Electricity demand will rise much faster than overall energy growth in the coming decades, underscoring the need for diversified energy sources, according to an analysis released Wednesday.

The report by the International Energy Agency ����������renewable energy, led by solar power, will grow faster than any other major source in the next few years. One scenario the agency anticipates is coal and oil demand peaking globally by the end of this decade — but the group also said global oil and gas demand could continue growing until 2050. The report noted that many natural gas projects were approved in 2025, due to changes in U.S. policy, indicating worldwide supply will rise even as questions remain about how it will be used. Meanwhile, global nuclear power capacity is set to increase by at least a third by 2035 after being stagnant for years.

The release of the annual World Energy Outlook coincided with U.N. negotiations in Brazil, where global leaders this week are calling for ways to curb climate change.

The IEA says building greater resilience in energy systems is especially important as data centers, heating and cooling, electrification and more drive energy demand. Investment in data centers is expected to reach $580 billion this year, exceeding investment in the oil supply, according to the report.

Growing economies including India and nations in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America, will “increasingly shape energy market dynamics in the years,” the IEA said, noting their potential for solar power.

China, meanwhile, has accounted for half the global growth in demand for oil and gas, and more than half for electricity, since 2010.

“In a break from the trend of the past decade, the increase in electricity consumption is no longer limited to emerging and developing economies,” IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol stated in a release. Electricity use is also rising in advanced economies, according to Birol.

Nations are grappling with meeting demand while preparing for the risks brought on by climate change. The IEA says the world is falling short on universal energy access and climate change goals. Around 730 million people still live without electricity, according to the IEA, and despite progress, nearly one-quarter of the global population still relies on inefficient cooking methods that hurt their health or the environment. 2024 was also the hottest year on record.

Nations should diversify their energy sources and cooperate to expand supply chains for critical minerals used to make things like batteries for electric vehicles and components for solar and wind power generation, the IEA said. This also includes making quick improvements to the grid, energy storage and broader infrastructure.

“When we look at the history of the energy world in recent decades, there is no other time when energy security tensions have applied to so many fuels and technologies at once,” Birol said. “With energy security front and (center) for many governments, their responses need to consider the synergies and trade-offs that can arise with other policy goals — on affordability, access, competitiveness and climate change.”

The IEA brought back an approach to this year’s outlook using what it calls current policies. It used this approach in 2019 to weigh different possible global energy outcomes, before better aligning with clean energy transition plans. This year the agency’s outlook includes the possibility of essentially regressing on the phase-out of fossil fuels.

In a conference call Wednesday, Birol said: “We will still use oil. We will still use gas. But the growth of electricity demand is spectacular.”

He noted the role transportation plays in accounting for 45 percent of global oil consumption, for example. “How the electrification of the transportation takes place, especially in countries beyond China and Europe, will determine the shape of the oil demand and growth.”

Wednesday’s edition of the yearly report is the first released since the start of U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term. Trump’s administration has for a second time opted out of the Paris agreement, rolled back dozens of climate regulations, slashed federal support for renewable energies such as wind and solar power and is reversing the “endangerment finding” that sits at the core of U.S. climate policy.

Trump has pledged his support instead to the fossil fuel industry, investing in coal and loosening restrictions on pollution.

But energy analysts said the shift to clean power is happening regardless of climate policy around the world.

“The evidence on the ground is overwhelming,” said Dave Jones, chief analyst at global energy think tank Ember. “EV sales are taking off in many emerging countries, solar is permeating even through the Middle East. Renewables and electrification will dominate the future.”

Maria Pastukhova, energy transition program lead at climate change think tank E3G, said the report makes “the choices for the global energy system and the global economy unambiguous.”

Others, however, were critical of how the outlook addressed oil and gas. Ben Backwell, CEO of the Global Wind Energy Council, said the outlook does not fully capture the momentum in renewables, and that it should have emphasized the trajectory for renewable energy is accelerating, driven by the decreasing cost of the technologies, strong policy support and the move toward electrification.

“We’re accelerating,” he added. “You can see it all around the world and we can see it in our numbers for last year, but also in our numbers for the first half of this year. It looks very, very exciting, both for wind and for solar, in fact, and for next year, even more so.”

The IEA addressed some of the criticism in the call Wednesday. It said that it sees differences economically, politically and regarding clean energy efforts across the globe, and that its analysis tries to account for those differences.

“In a nutshell, the IEA is backsliding,” said Stephan Singer, global energy senior adviser at CAN International, a global network of environmental organizations. “As a global think tank, the IEA has largely failed to represent where most countries in the (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) and the developing world are, as they’re supporting net zero emissions with 98 percent CO2 emissions reductions by mid-century.”

Editor’s note: Associated Press reporters Jennifer McDermott in Providence, Rhode Island, and Sibi Arasu in Bengaluru contributed to this report.

