On September 17, 2025, Antarctic sea ice extent likely peaked with a maximum of 17.81 million square kilometers (6.88 million square miles), the third lowest maximum in the satellite record that began in 1979 . This year’s extent is 740,000 square kilometers (286,000 square miles) above 2023, the record low maximum. It is 900,000 square kilometers (348,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average Antarctic maximum extent. Sea ice extent is markedly below average in the Indian Ocean and the Bellingshausen Sea (Figure 1b). Extent is slightly above average stretching out of the Ross Sea.
The Antarctic maximum extent is six days earlier than the 1981 to 2010 median date of September 23. The interquartile range for the date of the Antarctic maximum is September 18 to September 30.
China’s installations of wind and solar in May are enough to generate as much electricity as Poland, as the world’s second-biggest economy breaks further records with its rapid buildup of renewable energy infrastructure.
China installed 93 GW of solar capacity last month – almost 100 solar panels every second, according to an analysis by Lauri Myllyvirta, a senior fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute. Wind power installations reached 26 GW, the equivalent of about 5,300 turbines.
While estimates for the amount of power generated by solar panels and wind turbines vary depending on their location and weather conditions, Myllyvirta calculated that May’s installations alone could generate as much electricity as Poland, Sweden or the United Arab Emirates.
“It was just a matter of time until people sort of started trusting used EVs enough to take the plunge and that would sort of have a ripple effect,” said Liz Najman, director of market insights at Recurrent, which provides range estimates and other EV-centric data to car dealers and shoppers.
A number of factors are feeding the buzz around used EVs. For one, there is finally a lot of product, as three-year leases expire on a crowd of cars purchased in 2022. That was the year a number of new battery-powered models first shipped to customers, including the BMW i4, Cadillac Lyric, Ford F-150 Lightning and Toyota bZ4X.
Meanwhile, prices of used EVs have steadily ticked down, a byproduct of more mainstream, non-luxury models and steep depreciation rates. Electric vehicles shed their value quickly, largely because consumers expect the technology to improve quickly.
Like their new counterparts, used EVs are losing federal purchase credits as well, in their case, of up to $4,000. But prices on slightly worn EVs are already on par with other options. In August, the average used electric vehicle traded hands for $34,700, nearly level with the average used car or truck running on gas, according to Cox Automotive. And the EVs were generally only two to three years old, while internal-combustion options average about six or seven years old.
oday, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, released a new staff report revealing that OMB Director Russell Vought has been directing NASA—since early summer—to begin implementing the devastating cuts in President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Request (PBR), without regard for the destructive impacts to NASA’s missions, safety and workforce. Based on whistleblower reports and documents, the report also reveals that Vought plans to impound NASA funds “to get to the PBR” under a continuing resolution (CR), in violation of the Constitution.
“Like other premier science agencies, NASA has thrived on consistent, bipartisan investments, which are essential to America’s economic prosperity and technological supremacy,” the report notes. “But today, NASA faces an existential threat under the Trump Administration.”
NASA Has Been Implementing the President’s Proposed Fiscal Year 2026 Budget Cuts Since Early Summer—In Clear Violation of the Constitution
As early as June, 2025, NASA began implementing immediately certain institutional changes budget—which carries no force of law.
NASA’s Chief of Staff Brian Hughes is enforcing OMB’s directive to actively implement the President’s FY 26 Budget request. It has been made clear to NASA employees that they are doing the PBRif it’s not in the PBR, it does not count
OMB Director Russell Vought’s budgetary end game is to use impoundment to illegally implement the President’s proposed budget at NASA, while ignoring congressional funding levels. Internal agency notes provided by a whistleblower reveal this plot: If there is a CR, impoundment is likely going to get on the table as a mechanism to get to the PBR
The Administration is Hiding OMB’s Budget Directives
The Trump administration’s effort to defy the Constitution and unilaterally implement sweeping cuts to NASA is “all under wraps”, “nothing is written down” and “all avenues of communication have been shut down.”
Which is what you do when you understand that something is a real phenomena that deserves our attention. In the interview below, Energy Secretary Chris Wright says, “That’s exactly what we want, is discussing these climate and energy trade-offs in a public setting.” Other cabinet members are doing their own grievous damage to the Republic, but this guy takes a back seat to no one for ideological dishonesty and idiocy.
The Energy Department has added “climate change,” “green” and “decarbonization” to its growing “list of words to avoid” at its Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, according to an email issued Friday and obtained by POLITICO.
The words on the DOE list are at the heart of EERE’s mission: It is the government’s largest investor in technologies that help reduce heat-trapping emissions that cause climate change as well as the hazardous pollution from fossil fuels. It is the latest in a series of Trump administration efforts to dispute, silence or downplay the realities of climate change.
“Please ensure that every member of your team is aware that this is the latest list of words to avoid — and continue to be conscientious about avoiding any terminology that you know to be misaligned with the Administration’s perspectives and priorities,” the directive from acting director of external affairs Rachel Overbey said.
CNBC discussion includes climate softball questions from climate denier Joe Kernan. To Kernan’s credit he asked if Trump’s circus about Tylenol delegitimized the administration’s credibility on science in general, as well as climateContinue reading “Energy Department Adds “Climate” to Forbidden Words”
“If Wind turbines go up around here, we’re going to kill everyone in your family.” It’s an extreme case, but it’s not unique for farmers and landowners in my state of Michigan and across the midwest.
The video above draws on on years of traveling, interviewing, and filming across Michigan and the Midwest, in support of Farmers property rights, and the clean energy transition. In particular it focuses on recent siting reforms in Michigan which attempt to balance the scales in support of clean energy. Similar measures have been passed in Wisconsin, Illinois, and Minnesota.
This year’s agricultural crisis makes it all too clear – farmers need the right to diversify their incomes, and clean energy provides a path. An international campaign of misinformation, harassment and threats has been coordinated by the fossil fuel industry to stop the energy transition, and local farmers and landowners have found themselves in the crosshairs.
Not just in the US, it’s an internationally coordinated campaign, as this Aussie reporter affirms, below.
Rare circulation pattern of twin systems off the Southeast coast might help avoid a direct hit. Which is a good thing, since FEMA is in a state of Trumpian discombobulation.
The growing disaster-recovery economy is about to be tested in the US.
After a quiet start to hurricane season in the Atlantic, twin systems have erupted – and they likely won’t be the last. California, meanwhile, is entering its riskiest period for wildfires.
This is playing out as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is responsible for funding and managing disaster response and recovery, hemorrhages staff and faces the possibility of further downsizing.
That uncertainty – layered on top of a surge in billion-dollar weather disasters nationwide – has created something of a vacuum that entrepreneurs are eager to fill. Private firefighting crewshelped safeguard high-value homes in Los Angeles as whole neighborhoods burned in January. And a startup called Bright Harbor is offering what it’s billed as a “white glove service” to navigate homeowners through the dizzying process of rebuilding.
Oil and gas executives are expressing concern about the Trump administration’s attacks on offshore wind, including attempts to block the construction of projects off the East Coast.
Executives generally have refrained from publicly denouncing President Trump, but in interviews with The New York Times, some voiced misgivings about what they have seen as undue political meddling in energy.
“Ever-changing policy, particularly as administrations change, is not good for business,” Darren Woods, the chief executive of Exxon Mobil, said in a recent interview. “It’s not good for the economy and ultimately, it’s not good for people.”
Mr. Woods, who runs the largest U.S. oil and gas company, was responding to a question about the Trump administration’s attempts to halt fully permitted offshore wind farms. He stopped short of directly criticizing those actions.
