Intense forest fires have been raging across the western United States this summer. So far this year, nearly 43,000 wildfires have torched almost 7 million acres of land. As NPR Science correspondent Christopher Joyce and photographer David Gilkey report from Arizona and New Mexico this week, the forests of the American Southwest have become so overgrown that they’re essentially tinderboxes just waiting for a spark.

Over the last 50 million years, tectonic shifts in the Earth’s crust caused by forces deep within the mantle have caused the Caribbean island chain to be pushed Eastward. Staring at a map will reveal the bulging shape of the lesser Antilles way out into the Atlantic. A new study by researchers from the University of Southern California has found the reason for this movement to be the South American plate. The South America is far larger and more heavily rooted in its location. The Caribbean movement to the east is caused by the underlying mantle pushing against the southern continent.

A $425 million lander that would drill a few meters into Mars in order to probe its crust, mantle, and core will be NASA’s next major planetary science mission. In a teleconference late Monday, NASA’s associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate, John Grunsfeld, announced that he has selected the InSight mission to Mars as NASA’s next cost-capped mission to explore the solar system. The craft will set a seismometer on the surface and send a temperature sensor down a drill hole to better understand how that rocky planet evolved from a nascent ball of magma.

Cape Wind cleared its last bureaucratic hurdle Wednesday when the Federal Aviation Administration released its finding that the project poses no hazard to planes. The finding came after a court-mandated re-evaluation of possible safety hazards the 130-turbine project poses to planes and a GOP inquiry into whether the FAA’s initial approval in 2010 was the result of political pressure from the left. “(The FAA’s) aeronautical study revealed that the structure does not exceed obstruction standards and would not be a hazard to air navigation,” the latest FAA determination reads. The project presents no hazard as long as Cape Wind marks and lights obstructions to planes, files required construction forms with the FAA and builds no turbines exceeding 440 feet above ground level, the decision reads.

“Fortune favors the bold” might as well be the motto of the Philippines regarding their energy policy and their efforts to achieve their goals. However, a bold plan is only the first step to achieving the colossal task of weaning an entire country off its dependance on foreign-sources fossil fuels. The logistics of the effort are proving to be more than a challenge for even the most developed of nations. However the Philippines are stepping up to the challenge by implementing a clear, comprehensive and decisive energy plan. This can be an example for other countries to emulate. Why Is Renewable Energy Such a Priority For The Philippines? Renewable energy development in the Philippines is vital because the nation is one of the fastest growing in Asia with over 92 million residents. As population and economy continue to grow, meeting the increased demand for electricity will pose a difficult challenge for the island nation. The cost of transmitting power and transporting traditional fossil fuel (which the nation lacks) to the more than 7,000 islands and to isolated areas is very high. Philippines has the highest electricity rate in Asia. With this in mind, the government has decided to take action now to begin reduce its reliance on costly fuel imports and tap its vast potential for renewable, locally produced energy, estimated to be over 70,000MW. The Government of the Philippines views the development of renewable energy sources as a national priority. The Philippine Department of Energy (DOE) outlined a clear energy plan with emphasis on the development of renewables. Over the next 20 years, the country looks to increase renewable capacity by 200%, to account for 50% of all energy produced, and keep self-sufficiency at 60% minimum. Most of this development will be in geothermal, solar, and particularly wind, in which it looks to become the largest wind producer in Southeast Asia.

The National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska is an area of land on the Alaska North Slope owned by the United States federal government and managed by the Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management. It lies to the west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which as a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service managed National Wildlife Refuge, is also considered federal land. At a size of 23.5 million acres, the area has been described as “the largest tract of undisturbed public land in the United States”. After receiving more than 400,000 public comments and following two days of meetings and visits with North Slope leaders, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has outlined a proposed plan that will allow for additional access for oil and gas development in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska while also protecting world-class caribou herds, migratory bird habitat, uplands, and sensitive coastal resources that are central to the culture and subsistence lifestyle of Alaska Natives and our nation’s conservation heritage.

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields. The sun rotates every 28 days, and because it doesn’t have a solid surface, it should be slightly flattened. This tiny flattening has been studied with many instruments for almost 50 years to learn about the sun’s rotation, especially the rotation below its surface, which we can’t see directly. Jeff Kuhn and Isabelle Scholl (Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii at Manoa) and others have used the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory satellite to find how astonishingly round the sun really is.

A new study has revealed the under-appreciation that exists for the role dams play in climate change; how the reservoirs behind them can cause surges of greenhouse gases as the water levels go up and down. In a study of the water column at such a reservoir, marine scientists found an astonishing 20-fold increase in methane emissions as water levels were drawn down. Bubbles coming out of the mud and sediment at the bottom were chock full of this potent greenhouse gas.

A new report confirms the critical importance of offshore wind in replacing aging power plants, saving up to £89bn from the UK’s energy bill, and has the potential to take a large share of a global £1 trillion market by 2050. As well as reducing reliance on imported gas and meeting GHG emissions and renewable energy targets, offshore wind could offer business opportunities of up to £35bn to UK companies.

A high federal court in Brazil has ruled that work on the Belo Monte dam in the Brazilian Amazon be immediately suspended. Finding that the government failed to properly consult indigenous people on the dam, the ruling is the latest in innumerable twists and turns regarding the massive dam, which was first conceived in the 1970s, and has been widely criticized for its impact on tribal groups in the region and the Amazon environment. In addition the Regional Federal Tribunal (TRF1) found that Brazil’s Environmental Impact Assessment was flawed since it was conducted after work on the dam had already begun.