Stories by Melissa C. Lott

Texas is well-known as the home of the oil and gas industry. Over the last decade it has also become the nation’s wind power leader. Today, it is poised to be America’s testbed for energy storage technologies.

On Tuesday, Massachusettes Governor Deval Patrick announced than a more than 1,160 square mile area off the coast of Rhode Island will be opened up for commercial wind leases.

The Transuranic Package Transporter (TRUPACT-II) is a specialized tractor-trailor used for radioactive waste. The design for the containers in this rig was originally approved by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission for use in 1989.

Each year, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory publishes a powerful graphic of U.S. energy use. In the most recent version, one can see how the ~97 quadrillion british-thermal units (quads) of energy used in the United States can be broken down by uses and sectors.

On Monday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officially released their highly anticipated rule for carbon emissions reductions in existing power plants.

Tomorrow, President Obama is expected to announce a major step in U.S. carbon regulation. Using executive authority, the President will issue a new rule to limit carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants in the United States.

This photograph is a part of the online photography exhibit "Form and Landscape," a collaborative project from William Deverell and Greg Hise.

Algae-based biofuels offer a potential solution to many of the concerns related to corn-based biofuels in the United States, including the food-versus-fuel debate.

In March, air pollution in northern France reached dangerous levels and resulted in a strong government response. Public transportation fees were removed and cars were partially banned from the roads.

The integrated circuit design pictured above was designed by Unified Solar, a student lead team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who won the regional price of the Department of Energy's (DOE) National Clean Energy Business Plan Competition at the MIT Clean Energy Prize at the end of April.

In the United States, 410 billion gallons of water are withdrawn for use each day. Almost half (49%) of this water is used by the power sector.

This poster of a man shoveling coal from a cart was created by J.C. Leyendecker for the Saturday Evening Post magazine. It was created with sponsorship from the United States Federal Fuel Administration.

This photograph is of a microbattery created by scientists at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). Used to monitor the movements of salmon through rivers, this microbattery can store  twice the amount energy compared to previous designs in the same size package.

The first Redondo Beach Steam Power Plant came online in 1907. This $1.25 million power plant was operated until 1933 – it was then taken offline, dismantled, bought/sold, and rebuilt, coming online again in 1948 as a part of Southern California Edison’s power fleet.

Biofuels made using corn waste could release 7 percent more greenhouse gases in the early years compared to conventional gasoline. As a result, this type of cellulosic ethanol could be inelligible to meet quotas under the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA).

Almost three years ago (on July 5, 2011) Plugged In joined the Scientific American blogging family, creating a space for exploring developments that connect us to energy, our planet and each other.

This picture is of the user interface screen of the home’s energy management system in the new Honda Smart Home in California. Located in the West Village at the University of California, Davis, this 1,922 square foot home includes a 9.5 kW rooftop solar panel array and an electric vehicle with 10 kWh of battery storage, [...]

The Point Conception lighthouse is located at the west enterance of the Santa Barbara Channel in Southern California. This photograph is a part of the online photography exhibit "Form and Landscape," a collaborative project from William Deverell and Greg Hise.

This spring, tribal leaders and community members broke ground on the Moapa Southern Paiute Solar Project. Located on the Moapa Indian Reservation, this 250 Megawatt (MW) solar project is expected to be fully operational by the end of 2015 and will provide energy to homes in the city of Los Angeles, California.

This 1979 photo is of a woman at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) opening a 97,000 pound (48.5 ton) door.

NASA’s Curiosity rover landed on Mars on August 6, 2012. Its primary goals were to gather geological and environmental data from the planet.

The 220m tall Contra Dam* was build in the early 1960s and forms part of the Verzasca Hydroelectric Complex in Ticino, Southern Switzerland.

Germany’s electricity mix is rapidly changing, with renewables on the way in and nuclear (potentially) heading out. But, given nationwide concerns regarding energy affordability and fairness, the future remains unclear.

This weekend, Parisians and those visiting the city will enjoy free public transportation as they move from Versailles to La Tour Eiffel. This initiative comes as much of Northern France experiences dangerously high levels of local air pollution, leaving local governments desperate to get cars off the road.