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The Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) is transforming its 7,000-square-foot Natural Sciences Hall into a space designed to deepen public understanding of climate-related challenges and community-level actions.

The renovation will begin once the hall closes to the public on Tuesday. The updated space, expected to open in spring 2026, will be named the Nancy Stueber Natural Sciences Hall after OMSI’s former president and CEO; she retired in 2020 after 38 years at the museum.

Bearing Architecture designed the project. The team also includes structural engineer VALAR Consulting Engineering and general contractor Walsh Construction.

The hall’s current Science on a Sphere exhibit will return. Also, access through the hall to the museum’s upstairs labs will remain. The museum’s prenatal exhibit will reopen in a different area of the hall. The remainder of the space will be renovated, including construction of new walls, additions of murals, and installation of new lighting to lower energy costs. Key activations in the hall focusing on renewable energy, sustainable living and conservation were developed in partnership with Portland General Electric, a sponsor of the renovation.

A new permanent, interactive exhibition will illustrate the relationship between humans and the environment. “Climate of Change/Clima de Cambio” will feature narratives from the communities in Oregon most affected by climate change.

“We want to invite visitors to explore in hands-on participatory ways how climate change is affecting our region here in the Pacific Northwest, both in our ecosystems and in our communities,” said Ciera Iveson, OMSI’s creative director.

Key climate science concepts and climate solutions will be presented, she said.

The climate impact message carried through the project’s design. OMSI is working with Timberlab to create an entrance using reclaimed yellow cedar left over from construction sites. Inside, tan oak will be used. The team will use mainly reclaimed wood that otherwise would have become waste, Iveson said.

The project’s theme is reclaiming waste, sourcing local building materials, and minimizing use of anything that in the long run would be discarded, she added.

Hall features will include: an immersive multimedia experience developed by Tellart that highlights the interconnectedness of humans and the natural world; design showcasing the beauty of the Pacific Northwest through landscapes, textures, and ecosystems; and other interactive, hands-on elements and education modules.

“We’re putting in a story theater where we’re sharing some documentary films we’ve been shooting of local communities here in the Pacific Northwest and their solutions,” Iveson said. “That’s going to be a really beautiful part of this installation.”

Donors, trustees and sponsors in the past few years have provided support for the project, Iveson said.

The museum’s “Accelerated” campaign raised $6.75 million from 2020-2025 in support of OMSI District plans. Approximately $2 million was allocated for the Nancy Stueber Natural Sciences Hall. Officials also garnered approximately $2 million in federal grants (from the National Science Foundation and the Institute of Museum and Library Services), of which $1.5 million was rescinded, Iveson stated in an email. When the grants were terminated, OMSI reduced the project scope and allocated operational funds to its partners to ensure key exhibition elements of the exhibitions could be preserved, she added.

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By MICHAEL CASEY
Associated Press

CARVER, Mass. (AP) — About this time of the year, Jarrod Rhodes should be checking on the vines of cranberries that have grown on his bog for decades in southeastern Massachusetts.

Instead, he is watching a backhoe tear up the cranberry bog, exposing the dark peat underneath that will eventually become a meandering stream through the 32-acre South Meadow Bogs Restoration site. The goal of the six-to-nine-month-long, $1.1 million project is to convert this bog to a wetland that should see the return of native plants like steeplebush and straw-colored flatsedge along with providing habitat for wildlife like wood frogs, hawks and muskrats.

“These bogs were originally built on top of a wetland, so now we’re putting it back to the way it was,” Rhodes said, adding that this bog was “distressed” which gave his family a choice of spending time and money to rebuild it with new vines and irrigation or take state and federal funding to conserve and restore it.

“There were a lot of factors that made this avenue make more sense as opposed to spending the money to rebuild it and waiting five or six years,” said Rhodes, a fourth-generation farmer whose family still has 250 acres in production.

Nature over housing

This project is part of a growing push by cranberry farmers in Massachusetts to choose conservation over other options to glean extra revenue like converting a bog into solar farms or housing.

The shift comes as the industry is being hit by lower prices for the pinkish crimson berries used in sauce and juice along with the rising cost of producing larger, hybrid varieties. Farmers also are seeing the effects of climate change, which is bringing unpredictable weather like droughts and warmer fall conditions that delay the harvest.

“It’s a tough environment right now economically,” said Brian Wick, the executive director of Massachusetts Cranberries, the state’s growers association. The state started growing cranberries in the 1800s and was country’s top producer until the 1990s. It ceded that title to Wisconsin and now its nearly 300 growers produce about 22% of the nation’s crop.

“We’re starting to see a shift because everyone is in a different place in the industry and what they see as their future,” Wick said. “For some of them, they’re saying I have some bogs. I can’t keep farming them. They’re not going to be economically viable. They could be an environmentally sensitive area where maybe it’s better to have them not being farmed.”

