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How Minecraft and other video games are teaching kids about climate change

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Monday, April 29, 2024

Earlier in April, more than 60 million people were presented with a mission: Track down and vanquish a golden, fire-breathing dragon terrorizing a vulnerable village.That is, a digital village in the metaverse of Minecraft, a videogame that allows its many users to explore and build their own worlds. In this new Minecraft minigame, “Heat Wave Survival,” players are facing up against the Heat Dragon, a villain developers created to represent the deadly threat of extreme heat as global temperatures rise.This is just one of the many ways that climate change is infiltrating game night. Around the world, developers and designers are intentionally weaving climate change characters like the Heat Dragon, as well as potential solutions, into board games and video games to help engage users in the fight to slow global warming.Today, we are exploring how the climate movement is growing within the gaming universe—and what that could mean for the real world.Climate Gamers: The main goal of Minecraft’s “Heat Wave Survival” is to slay the mighty heat dragon, but throughout the mission, players get tips on how to recognize the symptoms of heat-related illnesses and the best ways to respond such as hydrating or finding a cool space, reports Fast Company.The team, led by the nonprofit Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, is also developing a second game in its series in which players are in charge of building their own city supplied by renewable energy, with the option to install heat-resilient infrastructure such as shade structures. The games are primarily aimed at young students.But this isn’t the first initiative of its kind. In 2019, the United Nations launched its Playing for the Planet Alliance, with the goal of helping the video game industry shrink its environmental footprint and engage its players in climate action.Each year, the Alliance—which has dozens of members such as Sony and Google—hosts a “Green Game Jam,” where companies are encouraged to integrate more eco-friendly themes into their games. In 2023, developers added nature conservation elements into 41 games, Bloomberg reports. For example, the company Rovio Entertainment added a temporary new challenge to the popular game Angry Birds, in which users were tasked with saving virtual endangered animals in the Amazon.However, the video game industry itself has its own emissions issues to reckon with. Along with the energy required to play a game, engineers use large amounts of energy to power computers during development, and manufacturing of game accessories and devices uses vast quantities of plastic and batteries, which can contribute to the growing problem of electronic waste after they are disposed of, Claire Asher writes for Mongabay.In December, a CNET report found that “only a portion of gaming companies release climate impact data,” but that a growing number of developers are making efforts to reduce emissions through the use of renewable energy in their supply chains.Clean Energy Simulations: Outside the virtual world, a new energy-oriented version of the classic board game “Settlers of Catan” is being released this summer. The original iteration was created in 1995 and tasked players with creating their own nation from scratch on an undeveloped island. The new game, dubbed “Catan: New Energies,” will introduce more of the modern-day struggles that come along with rapid industrial growth, and the emissions associated with them.In the game, players must choose between investing in expensive clean energy options or low-cost but high-polluting fossil fuels (sound familiar?). Though “Catan: New Energies” does not outright mention the term climate change, if pollutant levels get too high, “the game ends in catastrophe” and the player with the most renewable energy tokens wins, according to Catan’s website.Benjamin Teuber, co-developer of the new game, told NPR that during the development phase, the testing team would “always manage to over pollute.”However, games offer unlimited chances to explore how to wrangle in runaway emissions: “We had heavy discussions afterwards,” Teuber said. “We all felt kind of bad, we learned a thing or two, and the next game we played differently.”But what about the real world, where research shows that there won’t be unlimited opportunities to slow emissions before climate change irrevocably alters ecosystems and cities? Board games and simulations can “inspire players to learn about the climate crisis and motivate them to act,” Sam Illingworth, a game developer and science communications expert at Edinburgh Napier University in the United Kingdom, wrote in the Conversation.“As we face the urgent challenges ahead, I believe that such games can play a crucial role in fostering understanding, dialogue and action.”This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. It is republished with permission. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Forget slaying dragons, the newest gaming trend is saving the virtual world (and maybe ours too).

Earlier in April, more than 60 million people were presented with a mission: Track down and vanquish a golden, fire-breathing dragon terrorizing a vulnerable village.

That is, a digital village in the metaverse of Minecraft, a videogame that allows its many users to explore and build their own worlds. In this new Minecraft minigame, “Heat Wave Survival,” players are facing up against the Heat Dragon, a villain developers created to represent the deadly threat of extreme heat as global temperatures rise.

This is just one of the many ways that climate change is infiltrating game night. Around the world, developers and designers are intentionally weaving climate change characters like the Heat Dragon, as well as potential solutions, into board games and video games to help engage users in the fight to slow global warming.

