the threat of guerrilla violence and poverty remain whichever candidate wins

Like most people settling in the area, Pablo Peña was seeking to escape violence and make a living from a patch of land when he moved to Guaviare in central Colombia. While his life has been strongly marked by conflict and deforestation, more than 30 years on he now focuses on community work and conservation.

Peña first visited Guaviare during his mandatory military service. Years later, in 1994, he settled down to farm in Guaviare’s Calamar, a town in a remote corner of the Amazon.

Hitachi Energy's new HVDC Light® technology is at work behind the scenes of a massive new hydropower transmission line connecting New York City to Canada.

The post Self-Own #837: High Tech Hydropower Transmission Trips Up Trump’s Fossil Fuel Fantasy appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Europe talks the talk on recycling. But can it walk the walk? The upcoming Circular Economy Act must prove we have what it takes. Our valuable battery waste is currently leaving Europe on ships headed halfway across the world. And we’re doing little to stop them. Whilst Europe manages to ... [continued]

The post How Can Europe Reduce Its Strategic Dependencies by Boosting Recycling? appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Scientists are returning to a wartime solution that may be more sustainable than the traditional rubber tree

There is a global shortage of natural rubber and dandelions may be coming to the rescue. In the second world war there was such a severe shortage of rubber that the Allies used the Russian dandelion, Taraxacum koksaghyz, from Kazakhstan. Soviet scientists found the dandelion roots produced enough white milky latex to make natural rubber, but when the war ended producers returned to the traditional rubber tree, Hevea brasiliensis.

But the demand for rubber is now increasing, with rubber trees suffering from a fungal disease and the impacts of extreme weather caused by the climate crisis. So, scientists are looking again at using dandelions, with the added benefit that they grow in temperate climates, are a sustainable crop that do not need pesticides and lots of water, and don’t lead to the deforestation common in tropical rubber tree plantations.

In the first five months of 2026, utility-scale solar generation surpassed natural gas generation in CAISO. Solar electricity generation in the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) over the first five months of 2026 increased 21% compared with the same period in 2024, and natural gas generation decreased by 60%, data ... [continued]

The post Solar Generation in CAISO Surpassed Natural Gas in the First 5 Months of 2026 appeared first on CleanTechnica.

We took our second daughter to Paris for 6 months when she was 5 years old. After she grew up, we have been chasing her around the world ever since: Barcelona, Prague, Munich, London twice, Bangkok twice, Sydney 4 times, and back to Paris several times. She is a force ... [continued]

The post Toyota Rav4 Plug-in Hybrid vs. Tesla Model Y Basic appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Nottinghamshire tree, one of Europe’s oldest and largest, fails to produce leaves after being stressed by series of hot, dry summers

The Major oak, one of Europe’s oldest, largest and most celebrated ancient trees, has died.

The huge tree, which has grown in Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire, England, for at least 1,000 years, failed to produce any leaves this year, after becoming stressed by a series of hot, dry summers.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library is an invaluable online archive of historic texts on species living and lost supplied by the world’s leading museums and universities. Now its future is in doubt

Some go there to read about the wood that Victorian manufacturers used to make walking sticks. Others want to see an illustration of a Tasmanian tiger or marvel at the field diary of one of the first known botanists to explore the Antarctic.

Over the past 20 years, more than 64m pages have been made freely available through the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) – a digital treasure trove for fans of the natural world. More than 680 museums, universities, libraries and scientific institutions from China, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand to Europe, Africa, Mexico, Canada and the US, have contributed to the library.

Manuscript on parchment from the Circa instans. Dating from about 1190, it is the oldest book in the digital library. Photograph: LuEsther T Mertz Library/New York Botanical Garden/Biodiversity Heritage Library

John Ray, 17th-century botanist who coined words petal and pollen, was a tutor at Cambridge when he created his first garden

He coined the terms petal and pollen, helped to lay the foundations of modern biology and is widely regarded as the greatest English naturalist of the 17th century.

But it was while he was a young college tutor at Cambridge in the 1650s that the botanist John Ray – also known as “the father of natural history” – created his first known garden and began to systematically study plants for the first time.

Maritime companies and organisations call the EU Commission to fully integrate the shipping industry in the upcoming Electrification Action Plan. On July 15 the Commission will publish its Electrification Action Plan, an important opportunity to electrify Europe, cut fossil fuels imports and reduce emissions of air pollutants and greenhouse gases. ... [continued]

The post Maritime Organisations Call to Include Shipping in Electrification Action Plan appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Blackwater Estuary, Essex: Near a vast sweep of flats and creeks, one small pool has become a destination for both me and a parade of shore birds

I saw in this summer with the brief stays of Arctic-bound birds. Waders from the south came in such number and variety to my local patch near Tollesbury that for one week in May I went down to the marsh every dawn and dusk. I went to watch and feel the motion of it all at the turn of tide and time. Everything was change.

They kept coming, new species every day, ready to leave even as they arrived at this pool in the north-east corner of a field by the vast sweep of flats and creeks that give Essex more coastline than any other county in England.

London Tree Ring project aims to create corridors of plant and animal life around the city to strengthen its biodiversity

Harry Ewing is heaping branches and foliage from the forest floor on to a dead hedge, reinforcing the protective circle around his newly planted trees in Hadley Wood, north London. He is in a glade created by a fallen oak that was previously overrun with thick bramble.

“I feel very happy – the trees are growing already. It’s really nice seeing it when it starts,” says Ewing.

Jackery launched its stylish, slim FridgeGuard CleanTechnica was given an exclusive preview of the FridgeGuard a couple of months ago and we came away impressed with what we saw. Clear attention was given to design the refrigerator backup battery to fit customer needs and the refrigerator application The final product ... [continued]

The post Jackery FridgeGuard Takes Stylish, Customer-Centric Design to Refrigerator Backup Battery appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Warmer winters and springs are drying out wetlands and the birds are missing out on an abundance of insects to eat

When we think of spring migrant birds, it is easy to focus on songbirds such as warblers, flycatchers and swallows. Yet during late spring, many are waders – passing through Britain on their way north to breed in the high Arctic from their winter quarters in sub-Saharan Africa.

According to the British Trust for Ornithology’s regular migration blog, it has been a good year for waders: including more common species such as ringed and grey plovers, bar-tailed godwit, sanderling and knot.

Clinton Monchuk, executive director of Farm and Food Care Saskatchewan, is trying to persuade Canadian farmers to share more information about their growing practices in order to dispel misinformation that is circulating on social media. Monchuk states, “It’s just telling the truth and being transparent about what we do so ... [continued]

The post Is Being Transparent The Best Approach To Fighting Food Disinformation? appeared first on CleanTechnica.