Prime location for bog conversion

Massachusetts is well suited for bog conservation because most sites are built on former wetlands.

The push also comes as federal, state and local funding has increased in recent years for this kind of coastal conservation. Wetlands, which have significantly declined across the United States, provide a home for native plants and wildlife, a filter for pollutants and natural barriers to rising seas, higher tides and stronger storm surges. The restored sites also have proven popular with hikers, bikers and bird watchers.

“A year from now, that river channel will be flowing through a green meadow. You’ll see native plants across this dry landscape behind us. You’ll see wetland trees starting to grow,” said Beth Lambert, the director of the Massachusetts Division of Ecological Restoration, as she visited the South Meadow site. “The real restoration really happens after the construction equipment leaves the site. Mother Nature takes it from there and the site continues to evolve into a wetland for the next five to 10 years.”

The state has converted eight bog sites to wetlands at a cost of more than $27 million and has 12 more planned. Wisconsin and New Jersey have done some bog restoration but on a much smaller scale.

Most conversions can take several years, with construction teams pulling down gates and berms that controlled water flows, filling in drainage ditches and removing several feet of sand used in cranberry farming. They also aim to recreate the unique topography of a wetland — sometimes constructing mounds throughout the site.

“When you look at a natural wetland, you’ll see the surface of that wetland is not flat like a table. It’s hummocky. It has little hills, little tiny valleys,” Lambert said. “It’s that topography, which we call microtopography, that creates a wide diversity of wetland plant species, because each wetland can tolerate a certain amount of water.”

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In San Francisco Bay, salt ponds created more than a century ago are reverting to marshland. Along the New York and New Jersey coasts, beaches ravaged by Superstorm Sandy underwent extensive restoration. In Alabama, a rebuilt spit of land is shielding a historic town and providing wildlife habitat.

Coastal communities nationwide are ramping up efforts to fend off rising seas, higher tides and stronger storm surges that are chewing away at coastlines, pushing saltwater farther inland and threatening ecosystems and communities.

The need for coastal restoration has been in the spotlight this month after Louisiana officials canceled a $3 billion project because of objections from the fishing industry and concerns about rising costs. The Mid-Barataria project was projected to rebuild more than 20 square miles of land over about 50 years by diverting sediment-laden water from the Mississippi River.

But work on many other projects continues in Louisiana and around the country, including barrier islands, saltwater marshes, shellfish reefs and other natural features that provided protection before they were destroyed or degraded by development. Communities are also building flood walls, berms and levees to protect areas that lack adequate natural protection.

The work has become more urgent as climate change causes more intense and destructive storms and leads to sea-level rise that puts hundreds of communities and tens of millions of people at risk, scientists say.

“The sooner we can make these coastlines more resilient the better,” said Doug George, a geological oceanographer at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Gulf Coast

In the U.S., perhaps nowhere is more vulnerable than the hurricane-prone Gulf Coast. Louisiana alone has lost more than 2,000 square miles of coastline — more than any other state — over the past century, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Historically, sediment deposited by the Mississippi River and others rebuilt land and nourished shore-buffering marshes. But that function was disrupted by the construction of channels and levees, along with other developments.

The dangers were magnified in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina breached flood walls and levees, submerging 80 percent of New Orleans and killing almost 1,400 people. Then Hurricane Rita followed.

Afterward, the state formed the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority to lessen risks from storm surges and stem land loss.

In the past 20 years, nearly $18 billion was spent on mitigation efforts — mostly to shore up levees, flood walls and other structures, the authority said.

Dozens of other projects are completed, planned or under way. Marshes and other habitats are being rebuilt with sediment dredged from waterways and river flow is being restored to areas that have lacked it for years.

On Louisiana’s Chandeleur Islands, a barrier island chain, the state will pump in sand to help rebuild them, which will dampen storm surges and benefit sea turtles and other wildlife, said Katie Freer-Leonards, who leads development of the state’s 2029 coastal master plan.

The authority is digging a channel to allow water and sediment from the Mississippi River to flow into part of Maurepas Swamp, a roughly 218-square-mile forested wetland northwest of New Orleans that has been “dying for over a century” because of levees, project manager Brad Miller said.

Sediment dredged from elsewhere also has been pumped into thousands of acres of sinking marshes to nourish them and raise their levels.

The same is happening in other states.

In Bayou La Batre, Alabama — a fishing village built in the late 1700s — The Nature Conservancy built breakwaters offshore, and then pumped in sediment and built ridges that are now covered with vegetation. That created a “speed bump” that has helped protect the town from erosion, said Judy Haner, the Alabama Nature Conservancy’s coastal programs director.

The conservancy and others also have been creating miles of oyster reefs and acquiring tracts of land away from the coast to allow habitats to move as seawater encroaches.