Today, we are exploring how the climate movement is growing within the gaming universe—and what that could mean for the real world.

Climate Gamers: The main goal of Minecraft’s “Heat Wave Survival” is to slay the mighty heat dragon, but throughout the mission, players get tips on how to recognize the symptoms of heat-related illnesses and the best ways to respond such as hydrating or finding a cool space, reports Fast Company.

The team, led by the nonprofit Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, is also developing a second game in its series in which players are in charge of building their own city supplied by renewable energy, with the option to install heat-resilient infrastructure such as shade structures. The games are primarily aimed at young students.

But this isn’t the first initiative of its kind. In 2019, the United Nations launched its Playing for the Planet Alliance, with the goal of helping the video game industry shrink its environmental footprint and engage its players in climate action.

Each year, the Alliance—which has dozens of members such as Sony and Google—hosts a “Green Game Jam,” where companies are encouraged to integrate more eco-friendly themes into their games. In 2023, developers added nature conservation elements into 41 games, Bloomberg reports. For example, the company Rovio Entertainment added a temporary new challenge to the popular game Angry Birds, in which users were tasked with saving virtual endangered animals in the Amazon.

However, the video game industry itself has its own emissions issues to reckon with. Along with the energy required to play a game, engineers use large amounts of energy to power computers during development, and manufacturing of game accessories and devices uses vast quantities of plastic and batteries, which can contribute to the growing problem of electronic waste after they are disposed of, Claire Asher writes for Mongabay.

In December, a CNET report found that “only a portion of gaming companies release climate impact data,” but that a growing number of developers are making efforts to reduce emissions through the use of renewable energy in their supply chains.

Clean Energy Simulations: Outside the virtual world, a new energy-oriented version of the classic board game “Settlers of Catan” is being released this summer. The original iteration was created in 1995 and tasked players with creating their own nation from scratch on an undeveloped island. The new game, dubbed “Catan: New Energies,” will introduce more of the modern-day struggles that come along with rapid industrial growth, and the emissions associated with them.

In the game, players must choose between investing in expensive clean energy options or low-cost but high-polluting fossil fuels (sound familiar?). Though “Catan: New Energies” does not outright mention the term climate change, if pollutant levels get too high, “the game ends in catastrophe” and the player with the most renewable energy tokens wins, according to Catan’s website.

Benjamin Teuber, co-developer of the new game, told NPR that during the development phase, the testing team would “always manage to over pollute.”

However, games offer unlimited chances to explore how to wrangle in runaway emissions: “We had heavy discussions afterwards,” Teuber said. “We all felt kind of bad, we learned a thing or two, and the next game we played differently.”

But what about the real world, where research shows that there won’t be unlimited opportunities to slow emissions before climate change irrevocably alters ecosystems and cities? Board games and simulations can “inspire players to learn about the climate crisis and motivate them to act,” Sam Illingworth, a game developer and science communications expert at Edinburgh Napier University in the United Kingdom, wrote in the Conversation.

“As we face the urgent challenges ahead, I believe that such games can play a crucial role in fostering understanding, dialogue and action.”

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, independent news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. It is republished with permission. Sign up for their newsletter here.

Read the full story here.

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Prince William to attend Cop30 UN climate summit in Brazil

Prince of Wales’s decision welcomed as a means of drawing attention to the event and galvanising talksThe Prince of Wales will attend the crunch Cop30 UN climate summit in Brazil next month, the Guardian has learned, but whether the prime minister will go is still to be decided.Prince William will present the Earthshot prize, a global environmental award and attend the meeting of representatives of more than 190 governments in Belém. Continue reading...

