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Tesla Is Finally Doing the Smart, Obvious Thing
Elon Musk tried to soften the blow. On a call with investors last week, the Tesla chief warned of a “gap year” for the company. Its tremendous sales driven by the Model Y crossover would slow, while Tesla’s promised next wave of success was at least a year away. That phase would be powered by “Project Redwood,” a new platform on which Tesla would build a new, smaller crossover starting in the middle of 2025. It can’t come soon enough. Despite the company’s waning market dominance, it’s still true that as Tesla goes, so goes the EV industry — and...
The Picture of Louisiana’s Cancer Alley Just Keeps Getting Worse
For decades, oil and gas producers have built their facilities along an 85-mile stretch of the Mississippi River in Louisiana between Baton Rouge and New Orleans. Today, that area is known as Cancer Alley.A report by Human Rights Watch released last week documents in painstaking detail how lax oversight of Louisiana’s fossil fuel and petrochemical industries contributed not just to devastating rates of cancer diagnoses, but also to elevated incidence of birth defects and respiratory ailments. The area is a “sacrifice zone,” per the United Nations, in which the area’s Black residents bear the brunt of harms created by...
Heatmap Is Hiring a Climate Tech Reporter
The new climate media startup Heatmap News is looking for an ambitious, insightful reporter to lead its coverage of climate tech.This writer will report to the editor-in-chief and be tasked with reporting on the startups, venture capitalists, and technologies at the bleeding edge of the energy transition.Candidates should be intrepid, well-sourced reporters with a deep interest in climate tech. They should have a proven ability to go beyond press releases to report about the inner workings of startups, bringing to light in vivid detail the opportunities and challenges faced by companies as they grow. A background in climate tech...
A Climate Database Melts Away
Current conditions: Light snow is still falling in parts of Massachusetts after a storm brought 8 inches of snow to parts of the state on Sunday and Monday. Residents in Queensland, Australia, are evacuating as thunderstorms inundate towns on the coast. California is still waiting for an atmospheric river to dump rain on the state, which should start tomorrow.THE TOP FIVE1. U.S. finalizes stove efficiency rulesYesterday, the U.S. Department of Energy finalized energy efficiency rules for both gas and electric stoves that the agency says will save consumers around $1.6 billion in energy costs over 30 years, according to...
More Clean Energy Is Good, Even If It Comes From China
As nearly any six year old would be more than happy to tell you, the problem is never that there is too much ice cream, or too many toys, or too much screen time. Yet adults considering the political and economic challenges of decarbonizing energy systems continue to harp on the downsides of “overcapacity” — in China, specifically — of production for clean technologies, namely solar and batteries and EVs. As Heatmap’s own Robinson Meyer has argued, China’s monumental “overinvestment” in clean technologies may lead to trade difficulties with the United States and European Union, which are attempting to stand...
The First Big Fight of the U.S. General Election Is Over LNG
When the White House announced on Friday that it would temporarily pause the approval of new liquified natural gas export terminals, it wasn’t just a victory for climate activists. It also drew the line for the first big showdown of the longest general election in modern history. With all due respect to Nikki Haley and some guy named Ryan Binkley, who are both nominally still in the Republican race, former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden are both acting, understandably, like the primaries are already over. Trump wasted no time vowing to “approve the export terminals on my very...
EV Earnings on Deck
Current conditions: Warm temperatures in the Pacific Northwest and Central Plains could set daily records • Jet stream to dump “extended” rain on California • It’ll hit nearly 60 degrees today in Kansas City, whose Chiefs are headed to the Super Bowl for the fourth time in five years to face the San Francisco 49ers. THE TOP FIVE1. Earnings calls continue — and with them, EV insights Earnings season continues this week with 106 S&P 500 companies on deck to report to investors in the next five days. Upcoming calls with automakers in particular could offer additional insight into the purported...
Warm Winters Won’t Make You Happier
Does everything actually suck right now? Or is it just the end of January? It can be difficult to tell. We’re officially in the thick of what Americans consider to be the worst time of year, when complaining about the weather is an acceptable salutation and feeling “blah” is the basic condition of being alive. Even setting aside seasonal affective disorder — a condition linked to limited daylight, and thus not directly affected by climate change — studies have shown that people have a lower quality diet in the winter, and body weight usually reaches its peak this time...
Climber Alex Honnold on Why He’s a Climate Optimist
In 2017, rock climber Alex Honnold went on Jimmy Kimmel Live! to promote Free Solo, the then-new documentary about his unassisted climb of Yosemite’s El Capitan. “Is there anything bigger than that?” Kimmel prompted as a closing question. “I mean, there are technically some bigger walls in the world,” Honnold said. “But they’re in very remote places — like Greenland.”Five years and an Oscar later, Honnold was scrambling off a boat at the base of Ingmikortilaq, a crumbly sea cliff that towers nearly 1,000 feet higher than El Cap over an iceberg-ridden fjord in eastern Greenland. His intended first...
Wow, It’s Hot in D.C.
The temperature rose to 80 degrees Fahrenheit in Washington, D.C. today. That is weird because it’s currently January 26, and because about four inches of snow fell last week. (Literally, D.C. public schools had a snow day a week ago.) Now the snow has melted and people are walking around in shorts and t-shirts. While it can be hard to attribute individual weather events to climate change, “freakishly warm winter days” are an exception. Washington’s winters have gotten significantly warmer lately because of climate change. Across the country, climate change is making winters warmer and less snowy. As a Washingtonian, I’ll add that these warmer days are especially odd because the sun is still at a slanty January angle. At 2 p.m. the sun was less than 30 degrees above the horizon; that’s the same height it would be at, say, 5 or 6 p.m. in June or July. So it looks and feels like a cool summer evening here — but it’s actually a bright winter early afternoon. Global weirding is right. Read more: This Is How You Die of Extreme Heat
Biden Paused New LNG Terminals. The Real Test of the Climate Movement Begins Now.