Such efforts won’t prevent all land losses, but in Louisiana, “cumulatively, they could make a big difference,” said Denise Reed, a research scientist who is working on Louisiana’s coastal master plan. “It could buy us some time.”

Pacific Coast

On the West Coast, communities vulnerable to sea-level rise also could see more flooding from increasingly intense atmospheric rivers, which carry water vapor from the ocean and dump huge amounts of rain in a short period of time.

So, tidal marshes and estuaries drained for agriculture and industry are being restored along the entire coast, both for habitat and coastal protection.

Habitat restoration, not climate change, was the primary consideration when planning began about 20 years ago to restore marshland along the south end of San Francisco Bay, destroyed when ponds were created to harvest sea salt.

But as sediment naturally fills in ponds and marsh plants return, “we’re realizing that … marshes absorb wave energy, storm surge and the force of high tides,” said Dave Halsing, executive project manager at the California State Coastal Conservancy.

That helps protect whatever is behind them, including sea walls and land that otherwise could be inundated or washed away, including some of California’s most expensive real estate, near Silicon Valley.

Projects also are under way along Alaska’s coast and in Hawaii, where native residents are rebuilding ancient rocky enclosures originally intended to trap fish, but that also protect against storm surge.

Atlantic Coast

Thirteen years after Superstorm Sandy swamped the Atlantic coast, communities still are restoring natural buffers and building other protective structures.

Sandy began as a routine hurricane in 2012 before merging with other storms, stretching for a record 1,000 miles and pushing enormous amounts of ocean water into coastal communities.

But the threat of future storm surges could be even greater because sea levels in some areas could rise as much as three feet within 50 years, said Donald E. Cresitello, a coastal engineer and senior coastal planner for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The Corps rebuilt beaches, dunes and human-made structures from Massachusetts to Virginia and now is turning to areas farther inland that are increasingly vulnerable to more powerful storm surges, Cresitello said.

“If there’s a river coming to the coast, that storm surge has the potential to just ride up that river,” depending on the storm, he said.

A “phenomenal amount” of the U.S. population lives and works along its coasts, so protecting those areas is important to the U.S. economy, said George, the NOAA scientist. But it is also important to preserve generations of culture, he said.

“When you think about why people should care … it’s a whole way of life,” he said.

Editor’s note: Associated Press video journalist Stephen Smith contributed to this report.

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KATHMANDU, Nepal — Floods that damaged hydropower dams in Nepal and destroyed the main bridge connecting the country to China show the vulnerability of infrastructure and the need for smart reconstruction in a region bearing the brunt of climate change, experts say.

On July 8, Bhotekoshi River floodwaters killed nine people and damaged an inland container depot that was being built to support increasing trade between the two countries. The 10 damaged hydropower facilities, including three under construction, combined have capacity to power 600,000 homes.

Another smaller flood in the area on July 30 damaged roads and structures but caused less overall destruction. Elsewhere in the Himalayas, flash floods swept away roads, homes and hotels in northern India on Tuesday, killing at least four people and leaving many others trapped under debris, officials said.

The Himalayan region, which crosses Nepal and several nearby countries including India, is especially vulnerable to heavy rains, floods and landslides because the area is warming faster than the rest of the world due to human-caused climate change. Climate experts say the increasing frequency of extreme weather has changed the playbook for assessing infrastructure risks while also increasing the need for smart rebuilding plans.

“The statistics of the past no longer apply for the future,” said John Pomeroy, a hydrologist at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada. “The risk that goes into building a bridge or other infrastructure is generally based on historical observations of past risk, but this is no longer useful because future risk is different and often much higher.”

While damage estimates from the July floods in the Rasuwa region are still being calculated, past construction costs give a sense of the financial toll. The Sino-Nepal Friendship Bridge, for example, cost $68 million to rebuild after it was destroyed by a 2015 earthquake that ravaged Nepal.

The latest disaster has also stoked fears of long-lasting economic damage in a region north of the capital city, Kathmandu, where reconstruction took place for years after the 2015 quake. Nepali government officials estimate that $724 million worth of annual trade with China took place over the bridge, and that has come to a standstill.

“Thank God there wasn’t much damage to local villages, but the container depot and bridges have been completely destroyed,” said Kaami Tsering, a local government official, in a phone interview with The Associated Press. “This has severely affected workers, hotel operators, laborers, and truck drivers who rely on cross-border trade for their livelihoods.”

Among those affected is Urken Tamang, a 50-year-old parking attendant at the depot who has been out of work for several weeks. A small tea shop he runs nearby with his family has also suffered.

“We’ve been unlucky,” said Tamang, a former farmer who sold his land and changed jobs when work on the depot began. “The whole area was severely damaged by the 2015 earthquake, and just when life was slowly returning to normal, this devastating flood struck.”