The Prince of Wales will attend the crunch Cop30 UN climate summit in Brazil next month, the Guardian has learned, but whether the prime minister will go is still to be decided.Prince William will present the Earthshot prize, a global environmental award and attend the meeting of representatives of more than 190 governments in Belém.Environmental experts welcomed the prince’s attendance. Solitaire Townsend, the co-founder of the Futerra consultancy, said it would lift what is likely to be a difficult summit, at which the world must agree fresh targets on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.“Is Prince William attending Cop a stunt? Yes. But that doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea,” she said. “Cop has long been as much about so-called ‘optics’ as it is negotiations. Prince William’s announcement will likely encourage other leaders to commit, and will have the global media sitting up to attention.“I suspect HRH knows very well that by showing up, he’ll drag millions of eyes to the event. In an era when climate impacts are growing, but media coverage dropping, anything that draws attention should be celebrated.”King Charles has attended previous Cops, but will not be going to this one.skip past newsletter promotionThe planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essentialPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionGareth Redmond-King of the Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit, an environmental thinktank, said: “All hands on deck – and any prominent, high-profile individual like the Prince of Wales, there helping make the case for the difficult job that needs doing, is almost certainly a good thing.“[King Charles] was the Prince of Wales when he went to Cop26 [in Glasgow in 2021] and pitched in to help galvanise talks. I don’t think it necessarily needs both of them to go.”The British prime minister, Keir Starmer, has not yet said whether he will attend the summit, to which all world leaders are invited, with scores already confirmed. He was heavily criticised by leading environmental voices, including the former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon and the former Irish president Mary Robinson, for appearing to waver on the decision earlier this month.Ban said: “World leaders must be in Belém for Cop30. Attendance is not a courtesy, it is a test of leadership. This is the moment to lock in stronger national commitments and the finance to deliver them, especially for adaptation” to the effects of the climate crisis.“The world is watching, and history will remember who showed up.”

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Government

Energy

Scientists Suspect Fracking Contaminated This Pennsylvania Town’s Wells

This story was originally published by Inside Climate News and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. In the summer of 2022, John Stolz got a phone call asking for his help. This request—one of many the Duquesne University professor has fielded—came from the Center for Coalfield Justice, an environmental nonprofit in southwestern Pennsylvania. They told him about New Freeport, a small town in Pennsylvania’s Greene County that had experienced what’s called a “frac-out,” when drilling fluids used in the fracking process escape their intended path and end up at the surface or elsewhere underground, in this case via an abandoned gas well nearby. Residents had noticed strange odors and discoloration in their well water. Their pets were refusing to drink it. Now they wondered if it was unsafe. Stolz, who has been testing water for signs of pollution from fracking for more than 10 years, agreed to find out. The testing that he and his colleagues carried out over the next two years shows that residents were right to be concerned. They found evidence for oil and gas contamination in a larger geographic area than was initially reported, according to a study published last month. Of the 75 samples tested, 71 percent contained methane. “We found significant contamination,” Stolz said. “Essentially half of the people in our study had bad water.” Two of the wells registered “explosive levels of methane,” he said. “The homeowners had no clue it was that bad.” Sarah Martik, the executive director at the Center for Coalfield Justice, said she was grateful for Stolz’s work. “Dr. Stolz has been one of the only people in our area that we can count on to come provide free water tests,” she said. Stolz said the more people heard about the study, the bigger it got. “It started essentially on Main Street, where that initial report came in,” he said. “But I gave a couple of presentations down there with our preliminary results, and it grew, and people started calling and saying, ‘Would you test my water?’” Guy Hostutler, the chairman of the Board of Supervisors in Freeport Township, where New Freeport is located, said at least 22 households there rely on holding tanks called water buffaloes right now because of contamination, and others are using five-gallon jugs brought in by the Center for Coalfield Justice. Some people have installed filter systems. In addition to the pollution issues, some New Freeport residents have also recently noticed their wells are drying up. In 2024, residents filed a class-action lawsuit against fracking company EQT, the owner of the well pad that is the alleged source of the frac-out. “I am hopeful that this publication is going to lend a lot of credibility to that fight,” Martik said. “This study is really a validation of what people already know. They have this thing that they’re able to point to now and say, ‘Hey, EQT, this did happen, and I have been impacted.’” EQT has maintained that it bears no responsibility for the contamination. The company did not respond to a request for comment. When the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection tested wells in New Freeport, the agency found that the water was not safe for human consumption but did not find a link to oil and gas drilling, according to spokesman Neil Shader. “If you suspect that there’s ever going to be any drilling, get your water tested,” so you’ll have a baseline for comparison. Stolz said he thought DEP had not “fully utilized the data they have” to make a determination on the source of the contamination, which is complicated by the fact that an abandoned conventional gas well was involved. “You have to look at the broader picture and the timeline of events,” he said. “It’s very clear that things changed after the frac-out.” DEP is now investigating more recent complaints in the area that water sources have been contaminated by oil and gas. New Freeport is not the only town in Pennsylvania to find its water contaminated after oil and gas drilling took place nearby. Its story mirrors that of Dimock, a community in the northeastern part of the state that has been without clean water for more than a decade. Dimock made headlines around the world after residents were filmed setting fire to their water. They’re still waiting for a promised public water line. Groundwater contamination poses particularly acute public health dangers in Pennsylvania, where more than 25 percent of adults use private wells as their primary source for drinking water, 10 percentage points higher than the national average. And the water in those private water wells—serving more than 3 million people—is rarely tested, according to Penn State University’s Drinking Water program. “You’re looking at community after community across the state and in the tri-state region losing their water. What we’re trying to call attention to is these things happen, and somebody has to be accountable,” Stolz said. Daniel Bain, a co-author of the study and a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, said companies’ denial of responsibility for contamination becomes increasingly difficult to swallow as the number of incidents rises. “They start to lose credibility. When they say there’s no problem, then you’re like, ‘Well, who do I trust? Do I trust my water ever again?’” he said. Frac-outs are relatively rare, but Pennsylvania’s hundreds of thousands of abandoned and orphaned oil and gas wells make them more probable. These wells are not easily detectable, their locations are often unknown and they’re estimated to be more numerous here than in any other state. DEP recorded 54 “communication” incidents, as frac-outs are called, between 2016 and 2024. The Freeport township supervisors have one piece of advice for others who live near fracking. “If you suspect that there’s ever going to be any drilling, get your water tested,” said Tim Brady, the vice-chairman. Residents can contact Penn State’s Agricultural Analytical Services Laboratory to get testing for oil and gas contaminants, which costs $75. “Pay the money to have the test done so you have it in hand,” Brady said. “It helps not only you, but it would also help your local government. Seventy-five dollars is worth its weight in gold whenever it comes to fighting a battle like this.” With baseline test results, investigators can more easily pinpoint the source of the contamination, allowing them to distinguish between fracking pollution and other sources, like old coal mines and abandoned oil and gas wells. Stolz and Bain’s approach relies on “the preponderance of evidence” to separate fracking contamination from legacy pollution caused by other fossil fuel extraction. The results in this paper present “compelling evidence that the frac-out profoundly changed local well water chemistry even without sample data prior to the event for comparison,” according to the authors. Bain said the unpredictable nature of frac-outs means their impacts are more likely to evade regulatory scrutiny. According to state law, contamination within 2,500 feet of a fracking well is presumed to be caused by that drilling. But there is no such “zone of presumption” for frac-outs. “If it were around a well, it would be 2,500 feet. But because it’s around a frac-out, it’s zero feet, and there’s no responsibility whatsoever,” Bain said. Just last month, Freeport Township declared a disaster emergency, stating that the frac-out had “endangered or will endanger the health, safety and welfare of a substantial number of persons residing in Freeport Township.” Local officials are working to resolve the crisis on several fronts: opening a new investigation with DEP over the water quantity issues, raising money to build a public water line and talking to state and federal officials about what options they have for funding. “We’re doing everything in our power,” Hostutler said. “We’re going to fight as long as we can.” Hostutler said a few people have moved away in the three years since the frac-out happened, and others are trying to sell their houses. A water buffalo costs $3,000 a month, an expense many residents cannot afford. He worries about what will happen over the long term to the community, which he describes as a close-knit little village where everyone knows each other and looks out for one another. “We’ve lost a lot of residents over the years. And we want to keep what we have,” Brady said. “It’s not going to be easy, but you just take a look at all the towns around here that’s lost water. They’re nonexistent anymore. We don’t want to end up like that. If you don’t have water, you don’t have anything.”

