Technology

"The Dungeness crab fishery is under increasing regulation as California tries to prevent whales from getting entangled in fishing gear. Facing a truncated season and sharp limits on how many pots they can throw, crabbers wonder whether the industry can survive. Experiments with a new form of pop-up crabbing gear show promise and could offer a solution."

"President Donald Trump is moving to reverse a federal push away from plastic straws, declaring that paper straws “don’t work” and don’t last very long."

"A new artificial intelligence model from China not only upended stock markets this week, it also called into question whether the rush to build new, mostly fossil-fueled power plants to run data centers is premature."

"One day after President Donald Trump’s inauguration, a digital mapping tool used by federal and state agencies to identify environmentally disadvantaged communities was taken offline. Within 48 hours, a coalition of data scientists known as the Public Environmental Data Project had resurrected a functional but unofficial copy of the tool on an independent domain."

"What was once the world’s largest solar power plant of its type appears headed for closure just 11 years after opening, under pressure from cheaper green energy sources. Meanwhile, environmentalists continue to blame the Mojave Desert plant for killing thousands of birds and tortoises."

"Vistra’s flagship energy-storage project in California turned into a towering inferno, forcing evacuations and raising fresh concerns about large battery installations."

"President-elect Donald Trump’s breezy rollout this week of a Dubai real estate developer’s $20 billion pledge shows the chasm between tech’s bold aspirations and electricity supplies."