The Nepal floods are the latest in a series of disasters in South Asia during this year’s monsoon season. Research has shown that extreme weather in the region has contributed to more heat waves, heavy rains and melting glaciers.

Climate experts said smart planning and rebuilding in climate-vulnerable regions must include accounting for multiple risks. This includes installing early warning systems, preparing local communities for disasters and, when needed, relocating infrastructure.

“What we have to avoid is the insanity of rebuilding after a natural disaster in the same place where it occurred and where we know it will occur again at even higher probability,” said Pomeroy, the Canadian hydrologist. “That’s a very poor decision. Unfortunately, that’s what most countries do.”

Before rebuilding in Rasuwa, Nepal government officials need to assess overall risks, including those due to extreme weather and climate change, said Bipin Dulal, an analyst at Kathmandu-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development.

The bridge connecting the two countries was rebuilt to better withstand earthquakes after the one in 2015, but it appears that officials didn’t properly account for the risk of flooding as intense as what occurred in early July, Dulal said.

“We have to see what the extreme risk scenarios can be and we should rebuild in a way in which the infrastructure can handle those extremes,” Dulal said.

Large building projects in South Asia typically receive environmental impact assessments that don’t adequately factor in the risks of floods and other disasters, Dulal said. The center is developing a multi-hazard risk assessment framework that it hopes will be adopted by planners and builders in the region to better account for the dangers of extreme weather.

In 2024 alone, Asia experienced 167 disasters — including storms, floods, heat waves and earthquakes. That was the most of any continent, according to the Emergency 91��Ƶ Database maintained by the University of Louvain, Belgium. These led to losses exceeding $32 billion, the researchers found.

“These disasters are all wake-up calls,” said Ramesh Subramaniam, global director of programs and strategy at the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure. “These risks are real.”

A CDRI analysis found that $124 billion worth of Nepal’s infrastructure is vulnerable to the impacts of climate-driven disasters, creating the potential for hundreds of millions of dollars in annual losses if the country doesn’t invest in resiliency.

“Investing a relatively smaller figure now would prevent the loss of these enormous sums of damages,” Subramaniam said.

Most climate investments are directed to mitigation, such as building clean energy projects and trying to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases being released, Subramaniam said. But given extreme weather damage already occurring, adaptation to climate change is equally important, he said.

“I think countries are learning and adaptation is becoming a standard feature in their annual planning,” he said.

Global efforts to prepare for such losses and recovery include a climate loss and damage fund set up by the United Nations in 2023. Currently, the fund has $348 million, which the U.N. warns is only a fraction of the annual economic damage related to human-caused climate change. The World Bank and Asian Development Bank have also provided loans or grants to build climate-resilient projects.

In Nepal’s recently flood-ravaged region, Tsering, the local government official, said the repeated disasters have exacted more than a financial toll on residents.

“Even though the river has now returned to a normal flow, the fear remains,” he said. “People will always worry that something like this could happen again.”

Editor’s note: Arasu reported from Bengaluru, India

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DIAMOND BAR, Calif. — Air quality regulators in Southern California earlier this month voted 7 to 5 to reject proposed rules that would have curbed harmful emissions from gas-powered furnaces and water heaters. But the majority voted to send the rules back to the committee to be changed and reconsidered.

The proposal aimed to reduce emissions of smog-contributing nitrogen oxides, also called NOx. They are a group of pollutants linked to respiratory issues, asthma attacks, worse allergies, decreased lung function in children, premature death and more. Burning natural gas is also one of the primary drivers of climate change.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District estimates that the proposed rules would have lowered NOx emissions from gas-fired furnaces, preventing about 2,490 premature deaths and 10,200 new asthma cases over a 26-year period in the region. The district regulates air quality for 16.8 million people in Southern California, including all of Orange County and large areas of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties — one of the smoggiest areas in the U.S.

The board received more than 30,000 written comments ahead of the vote, including a letter from U.S. Attorney Bilal “Bill” Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in the area, in which he threatened to sue the board if it adopted the proposed rules.

“California regulators are on notice: if you pass illegal bans or penalties on gas appliances, we’ll see you in court,” he posted Thursday on the social platform X. “The law is clear—feds set energy policy, not unelected climate bureaucrats.”

Before the vote, board member Janet Nguyen, who serves on the Orange County Board of Supervisors, echoed opponents’ concerns that the rules would financially burden people.

“I, like everybody here, support clean air,” she said. “These rules don’t target refineries or shopping ports. They target people — the 17 million homeowners, renters, seniors and small businesses.”

Los Angeles County Supervisor Holly J. Mitchell, who supported the proposed rules, said, “If we don’t start now, when will we effect any change?”

California is moving aggressively to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels ahead of a 2045 mandate for the state to have net-zero carbon emissions. California often sets or proposes stricter environmental standards than the rest of the country, such as a bid to ban the sale of new gas-powered cars by 2035.