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Has Your Scientific Work Been Cut? We Want to Hear.

For a new series, Times journalists are speaking with scientists whose research has ended as a result of policy changes by the Trump administration.

By most metrics, 2025 has been the worst year for the American scientific enterprise in modern history.Since January, the Trump administration has made deep cuts to the nation’s science funding, including more than $1 billion in grants to the National Science Foundation, which sponsors much of the basic research at universities and federal laboratories, and $4.5 billion to the National Institutes of Health. Thousands of jobs for scientists and staff members have been terminated or frozen at these and other federal agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Park Service.To thousands of researchers — veteran scientists and new grad students, at state universities and Ivy League institutions alike — these sweeping reductions translate as direct personal losses: a layoff, a shuttered lab, a yearslong experiment or field study abruptly ended, graduate students turned away; lost knowledge, lost progress, lost investment, lost stability; dreams deferred or foreclosed.“This government upheaval is discouraging to all scientists who give their time and lend their brilliance to solve the problems beleaguering humankind instead of turning to some other activity that makes a more steady living,” Gina Poe, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Los Angeles, wrote in an email.Next year looks to be worse. The 2026 budget proposed by the White House would slash the National Science Foundation by 56.9 percent, the N.I.H. by 39.3 percent and NASA by 24.3 percent, including 47.3 percent of the agency’s science-research budget. It would entirely eliminate the U.S. Geological Survey’s $299 million budget for ecosystems research; all U.S. Forest Service research ($300 million) and, at NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, all funding ($625 million) for research on climate, habitat conservation and air chemistry and for studying ocean, coastal and Great Lakes environments. The Trump administration has also proposed shutting down NASA and NOAA satellites that researchers and governments around the world rely on for forecasting weather and natural disasters.