Perhaps the biggest political test of the climate movement has now arrived. There are a few ways to think about this. But first, the facts: The Biden administration will temporarily stop approving new liquified natural gas export terminals, allowing the Energy Department to study the effect that they have on the climate, the White House announced on Friday. The decision is a victory for climate activists, who had demanded President Joe Biden halt the growth of what may be the country’s most important fossil fuel industry. It also throws into question whether some of the biggest pending LNG projects — such...
Biden Presses Pause on LNG Export Approvals
Current conditions: Spain experienced its warmest January day ever recorded • Huge parts of the U.S. are blanketed in dense fog • California is bracing for another atmospheric river that could bring heavy rain. THE TOP FIVE1. Biden confirms delay on LNG export approvals The Biden administration confirmed this morning that it is pausing approvals of contentious liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminals until the climate impacts of such projects can be better understood. The New York Times broke the news earlier this week but the White House didn't comment until today. Any review by the Department of Energy of...
What Is Winter Anymore?
If you’ve had the uneasy sense that winter weather isn’t what it used to be, you’re not alone — and you’re probably right. The everyday effects of climate change on the year’s coldest months are quickly becoming too blatant to dismiss. As annual heat records continue to topple year after year — 2023, now officially the hottest year on record, came terrifyingly close to averaging 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial temperatures — winter weather is responding. In some places, it’s turning snowy days into rainy ones. In others, it’s turning cold days bitterly so. So — what, exactly, is going on?...
How Wall Street Is Making Sense of Energy’s Weird In-Between Period
Every few months, corporate earnings announcements give us the chance to (pretty literally) take stock of how the energy transition is going. After a rocky end-of-year for many renewables companies, this earnings season was, perhaps, more warily anticipated than most. A bunch of energy companies reported this week, ranging from fossil fuel stalwarts to the bleeding edge of decarbonization and in between. The results indicate an industry that's a bit unsure of itself — showing promising signs overall, but with lots still to figure out, especially in how to make offshore wind a real business. Everyone expects growth, but turning...
The Coolest Thing in Climate Tech is a Super Hot Rock
One of the oldest ways to store up energy is in hot rocks. Egyptians built adobe homes millennia ago that absorbed heat during the day and released it at night, and wood-fired ovens with bricks that radiate residual heat have been around since the Middle Ages. Now, this ancient form of heating is poised for a breakout year as one of the hottest things in climate tech: thermal batteries. These aren’t the kinds of batteries you’d find in a laptop or electric vehicle. Instead, these stationary, shipping container-sized units can provide the high temperatures necessary to power hard-to-decarbonize industrial...
The Rising Threat of Really Big Waves
Current conditions: Colombia declared a natural disaster after unrelenting wildfires • Tropical Cyclone Kirrily poses a unique risk to Australia due to the storm’s “irregular shape” • Washington, D.C., could hit 70 degrees Fahrenheit in January for the first time in four years. THE TOP FIVE1. Report: Biden delaying approval of major LNG export terminal The Biden administration has delayed approval of 17 new facilities for the export of liquified natural gas (LNG), according to a New York Times report. Officials are instead asking the Department of Energy to widen its review of the first of these 17 — known...
Biden Bets on the Climate Crowd
This morning, as far as anyone knew, the U.S. was considering whether to approve 17 new facilities for the export of liquified natural gas. By this afternoon, in a move destined to ripple through the race for the White House, those considerations were off. According to reporting by The New York Times, Biden officials have paused their decisionmaking, instead asking the Department of Energy to widen its review of the first of these 17 — known as Calcasieu Pass 2, or CP2 — to include effects on the global climate.“Um, I think we all just won,” wrote Bill McKibben...
Tesla Prepares Investors For Its Gap Year
2023 was the year Tesla decided it would sell a lot of cars, even if it meant lowering prices. This year, however, Tesla may see “notably slower” growth, the company warned Wednesday in an investor update.Tesla argued it was “between two major growth waves.” The first saw the rise of the Model 3 and Model Y, its more moderately priced sedan and SUV which together made up over 95 percent of its total unit sales in 2023. “The next one we believe will be initiated by the global expansion of the next-generation vehicle platform,” the company said, likely referencing...
The Largest Dam Removal in U.S. History Has Begun
The largest dam removal project in American history took an irreversible step forward earlier this month when crews opened a 16-foot-wide tunnel in the base of the Iron Gate Dam in Hornbrook, California. That event marked the beginning of the end of a decades-long effort to restore the Klamath River, which snakes for more than 250 miles through Oregon and California, to a new natural state. “This is historic and life-changing, and it means that the Yurok people have a future,” Amy Cordalis, a member of the Yurok tribe and one of the leaders of the effort to remove...
Tesla's Mysterious 'Redwood' EV
Current conditions: Sydney, Australia, is under a severe heatwave warning • Flood watches are in effect for 17 U.S. states • The air quality is dangerously low in Ayodhya, India, where half a million people have flocked to a new Hindu temple. THE TOP FIVE 1. Report: Tesla wants to build new mass-market EV in 2025 Tesla will release its Q4 and 2023 financial results this evening. Analysts are expecting a year-on-year rise in revenue but a drop in profits. Shareholders will be hoping for reassurances about CEO Elon Musk’s demands for greater voting control. They’ll also want details on Cybertruck...
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