Interesting Ideas

Continued global heating could set irreversible course by triggering climate tipping points, but most people unaware

The world is closer than thought to a “point of no return” after which runaway global heating cannot be stopped, scientists have said.

Continued global heating could trigger climate tipping points, leading to a cascade of further tipping points and feedback loops, they said. This would lock the world into a new and hellish “hothouse Earth” climate far worse than the 2-3C temperature rise the world is on track to reach. The climate would also be very different to the benign conditions of the past 11,000 years, during which the whole of human civilisation developed.

Intricate ice formations can grow on frozen lakes and seas when relatively warm ice is exposed to still air

Intricate fern-like “frost flowers”, said to be painted on windows and windscreens by Jack Frost, are a familiar feature of British winter. In Arctic regions there is an even prettier three-dimensional version.

These frost flowers are typically 3-4cm across and whole gardens of them grow on frozen lakes and seas. Like the window version, they are the result of ice crystals growing in a slow, orderly fashion.

Commercial robotaxi service continues to expand in city after city. In Abu Dhabi, Uber and WeRide just expanded driverless commercial robotaxi service into downtown. WeRide and Uber launched robotaxi service in Abu Dhabi a little more than a year ago. With this expansion into downtown, the partners now serve about ... [continued]

The post Uber Expands Robotaxi Service to Downtown Abu Dhabi with WeRide appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Solid-state batteries for electric vehicles potentially have some significant improvements over lithium-ion and lithium-ion-phosphate batteries. They are less prone to combustion, can charge faster and can provide longer driving ranges. Some progress recently has been made with solid-state batteries: February 5: Karma Automotive agreed with Factorial Energy to launch the first ... [continued]

The post Solid-State Battery Milestones Appear Encouraging For Near Future appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Emissions have plunged 75% since communist times in the birthplace of big oil – but for some the transition has been brutal

Once the frozen fields outside Bucharest have thawed, workers will assemble the largest solar farm in Europe: one million photovoltaic panels backed by batteries to power homes after sunset. But the 760MW project in southern Romania will not hold the title for long. In the north-west, authorities have approved a bigger plant that will boast a capacity of 1GW.

The sun-lit plots of silicon and glass will join a slew of projects that have rendered the Romanian economy unrecognisable from its polluted state when communism ended. They include an onshore windfarm near the Black Sea that for several years was Europe’s biggest, a nuclear power plant by the Danube whose lifetime is being extended by 30 years, and a fast-spreading patchwork of solar panels topping homes and shops across the country.

This is quite a notable milestone that has gone under the radar! BYD delivered 4.6 million vehicles to customers in 2025. That was actually not a great result for BYD. However, it did mark BYD flying past Tesla in BEV sales, which got a lot of attention. Something that has ... [continued]

The post BYD Passed Up Ford In Global Auto Sales In 2025 appeared first on CleanTechnica.

In an EV market where so many companies are trying to break through, make their mark, and stand out from the crowd, one new entrant has jumped ahead of the rest in the past two years. That company is Xiaomi, of course. Better known for its phones, it decided to ... [continued]

The post Xiaomi Targeting 550,000 Sales This Year appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Washington, DC — Today, in a brazen assault on the health and welfare of the American public, the Trump administration announced its rule revoking the Environmental Protection Agency’s longstanding greenhouse gas endangerment finding under the federal Clean Air Act. With the stroke of a pen at a White House, Donald Trump ... [continued]

The post Sierra Club Statement on Trump Administration’s Elimination of the EPA’s Endangerment Finding appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Electricity consumption from customers connected to Kenya Power’s E-Mobility tariffs surged 188% in 2025.  Consumption rose from 2,922,692 kWh in 2024 to 8,433,437 kWh in 2025. This led to an increase in revenue from EVs charging to KShs. 190,800,016 ($1,479,069.89) from KShs. 64, 843,181 ($502,660.32) in 2025. Kenya Power says ... [continued]

The post Kenya Power Says Consumption From EV Charging Was Up 188% In Kenya In 2025 appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Continuing extreme weather has caused deaths of 16 people, evacuation of thousands and destruction of homes

• Europe live – latest updates

Portugal is under pressure to draw up plans to adapt to the climate emergency as the country continues to be lashed by an unprecedented series of storms that have killed at least 16 people and left tens of thousands without electricity.

More than 3,000 people were evacuated from the Coimbra area of central Portugal on Wednesday as the Mondego River reached critical levels, while part of the country’s main motorway, the A1, collapsed after a dyke on the Mondego gave way under the weight of flood water.

Marineland Antibes, the French government and animal welfare groups all agree on the need to rehome the listless killer whales but no one can agree where

In a sprawling aquarium complex in south-eastern France that once drew half a million visitors a year, only a few dozen people now move between pools that contain the last remaining marine mammals of Marineland Antibes. Weeds grow on walkways, the stands are empty and algae grows in the pools, giving the water a greenish hue.

