Oil

A Polar bear surrounded by arctic wilderness, for article on Alaska petroleum reserve drilling limits

Biden limits oil drilling across 13 million acres of Alaskan Arctic

By / / Good News For Humankind

Thirteen million acres of Arctic Alaska just got a stronger legal shield, with the Interior Department banning new oil and gas leases outright across more than 10 million of them. The protected lands include Teshekpuk Lake, a summer gathering place for up to 100,000 geese and a continental waystation for birds that winter as far south as South America. A companion decision blocks the proposed 211-mile Ambler Road, which would have cut through caribou migration corridors and affected subsistence hunting in more than 60 Alaska Native communities. The rule won’t end every fight over Arctic drilling, and Indigenous voices remain genuinely divided. Still, safeguarding a wild expanse the size of Indiana is the kind of durable win conservation movements everywhere can build on.

Wind turbines amid clouds, for article on E.U. wind power, for article on renewable electricity generation

Wind power overtakes natural gas in the E.U. for first time ever

By / / Good News For Humankind

Wind energy outproduced natural gas across the European Union for the first time ever in 2023, according to an analysis from the energy think tank Ember. Renewables together supplied nearly half of Europe’s electricity that year, while coal generation fell by 26 percent — the steepest single-year drop the continent’s power sector has ever recorded. Analyst Sarah Brown called it a “monumental shift,” noting that wind and solar are now becoming the backbone of the grid rather than an add-on. What makes this especially hopeful is that it happened during an energy crisis, when many expected Europe to retreat to coal. Instead, the continent leaned harder into clean power — and showed the rest of the world what’s possible.