Yesterday, Japan’s prime minister, Naoto Kan, announced that the government was scrapping a planned expansion of nuclear power, which currently provides about a third of Japanese electricity. Instead, the government would redouble efforts to expand its renewable energy portfolio, Kan said. The turnaround followed Kan’s urging last week that a reactor in Hamaoka, near an…

Yesterday ScienceInsider went through the implications of new federal rules on greenhouse gases for industries which pollute the air with these pollutants. But legal challenges could complicate an already complex landscape for the rules.

For 2 years industry officials, states, and environmentalists have had 2 January 2011 circled on their calendars. That’s the date greenhouse gases officially become regulated pollutants under the Clean Air Act—a direct result of a 2007 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that carbon dioxide is a pollutant under that law. The Environmental Protection Agency’s…

Just before Christmas, President Barack Obama celebrated a string of last-minute legislative accomplishments on tax cuts, gays in the military, the nuclear arms pact, the 9/11 responder bill, and food safety. But 2 weeks after saying that competition on innovation from overseas made this “our generation’s Sputnik moment,” the White House barely mentioned that key…

Researchers have uncovered the largest geothermal hot spot in the eastern United States. According to a unique collaboration between Google and academic geologists, West Virginia sits atop several hot patches of Earth, some as warm as 200˚C and as shallow as 5 kilometers. If engineers are able to tap the heat, the state could become…