The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is taking steps to speed up progress in plant science by calling on universities and stakeholders to help build new AI tools that can translate the huge amount of germplasm data the agency collects. Through the Genesis Mission and the Agriculture Advanced Research and Development Authority (AgARDA), USDA is...
Investors Are Getting Pickier With Their AI Power Plays
Not long ago, the artificial intelligence boom lifted pretty much any stockwith a story to tell about serving electricity to data centers. Investors are getting more fretful about whether there will be enough power demand to go around. For them, selling into a tight market in the 2030s would be a nice way to fund the continued...
Modular approach can speed data center construction by 30%
A modular approach to data center design and construction could help overcome bottlenecks like labor availability, land constraints and long lead times for power and electrical equipment while boosting performance once operational, an executive with data center solutions provider Flex told Facilities Dive last week. Chris Butler, president of Flex’s embedded and critical power business,...
This software firm has a plan to take grid-enhancing tech nationwide
A major grid-tech company is asking the Trump administration to fund a project it says could significantly boost the nation’s ability to move power around — without building a single new transmission tower or line. Open Access Technology International (OATI) is a Minneapolis-based firm whose software is used by nearly every North American transmission grid operator to manage the flow...
Growing Grid Strategy: Undergrounding Power Lines to Withstand Weather
Electric utilities and power grid operators increasingly are looking at ways to diminish and avoid disruptions from extreme weather. The power sector also has experience with the financial impacts of wildfires, both with damage to assets and losses incurred when equipment is found liable for causing those events. Undergrounding lines, in addition to enhancing safety,...
Why one of the cities most dependent on the Colorado River now has water for sale
Even as California is offering to take less water from the drought-shrunken Colorado River, one of the state’s biggest cities that’s long been the most dependent on it curiously now has excess water to sell. On a good year, San Diego gets barely eight inches of rain. And not too long ago, the picturesque coastal...
The hidden innovation behind Antora’s massive new heat battery
A giant energy-storage project in South Dakota will soon turn cheap wind energy into clean industrial steam for a neighboring biofuels facility. The startup Antora Energy said it recently began booting up a 5-gigawatt-hour thermal energy storage system at Poet’s ethanol-production plant near Big Stone City, close to the Minnesota border. With a fleet of more than 200 batteries, Antora’s project is expected to become...
Could Lasers Replace Herbicides?
Farm Bill debates this year have been riddled with pesticide fights. While the House was passing its farm bill, the Supreme Court was gearing up for a major case that could change how pesticide companies are held liable for their labeling. At the heart of these debates is one chemical in particular: glyphosate.
Star Catcher raises $65m to build first power grid in orbit
Star Catcher Industries, the company building the first power grid in space, has raised $65m in an oversubscribed Series A round. The new investment – led by B Capital and co-led by Shield Capital and Cerberus Ventures, the venture arm of Cerberus Capital Management – brings Star Catcher’s total capital raised to $88m Read more...
Will China’s new airborne wind turbine succeed where predecessors failed?
On 5 January 2026, the skies of Yibin were briefly darkened by the S2000 Stratosphere Airborne Wind Energy System (SAWES) – a buoyant air turbine (BAT) measuring 60m in length, 40m in width and 40m in height (197 × 131 × 131ft). The helium-powered platform rose to around 2,000m (6,560ft) in 30 minutes, generating 385kWh-hours (kWh) of power...