It is here that Wikie and Keijo, a mother and son pair of orcas, are floating. They were born in these pools, and for decades they performed in shows for crowds. But since the park’s closure in January 2025, they no longer have an audience. When they are alone, they “log”, or float at the water’s surface, according to a court-ordered report released last April.

Volkswagen Group has achieved another electric vehicle milestone this week. The German auto giant has just produced its 5 millionth electric drive unit. This was achieved across a handful of factories. “The Volkswagen Group has reached a milestone in producing five million electric drive units worldwide. This collective achievement by ... [continued]

The post Volkswagen Group Produces 5 Millionth Electric Drive Unit appeared first on CleanTechnica.

A pilot scheme in Brooklyn is giving businesses batteries to form an electricity storage network – part of a growing number of innovative DIY energy ideas around the world

In the back of Black Seed Bagels in northern Brooklyn is a giant catering kitchen filled with industrial-size containers of condiments and freezers full of dough. A tall, silver electric oven named the Baconator stands in a far corner, cooking thousands of pounds of meat every week to accompany Black Seed’s hand-rolled, wood-fired bagels. The Baconator is connected to a battery the size of a carry-on suitcase, which is plugged into the wall.

While the morning rush is under way, the 2.8-kilowatt-hour battery can directly power the commercial oven to reduce the company’s reliance on the electric grid, Noah Bernamoff, Black Seed’s co-owner, explained recently at the company’s Bushwick shop. Two more batteries are paired with energy-intensive refrigerators in the front.

Stuart Vevers wants the luxury brand to keep championing upcycled materials and reduce landfill waste

Stuart Vevers, the British designer of the American mass luxury brand Coach, is working to keep sustainability in the spotlight at New York fashion week. Not an easy task, when environmental concerns are slipping down the global agenda and fashion, perennially a mirror to the world we live in, has reverted to putting profits first.

“I’m an optimist, but it’s not a blind optimism. There’s a lot of tension in optimism, because the world is challenging and I am not ignoring that. My optimism comes from believing that the young people of today are going to make this world better,” he said before Wednesday’s show, held in the historic Cunard building in downtown New York.

Torcross, Devon: 2026 has been defined by storms here. My job of repairing a thatched roof is simple compared with the wider recovery

During the storm, the waves sounded like bombs going off under the house, Bonni Breeze Lincoln tells me. She lives on the seafront of Torcross, a Devon village that is accustomed to weathering storms, but even she is not used to waves shattering her storm shutters, or sending seawater down the chimney.

I’ve come to Torcross to repair the thatch on Bonni’s roof. Up the ladder, I tie bundles of reed, called “wads”, to pack them into the holes; the thatch is riddled with shingle, fragments of seaweed and even limpet shells. Looking down the seafront to torn up paving slabs and slate roofs that yawn open to the sky, it’s clear that this house – the oldest in the village – has come off comparatively well. The soft, springy nature of thatch allows it to absorb even the impact of breaking waves.

As noted earlier today, Donald Trump is continuously engaging in assaults on US human health due to Trump’s incessant push for fossil fuels and against cleantech. The policies go beyond normal subsidies. Trump and his team are basically forcing the use of old coal power plants. And that will come ... [continued]

The post Will Trump’s Assault on Human Health Matter in Texas? appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Rollback Will Make Americans Sicker, Raise Costs for Families WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, Lee Zeldin will finalize a federal regulation that would obliterate the Environmental Protection Agency’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emission standards for light-duty, medium-duty, and heavy-duty vehicles. As a part of the Trump administration’s wholesale attack on the EPA’s ... [continued]

The post Trump Administration Guts Clean Vehicle Standards and Wipes Out Longstanding Climate Finding appeared first on CleanTechnica.

Doyne Farmer says a super-simulator of the global economy would accelerate the transition to a green, clean world

It’s a mind-blowing idea: an economic model of the world in which every company is individually represented, making realistic decisions that change as the economy changes. From this astonishing complexity would emerge forecasts of unprecedented clarity. These would be transformative: no more flying blind into global financial crashes, no more climate policies that fail to shift the dial.

This super simulator could be built for what Prof Doyne Farmer calls the bargain price of $100m, thanks to advances in complexity science and computing power.

The government has not made enough of a dent in emissions, but global trends and a shambolic opposition offer a rare opportunity to act

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There is good news out there, even if it feels like scraps in a world on the brink. Some came last week – with plenty of caveats – when analysts at the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) found coal-fired power generation decreased in both China and India last year.

This is a potentially big shift. Among other things, it exposes the hollowness of arguments in Australia that there is no point doing anything about the climate crisis because the big Asian economies are building endless new coal plants.

The new Highlander EV is a big deal for Toyota -- a big three-row SUV built in the US and battery-powered exclusively.

The post Automotive Press Heaps Praise On Toyota Highlander EV appeared first on CleanTechnica.