Energy & Fuel

"TVA is closing and capping 10 coal ash ponds at power plants in Tennessee and Alabama, against the urging of environmentalists who want the ash dug up and removed."

"In Texas, there were more than 2,700 spills at oil and gas sites last year. But the state tracked only about half of those."

"The auto industry will need to step up introduction of fuel-saving technology to help the U.S. meet aggressive goals to combat climate change despite manufacturers’ requests for relief from existing rules, the Environmental Protection Agency’s top transportation official said."

"Abruptly and without explanation, federal prosecutors slashed potential criminal penalties for Pacific Gas and Electric Co. from $562 million to $6 million Tuesday while a jury was considering whether the company violated safety laws both before and after the lethal 2010 gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno."

"New York officials approved a clean energy standard on Monday that requires half of the state’s electricity to come from renewable sources by 2030."

"In a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), Massachusetts Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey demand new answers about an alleged conflict of interest in the environmental review of a proposed Spectra Energy natural gas pipeline project."

"The Chinook salmon that Randy Settler and other Yakama tribal fishermen are pulling from the Columbia River are large and plentiful this summer, part of one of the biggest spawning runs since the 1960s. It is a sign, they say, of the river’s revitalization, through pollution regulations and ambitious fish hatchery programs. But barely four miles upstream from the fishermen’s nets, state workers are still cleaning up after a major oil train derailment in June."

"Environmentalists are again taking aim at the company that proposed the Keystone XL pipeline — this time for another of its projects they fear would send hundreds of supertankers laden with crude oil down the Atlantic coast to refineries in Texas and Louisiana."

"Thirty years after atomic fallout from the Chernobyl meltdown rendered an area the size of Luxembourg uninhabitable for centuries, Ukraine is seeking investors to develop solar power near the defunct Soviet reactors."

"A federal judge in Virginia could soon decide a potentially landmark case determining whether power plants can be held accountable for contaminating surface waters with toxic chemicals that leached into the ground from coal ash pits."