The proposed rules would have set targets aiming to phase out the sale of gas-powered furnaces and water heaters starting in 2027. It would not have applied to gas stoves. The sales target would have started at 30 percent, then grown to 50 percent in 2029 and ended at 90 percent in 2039. The rules would not have been mandated, but manufacturers would have had to pay fees ranging from $50 to $500 if they sold gas-powered appliances.

That’s a significant rollback from the original proposal, which would have required residential buildings to meet zero-emissions standards beginning in 2029 when appliances need to be replaced. The agency amended the rules after strong opposition from Southern California Gas and other businesses.

The regulations would have impacted more than 10 million appliances in an estimated 5 million buildings, most of them residential.

Officials and supporters say the proposed rules would have reduced air pollution and substantially improved public health. But opponents — including property owners, industry professionals and natural gas companies — feared potentially higher costs for consumers and businesses, and a strained power grid with more electric appliances.

During a packed June 6 board meeting that ran for five hours, board chair Vanessa Delgado thanked the more than 200 people who signed up to speak about the proposed rules, which took more than two years to craft.

“I don’t believe that there’s necessarily a good or right answer about these rules,” she said. “I believe that it is very complicated, and I know that every single one of these board members are doing what is right to move forward air quality goals in our region.”

Lynwood City Councilmember Juan Muñoz-Guevara said the rules would be a long-overdue step toward environmental justice for communities like his.

“I’ve seen firsthand how families in my community are forced to live with the health consequences of dirty air,” he said. “Our children grow up with asthma, our elders struggle with respiratory illness, and too many lives are cut short. Gas appliances in our home are one of the largest sources of smog-forming pollution in the region. We cannot meet clean air goals without tackling this.”

Peggy Huang, a member of Yorba Linda’s City Council, urged the board to reject the proposed rules.

“As someone who’s been advocating for affordable housing, this will increase costs for us to meet those goals,” she said.

Chino’s mayor pro tem, Curtis Burton, echoed some of Huang’s concerns. He said the rules would “create an additional financial burden on residents and businesses.”

Air quality regulators say the rules would save consumers money by reducing energy bills.

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JINJA, Uganda — Simon Tigawalana dreamed for years of doing something about the dirt floors in his small house, blaming them for making his family sick. But in a rural area in one of the world’s poorest countries, covering the floors with concrete was financially out of reach.

Then a company called EarthEnable approached him to offer an alternative: a clay-based earthen floor. The cost of this durable, sealed floor is less than half that of a concrete floor. Tigawalana now has an EarthEnable floor in two rooms and hopes to soon add another to the last room.

“I’m happy that we now have a decent home and can also comfortably host visitors,” said Tigawalana, a 56-year-old father of 16. “Ever since we got a clay floor my kids no longer get cough and flu that used to come from the dust raised while sweeping the dirt floors.”

EarthEnable, which seeks to upgrade housing across Africa, has been promoting and installing the clay-based floors in Uganda since 2017. Besides eliminating dust that can irritate breathing, the floors are credited with reducing infestations of jiggers — a parasitic flea that can burrow into the skin and cause pain, itching and infection. Uganda’s health ministry says poor hygiene due to dirt floors contributes to such infestations.

“Our floors help to prevent pathogens and other illnesses linked to dust floors, since most of these families can’t afford hospital care,” said Noeline Mutesi, a sales and marketing manager for EarthEnable.

The first step in building the floor is digging and leveling the surface. Then murram — local red soil rich in iron and aluminum oxides — is mixed with sand and water and then compacted. After two weeks of drying, masons use wooden floats to smooth and further compact the surface. Next, the pasting process involves applying a fine clay screed to further smooth the surface and prepare it for a final sealant, a flaxseed-based varnish that hardens into a durable, plastic-like resin.

A typical floor costs around 240,000 Uganda shillings (about $65), which EarthEnable says is about 70 percent cheaper than concrete. Buyers can pay in installments. EarthEnable, a U.S.-based nonprofit, operates for-profit subsidiaries in Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya, and says any profits are invested into startup costs in new markets as well as research and development.

EarthEnable said it has installed about 5,000 floors in Uganda, more than 39,000 in Rwanda and more than 100 in Kenya. The company also does wall plastering to help reduce dust, moisture and insect infestations common in mud homes.

In Jinja, the company’s program employs more than 100 masons from within the community. Many are disadvantaged boys who have dropped out of school because they can’t afford fees, said Alex Wanda, a construction officer at the company.

“We focus on employing these young village boys that we train in skills to build these earthen floors, thus creating for them employment opportunities,” Wanda said in an interview.

About 42 percent of Ugandans live in extreme poverty. Its Bureau of Statistics says the country has a housing deficit of 2.6 million units, and it’s growing. The country needs to add 300,000 housing units per year to overcome the deficit, mainly in rural areas. That is where many Ugandans live and where housing quality and availability remain pressing concerns.

