Firefighters are battling to contain larger-than-usual wildfires in the Chernobyl exclusion zone as radiation levels spike at their center. The fires, which started April 3 in the west of the zone, then spread to forests in the area with higher radiation levels, Reuters reported. High winds Saturday risked pushing the blaze towards the abandoned plant […]
New Jersey will be the first state in the U.S. to require builders to take the climate crisis into consideration before seeking permission for a project. Gov. Phil Murphy announced the new regulations Monday as part of the final version of the state’s master energy plan, which commits New Jersey to achieving 50 percent clean […]
The Doomsday Clock is now 100 seconds to midnight, partly because of the climate crisis. That’s the closest the clock has moved to the apocalypse since it was first started in 1947 to warn of the dangers of nuclear war, BBC News reported. “It is 100 seconds to midnight. We are now expressing how close […]
Germany reached an agreement Thursday that will allow it to stop burning coal by 2038. The national government struck a deal with the leaders of the country’s coal-producing regions that will compensate workers, companies and regional governments more than 40 billion euros (approximately .7 billion), Reuters reported. Legislation finalizing the coal phaseout will be presented […]
By Paul Brown Nuclear power is in terminal decline worldwide and will never make a serious contribution to tackling climate change, a group of energy experts argues. Meeting recently in London at Chatham House, the UK’s Royal Institution of International Affairs, they agreed that despite continued enthusiasm from the industry, and from some politicians, the […]
All seven of Germany’s nuclear power plants are slated to close by 2022, but questions remain about where the European country can safely bury nearly 28,000 cubic meters of radioactive waste that will stay there for the next million years, as CNN reported. The decision to close the country’s nuclear plants came after the Fukushima […]
South Korea will close up to a quarter of its coal-fired plants for the winter months to tamp down on air pollution that the country declared a “social disaster” after several cities experienced record high levels of air pollution last winter, as CNN reported. The shutdown is noteworthy for its timing, since South Korea’s demand […]
Energy Secretary Rick Perry, who has aggressively championed fossil fuels and expressed skepticism that the climate crisis is man-made, will step down from his post by the end of the year, The New York Times reported. Perry is one of the few people in the Trump administration to remain despite unprecedented turnover, Twitter-storms and scandals. […]
By Jessica Corbett Japan’s new environmental minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, called Wednesday for permanently shutting down the nation’s nuclear reactors to prevent a repeat of the 2011 Fukushima disaster, comments that came just a day after Koizumi’s predecessor recommended dumping more than one million tons of radioactive wastewater from the power plant into the Pacific Ocean. […]