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Tour operator Intrepid drops carbon offsets and emissions targets

Firm will instead invest A$2m a year in ‘climate impact fund’ supporting renewables and switching to EVsOne of the travel industry’s most environmentally focused tour operators, Intrepid, is scrapping carbon offsets and abandoning its emissions targets as unreachable.The Australian-headquartered global travel company said it will instead invest A$2m a year in an audited “climate impact fund” supporting immediate practical measures such as switching to electric vehicles and investing in renewable energy. Continue reading...

One of the travel industry’s most environmentally focused tour operators, Intrepid, is scrapping carbon offsets and abandoning its emissions targets as unreachable.The Australian-headquartered global travel company said it will instead invest A$2m a year in an audited “climate impact fund” supporting immediate practical measures such as switching to electric vehicles and investing in renewable energy.Intrepid, which specialises in small group tours, said it was stopping carbon offsets and “stepping away” from the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), after having committed to 2030 goals monitored by the climate-certification organisation five years ago.In an open letter to staff, the Intrepid co-founder and chair, Darrell Wade, and the chief executive, James Thornton, told staff: “Intrepid, and frankly the entire travel industry, is not on track to achieve a 1.5C future, and more urgent action is required if we are to get even close.”While Intrepid’s brand focuses on the low impact of its group tours, it has long conceded that its bigger footprint is the flights its customers take to reach them, with Wade also admitting two years ago that its offsets were “not credible”.The letter blamed governments that “failed to act on ambitious policies on renewable energy or sustainable aviation fuels that support the scale of change that is required”, adding: “We are not comfortable maintaining a target that we know we won’t meet.”Thornton said the change should build trust through transparency rather than losing customers by admitting its climate pledges had not worked. He told the Guardian: “We were the first global tour operator to adopt a science-based target through the SBTi and now we’re owning the fact that it’s not working for us. We’ve always been real and transparent, which is how we build trust.”He said the fund and a new target to cut the “carbon intensity” of each trip had been developed by climate scientists and would be verified by independent auditors.Part of that attempt would be to reduce the number of long-haul flights taken by customers, Thornton said, by prioritising domestic and short-haul trips, and offering more flight-free itineraries and walking or trekking tours.Environmental campaigners have long dismissed offsets and focused on cutting flying. Dr Douglas Parr, the Greenpeace UK chief scientist, said offsetting schemes had allowed “airlines and other big polluters to falsely claim green credentials while continuing to pump out emissions”.He said Greenpeace backed a frequent flyer levy, with a first flight each year tax-free to avoid taxing an annual family holiday but rising steeply with subsequent flights to deter “the binge flyers who are the main engine of growth for UK flights”.Intrepid’s Thornton said he saw “first-hand how important meaningful climate action is to our founders and owners, who see it as part of their legacy”, but added: “We need to be honest with ourselves that travel is not sustainable in its current format and anything suggesting otherwise is greenwashing.”

Climate

Energy

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Trump’s coal bailout won’t solve the data center power crunch

