State of Change

Newsom’s deal to cut energy costs includes giveaways to Big Oil, more drilling OPINION: “What Californians need now are steady, clear-eyed leaders willing to stand with workers, communities and families — not fossil fuel billionaires looking for one last payday.”

🚨 Newsom just signed a bill that will EXPAND oil drilling in California 🚨

This signals “what could become a dangerous new pattern: allowing Big Oil to hold California hostage every time a refinery announces a potential closure.”

Read more: www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/open...

Don’t Let a Shutdown Wash Away U.S. Flood Protection By Nicholas Pinter A US federal government shutdown is looming, potentially starting Oct. 1, with broad impacts across the government and across the country.  The scope of these unfolding…

californiawaterblog.com/2025/09/30/d...

Vermont electric airplane maker files to go public - The Boston Globe Beta Technologies is still seeking FAA certification for its first plane, called the Alia.

Electric-powered airplane Alia can take off on a conventional runway or lift off vertically like a helicopter. It can carry four passengers or about 200 cubic feet of cargo and has a maximum range of more than 300 miles. #FossilFree www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/29/b...

Groundbreaking study shows how solar panels age after 30 years of use: 'It's an important message to the photovoltaic industry' "Everything that goes into a panel ... has a great influence on performance."

six, three-decade-old arrays in Switzerland found them to still be working well, retaining more than 80% of their initial power

www.yahoo.com/news/article...

California Supreme Court Clears Path For Wyoming Coal Exports Through Oakland Port The California Supreme Court on Wednesday effectively ended a decade-long legal battle over shipping coal out of the Oakland Bulk and Oversized Terminal.…

Wyoming coal could be shipped to Asia via Oakland by 2028. h/t @jfern.bsky.social cowboystatedaily.com/2025/09/18/c...

Experts raise concerns over frightening phenomenon in US rivers: 'The trend … is actually increasing faster' An in-depth study of riverine heat waves identified how America's rivers are running hot.

“Riverine heat waves” occur more often than air heat waves in 65 to 76% of sites, nationally.

www.thecooldown.com/outdoors/riv...

California “cold water droughts” (~same thing) increasingly result from mix of climate & landscape/water mgmt impacts, w/dire effects.

www.ppic.org/blog/tacklin...

‘Hidden costs’ of climate emergency are worsening California’s affordability crisis – report University of California, Berkeley, study found that those who experience severe effects will see upto a $1m in costs

“It’s not a future set of abstract numbers. It’s real and it’s immediate.”

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Hidden Costs of Climate Change Fueling Affordability Crisis in California — New Report - CleanTechnica Support CleanTechnica's work through a Substack subscription or on Stripe. Analysis from the Center for Law, Energy & Environment at the University of California, Berkeley shows that disaster costs, h...

Hidden Costs of Climate Change Fueling Affordability Crisis in California — New Report

cleantechnica.com/2025/09/26/h...

California Releases List of More than 4,000 Companies Required to Begin Reporting Under New Climate Disclosure Laws - ESG Today The California Air Resources Board (CARB) released a list of more than 4,000 companies that will be required to comply with the state’s new climate reporting laws, mandating disclosures on climate-rel...

State of California continues to lead on climate action, including climate disclosure, mandated for 4,000+ companies, including most of S&P500 www.esgtoday.com/california-r...

Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Fox: "We're announcing today expanded programs to help the American coal industry. We're helping it because for years it has been under assault. It was out of fashion with the chardonnay set in San Francisco, Boulder, and NYC ... coal just makes the world go round."

Methane makeover: As California dairies race to cut emissions, the solutions face pushback - Local News Matters DAIRY FARMER JERRY DA SILVA had a manure problem. The 500 cows on his family’s farm produced a lot of waste. He collected it in large lagoons and piped it

Methane digesters on dairy farms are controversial, but there's another set of solutions that involve separating manure from liquid and composting it to add to the soil. We took a deep-dive into manure management in California.
localnewsmatters.org/2025/09/26/m...

‘We’re standing together as one Kern County’: Elected officials celebrate the passing of landmark oil bill The bill would allow Kern County to open up to 2,000 oil drill permits each year for the next 10 years.

The bill would allow Kern County to open up to 2,000 oil drill permits each year for the next 10 years.

www.yahoo.com/news/article...

California isn't backing down on offshore wind power despite Trump cancellation The Trump administration canceled nearly half a billion dollars in funding for California's largest offshore wind project, but the state is persevering toward its ambitious goals.

“We’re planning for up to 25 gigawatts by 2045 because it’s essential that we meet our clean energy goals, create good-paying jobs, and keep the state competitive globally.” - Jana Ganion, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s senior advisor for offshore wind.
www.latimes.com/environment/...

The Catastrophic Outcome of 3°C But is 3°C really a win? What will this amount of heating mean for peo- ple in the United States? How alarmed, exactly, should Americans be? Well, 3°C of global heating would likely mean that for around three months of the year, the entire East Coast all the way to Maine, the Midwest to the Great Plains, and half of California would be so hot that being outdoors would put you at risk of death. Southern California, the Southwest, the Deep South, and Florida would be this deadly hot for nearly half the year.? And that's just the back- ground heat. The effects of this heat in the climate system —what are blandly known as the "impacts" of climate change should also be considered. And what the extreme weather already emerging across the globe, as well as the latest research, suggests is something quite frightening: the way our climate system is responding even to low levels of warming indicates that a 3°C world might look very much like the 4°C or s°C world it had seemed like we had avoided. This is not to say that scientists have failed to predict what is happening in some way-their projections of how much the planet will warm at rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have been entirely

Are you helping your kids with their homework? Teaching them how to save for retirement? Ok.

