Weekly Progress Roundup

Green technologies can be tools of abundance.

Green technologies are often caught in the political crossfire.

Thanks to the antics of extreme environmentalists, solar power and batteries have become associated with soup-throwing, bug-eating, and big government. For those wary of the latter, such associations can breed feelings of skepticism and resentment that accompany every headline about, for example, plummeting solar costs.

That is a mistake. Subsidies and mandates aside, the technologies themselves are blameless. And, when considered as supplements to existing energy infrastructure rather than complete replacements, they can be useful.

One emerging niche for batteries is as a backup energy source during emergencies. The Atlantic recently reported that during Hurricane Helene, electric trucks equipped with bidirectional charging, or the ability to send power back to the grid, kept people’s lights and refrigerators on during the extended blackouts.

Solar panels are filling a similar role in places suffering from government mismanagement. In South Africa and Pakistan, for instance, where sunshine and blackouts are regular, private, solar-powered microgrids are mitigating the harm from corrupt and incompetent governance.

Other uses for solar panels and batteries will surely be discovered by the market. The physicist and entrepreneur Casey Handmer has argued that if solar costs continue to fall, some industries may adapt to the plentiful but intermittent energy source by learning to “throttle” their processes up and down. Such innovation could be useful for grand-scale desalination and even the synthesis of cheap, clean-burning hydrocarbon fuels.

If public policy is oriented toward freedom and human flourishing, green technologies can be tools of abundance rather than forced scarcity.

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Culture & Tolerance:

• Countries Increasingly Supportive of Same-Sex Relationships

Energy & Environment:

• How New Technology Will Help Save Earth from Asteroids

• Big Tech Has Cozied up to Nuclear Energy

• Rare Birds Discovered in Western Australia Desert

• Canis Aureus Makes Sudden Tracks Into Western Europe

• The Australian Oyster Reef Revival

• Solar-Powered Desalination System Requires No Extra Batteries

• Atlantic Sturgeon Reintroduced in Sweden

• Northern Bald Ibis: Back from the Brink

• Colorado Slashes Wildlife-Involved Crashes Using Wildlife Crossings

• Han River Shows Recovery After Seoul’s Restoration Initiatives

• Herd of Tauros to Be Released Into Highlands to Replicate Extinct Aurochs

Food & Hunger:

• Solar Foods Obtains Self-Affirmed GRAS Status for Solein in the United States

Health & Demographics:

• Teeth-Cleaning Robots, Red-Light Therapy: What’s Ahead for Dental Health

• New Therapy Sends Autoimmune Diseases Into Remission

• Trachoma Eliminated as a Public Health Problem in Pakistan

• Brazil Eliminates Lymphatic Filariasis as a Public Health Problem

• A Placenta Restored Her Face After an Explosion

Science & Technology:

• Toyota to Invest $500 Million in Flying Taxi Start-up Joby

• “In Awe”: Scientists Impressed by Latest ChatGPT Model o1

• Breakthrough Step Toward Revealing Hidden Structure of Prime Numbers

• Mathematicians Discover New Class of Shape Seen Throughout Nature

• Boom Supersonic XB-1 Hits New Speed Record in Latest Test Flight

• New Quantum Computer Chip Now Outperforms Fastest Supercomputers in Certain Areas

• NASA’s Laser Comms Demo Makes Deep Space Record

• AI Chatbots May Ease the World’s Loneliness

• Elon Musk Shows off Tesla “Robotaxi” That Drives Itself