Today (2017 C.E. - 2025 C.E.)

This archive spans the years 2017 through 2025, a period marked by rapid advances in clean energy, medicine, technology, and social equity. It collects documented breakthroughs, policy wins, and scientific achievements from the present era. If you want evidence that progress is real and ongoing, this is where to look.

Minneapolis skyline, for article on nudification app ban

Minnesota passes ban on fake A.I. nudes

By / / Good News For Humankind

Minnesota’s nudification app ban just cleared the state Senate with a 65-0 vote, and it carries real teeth: fines up to $500,000 per fake image, with the money flowing directly to services for survivors of sexual assault and abuse. The bill targets the tools themselves — apps built specifically to strip images of real people without consent — while exempting general-purpose software like Photoshop. It exists because survivor Molly Kelley spent two years organizing after a man in her social circle used a nudifying service to fabricate images of more than 80 women he knew. Her advocacy turned a legal void into unanimous bipartisan action, offering a template other states are already studying as AI-enabled abuse outpaces older laws.

Whale fin, for article on Antarctic whale recovery

Antarctic whale populations are officially rebounding

By / / Good News For Humankind

Antarctic whale recovery is producing scenes scientists hadn’t witnessed in over a century. Near the South Orkney Islands in early 2026, researchers aboard a Sea Shepherd vessel watched groups of more than 100 humpback whales feeding together, with blows stretching “from horizon to horizon.” Humpback numbers are now approaching what they were before industrial whaling began, a comeback traced directly to the global moratorium on commercial whaling. The next challenge is already here: industrial krill trawlers, some 100 times the size of a humpback, are working the same waters, and scientists are calling for a 30-kilometer no-fishing buffer to protect the food web. It’s a reminder that ecological recovery is possible — and that protecting it requires the same cooperation that made it happen.

Man getting blood donation, for article on individualized risk assessment

New Zealand to allow gay and bisexual men to donate blood

By / / Good News For Humankind

New Zealand’s blood service will let gay and bisexual men donate under the same rules as everyone else starting May 4, 2026, replacing a blanket three-month deferral with questions every donor answers regardless of orientation. A University of Auckland study confirmed the shift wouldn’t compromise safety, giving the service the local evidence it had been waiting for. Liz Gibbs of the Burnett Foundation said the change widens the donor pool while finally letting men who’d long been excluded give back to their communities. New Zealand joins Australia, the U.S., France, and Germany in moving toward behavior-based screening — a quiet but meaningful sign that public health policy is catching up with both the science and the dignity of the people it serves.

French flag, for article on fossil fuel phase-out

France launches plan to ditch all fossil fuels by 2050

By / / Good News For Humankind

France just became the first country to set hard deadlines for ditching every fossil fuel: coal by 2030, oil by 2045, and gas by 2050. The roadmap was unveiled at a conference in Santa Marta, Colombia, where roughly 60 nations gathered to share their own transition plans after a global agreement stalled at COP30 last November. What makes France’s plan unusual isn’t a single bold target but the fact that it draws one clear line across all three fuels, covering everything from power plants to home heating to transport. As climate envoy Benoît Faraco noted, almost no other country has named an end date this clearly. In a moment of energy anxiety worldwide, naming the destination is itself a quiet act of leadership.

Man installing solar panels, for article on solar PV growth

Solar’s 2025 growth is the largest ever recorded for any energy source

By / / Good News For Humankind

Solar power just had its biggest year ever, adding 600 terawatt-hours to the global energy supply in 2025 — more than a quarter of all energy growth worldwide and the largest single-year jump any electricity technology has ever recorded. Battery storage quietly hit its own milestone too, with 110 gigawatts added in a single year, outpacing the best year natural gas has ever had. Meanwhile, electric vehicle sales topped 20 million, already nudging down global road fuel demand. Together, renewables and nuclear met nearly 60% of new energy demand. The takeaway is hopeful but honest: clean energy is finally outpacing fossil fuels in the places that matter most, even as the work of decarbonizing shipping, aviation, and heavy industry still lies ahead.

Pride celebration, for article on same-sex marriage recognition

Poland to recognize same-sex marriages from E.U. states

By / / Good News For Humankind

Same-sex marriages performed elsewhere in the EU must now be formally recognized in Poland, the country’s Supreme Administrative Court ruled — a turning point for a nation that still offers no domestic legal recognition for same-sex unions. Rights groups estimate that 30,000 to 40,000 Polish citizens have married abroad, and many can now see those unions entered into Poland’s civil registry for the first time. The case began with a couple who wed in Germany in 2018 and were turned away by Warsaw officials; when the ruling was read, activists in the courtroom broke into applause. In a country where change through parliament has stalled, this decision shows how European legal commitments can quietly open doors that domestic politics keep shut.

Sunset by smokestacks, for article on fossil fuel phaseout

More than 50 nations attend world-first conference on phasing out fossil fuels

By / / Good News For Humankind

Fossil fuel phaseout talks just crossed a real threshold: for the first time, more than 50 nations sat down together specifically to plan a way off coal, oil, and gas. The two-day gathering in Santa Marta, Colombia, brought together an unusually wide mix — major producers like Australia, Norway, and Canada alongside Pacific island nations like Tuvalu and Vanuatu, with Europe and emerging economies in between. No binding deals were expected, but the recommendations will feed into a voluntary roadmap being shaped under Brazil’s COP30 leadership. It’s a small, hopeful shift: producers and consumers finally talking openly about a transition that, until recently, was almost taboo to name out loud.

HIV up close, for article on mother-to-child HIV transmission

The Bahamas officially eliminates mother-to-child transmission of HIV

By / / Good News For Humankind

The Bahamas just became the 12th country or territory in the Americas certified by the World Health Organization for eliminating mother-to-child HIV transmission — meaning babies born there now enter the world free of the virus by design, not by luck. The country built this through a quietly powerful idea: every pregnant woman, regardless of nationality or legal status, gets HIV screening at her first prenatal visit and again later in pregnancy, with treatment and follow-up offered free. Reaching that standard across more than 700 scattered islands took years of coordination between nurses, doctors, and public clinics. More than half of all places worldwide to achieve this milestone are now in Latin America and the Caribbean — proof that with universal care and political will, this victory is replicable anywhere.

Scientist filling tubes, for article on reversible male contraception

Cornell researchers achieve first reversible male birth control in mice

By / / Good News For Humankind

Reversible male birth control just cleared a major hurdle: in a new Cornell study, male mice stopped producing sperm entirely after three weeks of treatment, then bounced back to full fertility within six weeks of stopping. The approach skips hormones altogether, targeting a specific window of sperm development in the testis so libido and other traits stay untouched. Even better, the mice went on to father healthy pups who were themselves fertile. The researchers are now testing new molecular targets and hope to launch a company within two years to move toward human trials. If the science holds up across species, it could finally give men a real long-acting option — and ease a contraceptive burden women have shouldered alone for generations.

Lakes, for article on coal mine restoration

Germany finishes 60-year project turning coal mines into a 23-lake district

By / / Good News For Humankind

Germany’s Lusatian Lakeland is now complete — a chain of 23 human-made lakes covering 14,000 hectares where open-cast coal mines once scarred the land between Berlin and Dresden. The final piece, Lake Sedlitz, opened to swimmers and boaters this April, and in June, five of the lakes will be linked by navigable canals into a continuous 5,000-hectare waterway. Engineers spent decades channeling river water into the old craters, securing embankments, and flushing out acid — work that would have taken nature a century. The region now welcomes around 800,000 overnight stays a year, with former miners finding work in hospitality and water sports. It’s a hopeful blueprint for coal regions everywhere navigating what comes next.