The Trump administration is spending more than half a billion dollars to help prop up the dying coal industry. It’s also weakening pollution regulations and opening up more federal land to coal mining. All of this isn’t likely to save the industry—and also isn’t likely to do much to meet the surging demand for power from data centers for AI. Coal power is expensive, and that isn’t going to change Aging coal power plants are now so expensive to run that hundreds have retired over the last decade, including around 100 that retired or made plans to retire during Trump’s first term. Offering relatively small subsidies isn’t likely to change the long-term trend. “I don’t think it’s going to change the underlying economics,” says Michelle Solomon, a manager in the electricity program at the think tank Energy Innovation. “The reasons why coal has increased in cost will continue to be fundamentally true.” The cost of coal power grew 28% between 2021 and 2024, or more than double the rate of inflation. One reason is age: the average coal power plant in the U.S. is around 50 years old, and they aren’t designed to last much longer. Because renewable energy is cheaper, and regulation is likely to ramp up in the future, investors don’t see building new coal power plants as viable. But trying to keep outdated plants running also doesn’t make economic sense. The new funding can’t go very far. The Department of Energy plans to spend $625 million on coal projects, including $350 million to recommission and retrofit old plants. Another $25 million is set aside for retrofitting coal plants with natural gas co-firing systems. But that type of project can cost hundreds of millions or even a billion dollars for a single plant. (The $25 million, presumably, might only cover planning or a small pilot.) Other retrofits might only extend the life of a power plant by a few years. Because the plants will continue to be expensive to run, some power plant owners may not think the subsidies are worth it. Utilities want to move on If coal power plants keep running past their retirement age, even with some retrofits, costs keep going up for consumers. “That’s something that you really see in states that continue to rely on coal for a big part of their electricity mix,” says Solomon. “Like Kentucky and West Virginia, who have had their cost for power increase at some of the fastest rates in the country.” In Michigan, earlier this year, the DOE forced a coal power plant to stay open after it was scheduled to retire. The DOE cited an “emergency,” though neither the grid operator nor the utility said that there were power supply issues; the planned retirement of the plant included building new sources of energy to replace it. The utility reported to the SEC that within the first 38 days, alone, it spent $29 million to keep the plant running. (The emergency order is still in place, and being challenged by multiple lawsuits.) The extra expense shows up on consumers’ bills. One report estimates that by 2028, efforts to keep large power plants from retiring could cost consumers more than $3 billion a year. Utilities have long acknowledged the reality that there are less expensive energy sources. In the first Trump administration, in 2018, utilities resisted Trump’s attempts to use emergency powers to keep uneconomic coal plants open. When utilities plan to retire a power plant, there’s a long planning process. Plants begin making decision to defer maintenance that would otherwise be necessary. And many won’t want to reverse their decisions. It’s true that demand for power from data centers has led some utilities to keep coal plants online longer—and electric bills are already soaring in areas near large data centers. But Trump’s incentives may not make much difference for others. The last coal plant in New England just shut down years early, despite the current outlook for data centers. “Utilities do have to take a long-term view,” says Lori Bird, director of the U.S. energy program at the nonprofit World Resources Institute. “They’re doing multi-year planning. So they consider the durability and economic viability of these assets over the longer term. They have not been economic, and they’re also the highest-emitting greenhouse gas facilities.” Even if the Trump administration has rolled back environmental regulations, she says, future administrations could reverse that; continuing to use coal is a risky proposition. In most states, utilities also have to comply with renewable power goals. There are better solutions It’s true that the U.S. needs more power generation, quickly. It’s not clear exactly how much new electricity will be needed—some of that will depend on how much AI is a bubble and how much tech companies can shrink their power usage at data centers. But the nonprofit Rewiring America calculated that data centers that are under construction or in planning could add 93 gigawatts of electricity demand to the U.S. grid by the end of the decade. The nonprofit argues that some or even all of that new capacity could be covered by rooftop solar and batteries at homes. Cheap utility-scale renewable power plants could obviously also help, though the Trump administration is actively fighting them. Battery storage can help provide 24/7 energy. One analysis of a retiring coal plant in Maryland found that it would be less expensive to replace it with batteries and transmission upgrades than to keep it running. Temporarily saving a handful of coal power plants won’t cover the new power needs. It would add to air pollution, water pollution, and climate pollution. And it would significantly push up power bills when consumers are already struggling. Real support for an “energy emergency” would include faster permitting and other work to accelerate building affordable renewable energy, experts say. “Making sure that resources can compete openly is really important,” says Solomon. “It’s important to not only meet the demand from AI, but make sure that it doesn’t raise costs for electricity consumers.”

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How Minecraft and other video games are teaching kids about climate change

Related News

Prince William to attend Cop30 UN climate summit in Brazil

Scientists Suspect Fracking Contaminated This Pennsylvania Town’s Wells

Has Your Scientific Work Been Cut? We Want to Hear.

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How Minecraft and other video games are teaching kids about climate change

Related News

Prince William to attend Cop30 UN climate summit in Brazil

Scientists Suspect Fracking Contaminated This Pennsylvania Town’s Wells

Has Your Scientific Work Been Cut? We Want to Hear.

Tour operator Intrepid drops carbon offsets and emissions targets

Trump’s coal bailout won’t solve the data center power crunch

Suggested Viewing

The Straight Poop

Voices of Transition

The Invisible Mammal - The Bat Rescuer

The Wisdom To Survive: Climate Change, Capitalism & Community

CO2? CO-Nee!

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