It was a tumultuous year for the agtech sector, with a string of once-promising startups declaring bankruptcy or downsizing in the face of a tough economic environment. Investors gravitated toward more established startups amid market uncertainty, with biostimulant maker Sound Agriculture raising $25 million in venture funding and Carbon Robotics nabbing $70 million for its laser-powered, weed-killing robot. An...
Electric utilities are calling for the U.S. Senate to pass legislation aimed at reducing wildfire intensity and restoring forest health, in part by allowing power companies greater leeway around vegetation management. The House passed the Save our Forests Act on Thursday in a 279 to 141 vote. The bill would “simplify and expedite the most critical forest...
The artificial intelligence boom has turbocharged demand for electricity, and everyone who is anyone in the U.S. energy industry wants a piece of the action. The latest entrant is Chevron, the country’s second-largest oil and gas company, which sees opportunity in building natural gas-fueled power plants that will feed energy directly to data centers. Chevron...
A new partnership between off-grid power systems provider DC Grid and energy services firm Liberty Energy seeks to provide data centers and EV hubs with modular, scalable off-grid power solutions in a matter of months, the companies announced Jan. 7. The partners expect to be able to deploy “small scale power output” within three months for fleet EV charging hubs...
When we think of solar, we tend to picture shimmering expanses of panels spread across farmland or mounted on rooftops. But how about attached to a raft, floating atop a reservoir? Floating solar photovoltaics, also called “floatovoltaics,” is an emerging technology that’s taken off in countries across Asia and Europe, especially near urban areas with limited space available...
Washington, D.C. is in a tizzy over President Donald J. Trump’s rescission of a slew of policies implemented under former President Joe Biden, and energy policies are receiving special attention in multiple executive orders (EOs). Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement, ended the social cost of carbon, and ordered a halt to climate-related regulation and offshore renewable energy leases—all with the...
TerraPower, a nuclear energy startup founded by Bill Gates, struck a deal this week with one of the largest data center developers in the US to deploy advanced nuclear reactors. TerraPower and Sabey Data Centers (SDC) are working together on a plan to run existing and future facilities on nuclear energy from small reactors. Tech companies are...
The Department of Energy last week launched a research and development program into the production of superhot rock geothermal energy, a resource that is unused but has major potential — 1% of its U.S. capacity could provide 4.3 TW of firm power, according to the Clean Air Task Force. DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy is offering $30...
Amazon-backed startup Windfall Bio said it successfully scaled production of methane-eating microbes, a milestone in sustainable fertilizer development. Windfall Bio said fermentation of the microbes reached 17,000 liters, representing commercial-scale production of its methane removal solution. The microbes consume methane and transform “into nitrogen-rich biomass that can be processed into high-value organic fertilizer,” according to the...
An executive order by President Donald Trump requiring agencies to stop paying money for two mammoth Biden-era laws could bring a wide range of infrastructure, transportation and energy projects to a halt — including those already delivering jobs to Republican-led states. The language in question, in one of dozens of orders Trump issued on his first...
