Checking the power output of a photovoltaic concentrator array built by Martin Marietta, Inc., at Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
USDOE/Flickr
President Trump’s budget reportedly will slash funding for clean energy research and development. An energy expert explains the importance of government support and spotlights some key opportunities.
Lessons from the Lone Star State: A surge in wind power on the Texas grid didn’t cause reliability problems (and brought down electricity prices) because regulators improved the efficiency of wholesale electricity markets.
Sarah Fields Photography/Shutterstock.com
Energy Secretary Rick Perry wants to know if wind and solar are compromising the reliability of the grid and hurting coal power. The answer lies in his home state of Texas.
Oil production used to fall when prices were low. But a new drilling boom in Alaska, driven by technical advances and global partnerships, spotlights America’s rise as a world oil power.
Former Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter, now leading a clean energy research center at Colorado State University, explains why clean energy will keep growing despite President Trump’s focus on fossil fuel.
Trump signed the executive order surrounded by coal miners, saying it was ‘about jobs.’
AP Photo/Matthew Brown
Trump’s executive order on climate will cede American leadership internationally and scores a political win. But reversing all Obama’s work will require big wins in court.
Even Trump’s most destructive proposals pale in comparison. The president is merely throwing a match on a burning building.
If carbon regulations restrict how much a company can pollute where it’s located, it could move operations (and jobs) to another country – with no reduction in emissions.
billy_wilson/flickr
As Trump explores warmer ties to Russia, he’d be wise to brush up on the history of past resets and the role the oil industry played in each one. The results weren’t good.
Trump promises to revive the coal industry in part by opening up mining on federal lands, yet economists found that increasing royalties on public land would lead to more mining elsewhere, including Northern Appalachia and the Illinois Basin.
AP Photo/Steve Helber
One of Trump’s first orders of business on energy will likely be to reopen federal lands to coal mining, which would be a bad deal for taxpayers and the environment.
Obama has prioritized development of wind and solar in a number of ways, including installation on military bases.
AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster
The Trump administration has the tools to slow the momentum Obama started on clean energy. Countering Trump are global market forces and state-level action.
U.S. Rep. Ryan Zinke campaigns for reelection in Billings, Montana, October 20, 2016.
AP Photo/Matthew Brown
If US Rep. Ryan Zinke of Montana is confirmed as interior secretary, he will face difficult choices about balancing extractive activities like energy production with conservation on public lands.
In 1945, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt met with King Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud, part of a behind-the-scenes policy to ensure access to oil for the U.S. and its allies.
National Archives and Records Administration
Big Oil has historically played a behind-the-scenes role on American policy and politics. No longer.
A political sign in West Virginia reflects the claim that the Obama administration, by developing policies to reduce carbon emission, was waging a campaign against the industry.
Vicki Smith/AP Photo
President Obama used an obscure 1953 law to bar offshore drilling in Arctic Alaska and along the Atlantic coast. Republicans and energy companies want to reverse the ban, but it will not be easy.
Uncertainty around government policy affects how businesses operate and whether they’ll invest in R&D.
Pixabay
Economists have shown, using both theory and data, that uncertainty about U.S. environmental policies makes clean tech innovation less likely.
The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration supervises the removal of 68 kilograms of highly enriched uranium (enough for two nuclear weapons) from the Czech Republic in 2013.
NNSA/Flickr
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry has experience with energy, but if confirmed as secretary of energy, he should get ready to learn a lot about DOE’s big jobs: nuclear security and basic science research.
The incoming EPA will likely lean toward less oversight over state public health programs – and lax enforcement is one of the causes behind the Flint water crisis.
Rebecca Cook/Reuters
The hostility of Scott Pruitt, Trump’s nominee to head the EPA, toward climate change rules is well-known. But his anti-regulatory stance could easily set back years of work on environmental justice.
Gatherers in Cannon Ball, North Dakota celebrate news that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers won’t grant an easement for the Dakota Access oil pipeline.
AP Photo/David Goldman
The protesters have scored a big victory in the Dakota Access Pipeline conflict, but it’s served only to illuminate the sharp divisions over energy policy in the US.
The ‘war on coal’ is not really a result of onerous regulations but a combination of market forces over which a Trump administration has limited control.