EPA scraps power plant rules; CCC blocks Heathrow expansion — SkimNews
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- EPA head Lee Zeldin scrapped Biden-era carbon limits for coal and gas plants, claiming $310bn in 'savings' while environmental groups note Biden's rules would have prevented an estimated 4,500 premature deaths annually.link ›
- The US power sector emits ~1.5 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent a year — about a quarter of total US emissions — and is now functionally unmoored from federal climate rules pending court challenges.link ›
- CCC chair Nigel Topping said an expanded Heathrow would emit more CO2 by 2050 than any other single sector of the UK economy, requiring carbon-removal machines to handle more than a third of those emissions.link ›
- Under the CCC plan, a return flight to Alicante could cost ~£150 more by 2050 and New York ~£400 more — though Topping framed the annual Alicante hit as 'less than a cup of coffee each way.'link ›
- Fluxnium raised a $7M seed round led by Congruent Ventures with Constellation Energy participating, betting polymer-fiber seawater extraction can beat land-mine uranium costs as prices have risen 75% in five years.link ›
- Daikin, Arkema ($60M Kentucky plant), and Chemours are expanding PFAS production for AI datacenter cooling and semiconductors — even as Chemours was ordered to pay $450M to settle a PFAS discharge lawsuit.link ›
- The World Food Programme warned ~50M people will face acute hunger from a 'supersized' El Niño virtually guaranteed to peak late 2026 into 2027, with India already running a ~50% monsoon shortfall.link ›
EPA administrator Lee Zeldin scrapped Biden-era carbon limits for US coal and gas plants this week, claiming the rules exceeded agency authority and freeing a power sector that pumps roughly 1.5 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent yearly — about a quarter of US emissions — from federal climate constraints. The agency claims the rollback saves $310bn; environmental groups counter Biden's framework would have prevented 4,500 premature deaths annually, a trade-off Zeldin's EPA calls too uncertain to quantify. Expect immediate lawsuits. Across the Atlantic, the Climate Change Committee declared Heathrow's third runway 'not currently compatible' with UK net zero, demanding legislation forcing airlines and passengers to fund decarbonization in a fight bound for a Commons vote before year-end.
The stories behind this week
CCC: Heathrow Expansion Not Compatible With UK Net Zero TargetThe CCC cannot block the runway, but it has redrawn the political fight: ministers now must either legislate to make airlines and passengers pay for decarbonisation or override their own climate advisers. A Commons vote later this year will decide whether the UK's flagship aviation project survives its net zero commitment intact.
EPA scraps Biden-era coal and gas power plant emissions limitsThe US power sector spews about 1.5 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent yearly, yet the EPA argues the public-health costs of regulation are too uncertain to quantify. With legal challenges already expected and the power sector now shielded from future federal climate rules, Americans who would have benefited from the estimated 4,500 avoided premature deaths per year under Biden's framework bear the risk of that trade-off.
‘Forcing a reckoning’: How Asia is preparing for a ‘supersized’ El NiñoFor Indonesians and Filipinos, food already consumes up to 50% of household income, so the projected 8-10% regional rice yield decline threatens social stability alongside hunger. Sri Lanka's pivot to its single desalination plant shows drought-stressed nations exhausting last-resort options, while Taiwan's terror-attack-style heat drills signal El Niño is now treated as a national-security threat—not just a weather event—across the region.
Hampshire plum tree yields infested fruit amid droughtHome fruit growers facing drought may see deceptive yields—lush appearance can mask serious pest infestations that compromise edibility and require immediate sanitation to break the reproductive cycle. The case underscores how environmental stress can alter both plant and pest behavior in unexpected ways.
Top PFAS Makers Ramp Up Production for AI BoomChemSec executive director Anne-Sofie Bäckar warned the expansion risks undermining nascent PFAS restrictions in Europe, the UK, and parts of the US, while a Danske Bank investor note flagged escalating multibillion-euro remediation and litigation liabilities — making Chemours's $450m settlement a potential preview of what's ahead for the industry as it doubles down on AI supply.
Trump Admin Rewrites Endangered Species Act RulesIndustries gain leeway to operate in sensitive areas without violating the Endangered Species Act, but species dependent on broad protections lose crucial safeguards—potentially reversing decades of recovery efforts. The shift creates legal uncertainty for companies relying on stable regulations, with courts likely to decide the final meaning.
ALSO Tours TM-B Demo Bikes While Pre-Order Customers WaitALSO has enough functional TM-Bs to send demo fleets on a nationwide tour, yet some day-one reservation holders who paid $4,500 nearly a year ago still have no delivery date — a contrast that creates a reputational optics problem on top of the delay. The fact that listed service-partner bike shops don't even know they're partners signals ALSO is still building the support infrastructure for the bike, not just the bike itself.
Fluxnium cracks seawater uranium extractionThe U.S. aims to triple nuclear capacity by 2050 but faces rising uranium prices and reliance on unstable foreign suppliers. Fluxnium’s seawater extraction could secure domestic fuel access at scale if it achieves cost parity with mines, altering long-term energy security calculations for plant operators and policymakers.
Why it matters: If the EPA rollback survives court challenges, the US power sector's ~1.5 billion tonnes of annual CO2-equivalent output will operate without federal climate guardrails for the foreseeable future, with the legal fate of the 4,500-deaths-a-year counter-claim now the only remaining pressure point.
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