"Exxon Mobil said on Monday that it planned to set up a facility in Arkansas to produce lithium, a critical raw material for electric vehicles, which pose one of the biggest challenges to the company’s oil business."
"A financial crisis has enveloped Enviva, the Maryland-based company that’s been harvesting large swaths of forest in the Southeast United States to make wood pellets for electricity production in the United Kingdom and Europe." "The company’s stock price plunged as its new interim CEO announced financial losses. Environmentalists had long questioned a business model they said was based on greenwashing."
"The US is warming faster than the global average and its people are suffering “far-reaching and worsening” consequences from the climate crisis, with worse to come, according to an authoritative report issued by the US government."
In our annual look-ahead on the environment and energy beat in 2024, we see a bumpy ride on global climate change talks coupled with more climate-driven disasters, even amid the evolving energy transition. And we see possible risks to ocean life from deep sea mining and continuing risks to human life from pollution of air, water and land. Insights in our overview and our full “2024 Journalists’ Guide to Environment & Energy” special report.
"As the world's nations enter another round of talks this week on creating a first-ever treaty to contain plastic pollution, officials are bracing for tough negotiations over whether to limit the amount of plastic being produced or just to focus on the management of waste."
"At fundraisers, Trump has been wooing oil billionaires with a variety of pitches, including false claims about electric cars".
"Earlier this summer, oil billionaire Harold Hamm called for Donald Trump to drop out of the presidential race. He made contributions to the presidential campaigns of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and questioned publicly whether Trump could beat President Biden in the 2024 election.
"The country’s first expected commercial small modular reactor was scrapped by NuScale Power on Wednesday, delivering a major setback to the advanced nuclear industry."
"The soaring cost of home insurance has consumed the town of Paradise, residents and officials say, as it prepares to commemorate the five-year anniversary of the Nov. 8, 2018, Camp Fire. Residents have received annual premiums that near or exceed $10,000 — leaving many to wonder how they’re supposed to rebuild their hard-hit community when insurance is so shockingly high for houses in an area that is supposed to be among the most affordable in California."
Freelance food systems reporter Thin Lei Win believes that if the world doesn’t change the way it produces, processes, transports, consumes and discards food, climate change will worsen and hunger levels will spike. But she also worries that powerful interests want to keep the status quo and cites parallels with the tobacco and fossil fuel industries. More in Freelance Files, including places for freelancers to pitch climate-food stories.
Reporting on interconnected ecosystems lends itself to better environmental stories, and so tracing how water moves across landscapes, communities, industries and regulatory schemes can help the public connect the dots. That’s how Annie Ropeik, who helps run the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, sees the watershed beat. She shares expert views and offers insights for environment journalists to use in their reporting.
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