But are you preparing them for this👇, the result of our current emissions trajectory?

Newsom signs California climate package aimed at lowering gas and utility costs Newsom said the bills were a compromise, designed to push California toward a clean-energy future while still ensuring the state has enough affordable gasoline to meet drivers' needs.

"The most controversial bill in the package was Senate Bill 237, which will allow oil and gas companies to drill up to 2,000 new wells per year through 2036 in Kern County."
www.latimes.com/california/s...

With climate and clean energy policy under attack, California just doubled down on leadership By Kelly Trombley, Ceres

With climate and clean energy policy under attack, California just doubled down on leadership reut.rs/3KbkuFX

Should We Let Public Transit Die? Urban-rural hostility is fueling a public transportation crisis in US cities. But demands to abandon bus and train riders ignore the economic and social costs of cutting service.

I have a major piece in Bloomberg Citylab today. Should the US let transit fail, as Pennsylvania is already doing? And if not, what are the arguments we need to let it succeed?

www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Surge in Solar Energy Deployment Offers a Glimmer of Hope in Dark Times As Trump tightens his authoritarian grip in the US, hundreds of ‘Sun Day’ events celebrate and showcase the promise of clean, affordable energy.

And who doesn't need a glimmer of hope?
www.oneearthnow.org/p/surge-in-s...

How environmental groups lost Newsom to Big Oil Environmental justice groups were riding momentum against the industry, but then refinery closure announcements changed everything.

Politico's Climate California lays out the winners and losers of California's long-awaited cap-and-trade extension — a new spending plan for the roughly $4 billion that the program generates every year. www.politico.com/newsletters/...

California just passed a suite of bills to tackle rising energy costs The state’s lawmakers got serious about reducing electricity rates this session, with measures to help with summer bills and enable public financing for…

The CA legislature agreed on a sprawling energy and climate package now on Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk. @jeffstjohn.bsky.social has some details:

www.canarymedia.com/articles/pol...

Anyone who wants to stream or show this film, please do! It's a powerful way to get folks thinking about solar

California passes bill curbing utilities use of ratepayer money for political spending State lawmakers last week made California the seventh state to pass a bill limiting investor-owned utilities from using customer money to pay for political and lobbying costs.

Rare good news: “State lawmakers last week made California the seventh state to pass a bill limiting investor-owned utilities from using customer money to pay for political and lobbying costs.”

energyandpolicy.org/california-l...

Inland Empire communities face dangerous levels of shipping industry pollution — the same emissions warming the planet. After a rule that would have protected residents near rail yards fell apart under Trump's EPA, they're hoping the state takes the lead.

capitalandmain.com/effort-to-cu...

Authority CEO Ian Choudri thanks State leaders for a continued commitment to delivering California’s high-speed rail project by agreeing to reauthorize the Cap-and-Invest program, securing $1 billion for the project annually through 2045.🚅🤝

🔗 bit.ly/4mX3zVR

With $1 billion a year from California, high-speed rail will start courting private financiers The guaranteed lifeline from California’s Cap-And-Invest program gives the bullet train leverage for public-private partnerships.

The guaranteed lifeline from California’s Cap-And-Invest program gives the bullet train leverage for public-private partnerships.

California Assembly and Senate just passed AB 1207, extending and strengthening the state’s centerpiece climate policy - cap and invest- for the next 20 years. Now onto the governor’s signature!

#climatesky #energysky

I asked one of the most progressive city councilors in #LA to weigh in on whether the city should require A/C for renters.

In 2023 #LosAngeles said A/C for all wasn't practical. But heat waves are getting longer, hotter, more dangerous for more than a million households. bsky.app/profile/aaro...

Rooftop solar and energy storage programs can remediate energy-limiting behaviors of energy insecure households in the United States - Communications Earth & Environment In the United States, rooftop solar and energy storage programs can provide utility bill relief for households facing energy insecurity and who may be ineligible for traditional assistance, according ...

PNNL researchers showed rooftop solar + storage could offset two-thirds of the savings households try to get by cutting heat, cooling, or even food/health spending
Clean energy can fight climate change and help families live safely & comfortably. nature.com/articles/s43247-025-02517-5 #EnergySky

The first onshore wave power pilot station in the US opens today in LA The new power station will generate electricity from the motion of waves, but it's only a pilot program - so far.

electrek.co/2025/09/09/t...

I don't know if wave power will ever pan out, but it is so tantalizing. All that kinetic energy, visible to the naked eye, but ready to corrode and beat the crap out of anything you put in it.

All the designs make me think of the wacky early days of human flight.

Chart: Trump is slowing climate progress. Here’s how much. After Trump’s budget law and regulatory rollbacks, the country’s carbon emissions are set to fall much slower than they would have under the Biden admin.

This is a useful visual.
www.canarymedia.com/articles/emi...