Opinion:
¶ “States Can And Should Save Climate Research And Weather Service” • It’s no secret that the incoming Trump administration has it out for NOAA. But it may surprise some readers that they also have a strange axe to grind with NOAA’s National Weather Service, because they’d rather a private company charge people for weather alerts. [CleanTechnica]
Hurricane Milton (Courtesy of NOAA)
¶ “Government Subsidies And Untaxed Externalities. Is Elon Crazy Like A Fox?” • Elon Musk, the idiot savant from Pretoria, is about to become the second most powerful person in the world, thanks to being appointed by the incoming president of the US to take a sledgehammer to the federal bureaucracy. But will he repay the incentives? [CleanTechnica]
World:
¶ “Latest Typhoon Batters The Philippines, Displacing About 400,000 People” • A powerful typhoon wrecked houses, caused towering tidal surges and forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee to emergency shelters as it cut across the northern Philippines in the sixth major storm to hit the country in less than a month. [ABC News]
Typhoon tracks, 1980-2005 (Nilfanion, public domain)
¶ “Russia’s Gazprom Stoped Flow Of Natural Gas To Austria, Utility Says” • Russia’s state-owned natural gas supplier Gazprom stopped supplies to Austria, the Vienna-based utility OMV said. Earlier, OMV said it would stop paying for Gazprom gas to its Austrian arm to offset a €230 million award it won in arbitration after gas was cut off to a German subsidiary. [ABC News]
¶ “Private Sector Key In Kenya’s Journey To 100% Renewable Energy By 2030” • Kenya is emerging as a leader in renewable energy on the African continent, with 90% of its electricity from renewable sources, such as geothermal, hydro, and solar power. However, Kenya’s increasing population means the demand is growing faster than the supply. [The Star, Kenya]
A tree grows in Kenya (Damian Patkowski, Unsplash)
¶ “Australia Is Awash With Solar Power. Experts Say We Can’t Store It All” • The number of Australian homes and businesses with solar installations clicked past 4 million. And everywhere, it seems, demand for power from the grid, demand for power not being met by rooftop solar, has fallen to record lows. There are times when there is too much solar. [MSN]
¶ “Cornwall Hits Renewable Energy Milestone” • Cornwall has become the first local authority area in the UK to have more than 40,000 renewable energy installations, according to official figures. The Microgeneration Certification Scheme said the county had 40,873 installations of items including solar panels and heat pumps. [BBC]
Rooftop solar in Cornwall (David Medcalf, CC-BY-SA 2.0, cropped)
¶ “Scientists Attribute Devastating Flood Events To Concerning Pattern: ‘No Longer A Distant Threat'” • Nepal endured its worst flooding in decades during September, with torrential monsoon rains inundating entire neighborhoods of Kathmandu. It is one more example of how overheating our planet is supercharging weather events. [The Cool Down]
US:
¶ “What To Know About Trump’s Energy Secretary Nominee Chris Wright” • President-elect Donald Trump announced that he has nominated Chris Wright, an executive of a fracking company who has fiercely criticized the existence of a climate crisis and the transition to renewable energy sources, to run the Department of Energy. [ABC News]
Chris Wright (Gage Skidmore, CC-BY-SA 2.0)
¶ “Trump Has Ambitious Plans For Federal Land Use. He May Not Be Able To Accomplish Them All” • President-elect Donald Trump promised at the Republican National Convention in July to “drill, baby, drill” if he were to be reelected. But he may not be able to accomplish the vast majority of his plans due to existing protections. [ABC News]
¶ “Algae Biofuel Is Booming Without Help From ExxonMobil” • ExxonMobil sent shivers through the algae biofuel world, when it gave up a longstanding research partnership with the US firm Viridos last year, after it decided there were better opportunities to make money elsewhere. Maybe they dropped the ball just a little too soon. [CleanTechnica]
Algae for biofuels (Honeywell, CC-BY-SA 3.0)
¶ “Huge Gas Plant Eyed To Power Mystery $5 Billion Louisiana Data Center” • In an area of northeast Louisiana known for rice, sweet potatoes, and poverty, an unnamed company has agreed to build a new data center with an investment of at least $5 billion. The development will need energy, and Entergy wants to build a new gas-burning plant. [Louisiana Illuminator]
¶ “Pilgrim Worker Claims He Was Poisoned by Radiation” • A 41-year-old worker assigned to the decommissioning of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station for several months in 2021 claims he was poisoned by radiation and that Holtec Pilgrim, the plant’s owner, misled workers about safety. He sued for injuries by release of toxic substances. [The Provincetown Independent]
Have a mystifyingly beautiful day.
geoharvey 
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