The company also touts the clay floors as a more sustainable alternative to concrete, which besides being more expensive generates major carbon emissions in production.

The cement industry is one of Uganda’s biggest contributors to carbon emissions, accounting for about 628,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2023, its highest recorded level. More broadly, construction accounts for 37 percent of global emissions, according to the United Nations Environment Programme.

Uganda, like much of the rest of the world, has seen a rise in extreme weather events — such as flooding and prolonged drought — made more likely by climate change.

“Initiatives like this are crucial in the global effort to decarbonize the construction sector,” said Penina Atwine, a program officer at the Uganda-based organization Environmental Alert. “Such innovative local solutions that address both climate change and social needs like EarthEnable’s model could inspire similar approaches across the globe.”

In the village of Budima, Rehema Namukose spent most of her family’s savings to build a house. She couldn’t afford a cleaner floor until she worked through EarthEnable to pay for a clay floor in installments. She lives there with her three children and credits the new floor for improving the health of a sickly daughter.

“This is affordable for my family and will help us maintain hygiene,” she said. “We are now living a better life.”

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EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — A judge in Oregon has rejected a U.S. Department of Justice request to dismiss a 2015 lawsuit brought by young people that alleges the federal government knew the dangers posed by carbon pollution but that it has continued through policies and subsidies to support the fossil fuel industry.

U.S. District Court Judge Ann Aiken said the parties “do not disagree that the climate crisis threatens our ability to survive on planet Earth. This catastrophe is the great emergency of our time and compels urgent action.”

“While facts remain to be proved, lawsuits like this highlight young people’s despair with the drawn-out pace of the unhurried, inchmeal, bureaucratic response to our most dire emergency,” she wrote in her decision late last week.

In a statement, Julia Olson, an attorney with the group Our Children’s Trust representing the plaintiffs, said she expects a trial in the case later this year.

In a similar lawsuit in Montana, a judge last year ruled the Montana Environmental Policy Act violates the plaintiffs’ state constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment. The 1971 law requires state agencies to consider the potential environmental impacts of proposed projects and take public input before issuing permits. The state’s attorney general has appealed that decision.

The plaintiffs in the Oregon case argued the government has violated young people’s constitutional rights to life, liberty and property.

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PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A state appeals court in Oregon decided late Wednesday that the rules for a program designed to limit and drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel companies are invalid. The program, started in 2022, is one of the strongest climate programs in the nation.

State environmental officials said the court’s decision hinges on an administrative error and doesn’t touch on whether the state has the authority to implement the program. The Climate Protection Program targets a 90 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels and natural gas by 2050.

Wednesday’s decision by the Oregon Court of Appeals comes in a case brought by fossil fuel companies that alleged the state Environmental Quality Commission erred in its rulemaking for the program. The commission acts as the Department of Environmental Quality’s policy and rulemaking board.

The court in its decision said it concluded the rules for the program were invalid.

The department said the decision was limited to an administrative error and not effective immediately, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported.

“The court did not make a decision about whether the Environmental Quality Commission has authority to adopt the Climate Protection Program,” Lauren Wirtis, a department spokesperson, said in a statement.

The department is confident it has the authority to adopt and enforce the program and is evaluating next steps with the state Department of Justice, Wirtis said.

NW Natural, one of the litigants, said it was pleased with the court’s decision and that it is committed to moving toward a low-carbon energy future.

A group of environmental, climate and social justice groups agreed with the state position that the decision focused on a procedural technicality and did not undermine the Department of Environmental Quality’s authority to set greenhouse gas emissions limits on the oil and gas industry.

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By Susan Haigh

The Associated Press

HARTFORD, Conn. — While Ameen Taylor feels fortunate he has a cooling tree cover in the front and back yards of his Detroit home, he knows it’s a different story for many residents of his hometown where neighborhoods often have little to no shade.

“To me, 70 degrees is fair weather, but when you’re walking somewhere or you’re around a neighborhood that don’t have trees, it will feel like it’s like 87, 90 degrees; that’s what it feel like,” Taylor said. “You’re exposed to more sun than you are shade.”

Like many cities in the U.S., Detroit has areas that are packed with large amounts of impervious surfaces and heat-absorbing infrastructure like roads and bridges. Coupled with low levels of cooling tree cover, or canopy, those surfaces can make cities dangerously hotter than suburbs.

Such an inequity of tree cover is behind the historic $1.5 billion included in the Inflation Reduction Act for the federal Forest Service Urban & Community Forestry Program to fund tree-planting projects over the next decade. With a focus on underserved communities, the initiative marks a massive increase from the roughly $36 million distributed annually to the program.

Urban forestry advocates, who’ve argued for years about the benefits of trees in cities, see this moment as an opportunity to transform underserved neighborhoods that have grappled with dirtier air, dangerously high temperatures and other challenges because they don’t have a leafy canopy overhead. Advocates also predict this is the beginning of a long-term financial commitment to trees, especially amid dire about climate change.

“City trees are not just having a moment,” said Dan Lambe, chief executive of the Arbor Day Foundation. “In many ways, this is more than a moment in the sun. This is, I believe, the new normal.”

The massive federal investment recognizes trees are essential for communities – “not just a nice-to-have; they’re a must-have,” he said.

Trees help suck up heat-trapping carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and reduce erosion and flooding. That’s important when considering heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont has proposed spending $500,000 in remaining COVID-19 relief funds, money he hopes to be complemented by the new federal funds, to pay for plantings in underserved urban neighborhoods. Hartford, the state’s capital, has a tree canopy in just a quarter of its 11,490 acres.

“I just drive around the state, I drive around Hartford, I see places where – imagine if we had just 30 trees in this empty lot – what it means for clean air, what it means for beauty, what it means for shade,” he said.

Historically redlined cities like Hartford, where banks denied or avoided providing loans because of the racial makeup, are up to 13 degrees hotter than neighborhoods not redlined, said Lauren Marshall, senior manager for program innovation at the Arbor Day Foundation. With less access to nature, many residents in these communities didn’t have the option to escape the heat and socially distance outside in shade during the pandemic, she said.

“I remember the summer of 2020 spending a lot of time outdoors because it was the only way we could see the people we loved,” she said. “And I live in a neighborhood with a ton of tree canopy. And for a lot of people, that wasn’t the case.”

The pandemic, coupled with the racial reckoning sparked by the murder of George Floyd, brought a lot of attention to the tree canopy inequity issue, Marshall said. Many cities and towns are now using a  developed by American Forests to target tree plantings in neighborhoods most in need.

“Across the board, in every state and in our state, we have underinvested in our urban tree canopy,” said Hilary Franz, Washington’s commissioner of public lands.

Seattle is planting 8,000 trees over five years on public and private properties and 40,000 in parks and natural areas. The initiative is partly financed by federal funds. The city also plans to require three trees be planted for every healthy, site-appropriate tree removed from its properties.

Some communities plan to use the federal funds for tree maintenance and development of a tree care workforce, especially where workers have barriers to employment, such as a criminal record. The nation’s current tree care labor pool is aging and needs more workers, said Joel Pannell, vice president of urban forest policy at American Forests. That workforce also is mostly white men.

“As folks are retiring and getting out of the workforce, there’s a tremendous need to get a new cadre of people who represent the communities where the work needs to be done,” he said.

Taylor is one of 300 workers who will plant 75,000 trees in Detroit over the next five years. He recently helped plant a dozen maple trees, carefully hand-digging holes to avoid underground lines. Taylor, who was formerly incarcerated, is proud of the work he is doing.

“It just looks vacant without trees,” he said.

Planting trees in urban areas is not new. In 2007, New York City’s mayor at the time, Michael Bloomberg, launched a successful effort to plant 1 million trees. A former mayor of Los Angeles, Antonio Villaraigosa, launched a similar effort to plant 1 million trees by the end of his first term in 2009, but many died because they had to be planted on private land where watering and care fell mostly to residents.

But the cost of this federal tree-planting program has received some political pushback from lawmakers who’ve likened it to pork-barrel spending.

Lora Martens, the urban tree program manager in Phoenix’s Office of Heat Response and Mitigation, acknowledged the amount of available money is “kind of wild.” But she predicted it will have “a significant impact” on Phoenix – considered the hottest large city in the U.S. – and the surrounding metro area. Last summer was the for heat-associated fatalities in Arizona’s largest county.

Phoenix hopes to expand its shaded, mile-long “cool corridor” pathways; initiate more neighborhood tree-planting on private property; maintain the city’s “urban forest” for the long term; and work with other communities and the state’s nursery association to address the tree care workforce shortage.

Also, a key goal is to nearly double the tree canopy in the city’s underserved neighborhoods, Martens said.

Brittany Peake knows firsthand how trees can transform a neighborhood. The three-bedroom home she purchased in Greer, South Carolina, came with no trees on the property, which formerly was part of a mobile home community.

TreesUpstate, a nonprofit, asked Peake last year if she’d like to get involved in its free tree-planting program. There are now five trees on her lot, including a swamp white oak that has already reached six feet tall. Peake said she’s looking forward to birds nesting in the tree and expects at least one of her four children to eventually scale its branches.

“My husband told me as a kid he actually climbed a couple oak trees,” she said. “I’m sure that my third son is going to be a climber like his daddy is.”

Editor’s note: AP writers Mike Householder in Detroit and Manuel Valdes in Seattle contributed to this report.

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