Catherine Clifford

New York

Senior Science and Economics Correspondent at Cipher News

Senior science and economics correspondent, @CipherNews. Fellow @Climatebase. Alumna @Columbia Energy Journalism Initiative. Also, lots of yoga.

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Articles

Geoengineering quantified: Heat is deadlier than air pollution

1 month ago | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

As the Earth’s temperature keeps rising, scientists and entrepreneurs around the world are exploring increasingly novel ways of tackling climate change — including lessening deadly levels of heat. One initiative garnering a lot of attention — and controversy — is solar geoengineering.
China on track to dominate nuclear energy

2 months ago | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

Add one more clean-energy technology China is set to dominate: nuclear power. China leads, by far, in nuclear energy capacity under construction, as the above chart shows. And within five years, it is forecasted to overtake the United States and Europe to be “the number one nuclear power in the world,” Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, said alongside the recent release of a new report on the technology.
National pride at a wilderness park and a research lab

Jan 17, 2025 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

I went camping last fall in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, a 150-mile-long collection of lakes and streams along Minnesota’s border with Canada. At the campsite where my partner and I stayed, one of 2,000 designated campsites in this rugged, pristine landscape, a sturdy, metal grill was installed over the firepit, with “U.S. Forest Service” engraved on the side.
Meet the unflappable physicist helping make fusion possible

Jan 15, 2025 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

Livermore, California — Richard Town was sleeping when he and his team achieved a scientific breakthrough that could kick off a revolution in our energy systems and help combat climate change. In the wee morning hours of December 5, 2022, science history was made and fusion “ignition” was achieved for the first time at a national lab here outside of San Francisco.
The world’s fastest supercomputer is accelerating efforts to bring star power to Earth

Jan 13, 2025 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

LIVERMORE, California — It makes sense that a technical achievement straight out of science fiction took place in a facility so futuristic that it was once used as a backdrop in a Star Trek movie.
Data centers drive up projected electricity growth in the U.S.

Jan 8, 2025 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

In just two years, the growth of data centers — fueled in part by artificial intelligence’s rapid integration into our livelihoods — have dramatically reshaped expectations for future energy consumption in the United States. Power utilities projected in 2024 that electricity demand would grow five times faster over the next five years compared to forecasts made two years ago: from 23 gigawatts of projected growth to over 128 gigawatts.
Majority of top states for jobs from new clean energy projects are GOP, battleground

Sep 4, 2024 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

Politically conservative and battleground states are leading the way in jobs created by new clean energy projects announced since President Biden’s signature climate law passed two years ago, according to a new report. Since the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was passed in August 2022, at least 334 clean energy projects have been announced, said E2, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization focused on the environment and economy.
Renewed interest in nuclear energy bolsters uranium prices

Aug 1, 2024 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

The price per pound of uranium has more than tripled over the past four years as interest in nuclear power has grown, according to data shared with Cipher from Platts, part of S&P Global Commodity Insights. On March 2, 2020, a pound of uranium concentrate, the mined uranium that is processed into nuclear reactor fuel, cost $24.80 on the spot market in Canada, according to Platts. More than four years later, on July 18, that same pound of uranium on the same market cost $84.85.
Surging power demand fuels new nuclear interest, federal funding

Jul 31, 2024 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

The exploding global demand for energy, combined with the urgent race to reduce carbon emissions, is focusing interest and investment on the once-staid, long-stagnant nuclear industry. A promising lineup of advanced nuclear reactor technologies and more streamlined and flexible construction techniques are getting public and private funding as nuclear is increasingly seen as a critical piece of the decarbonization puzzle.
How to understand new nuclear energy

Jul 29, 2024 | ciphernews.com | Catherine Clifford

The nuclear industry is attempting to reinvent itself. Historically, nuclear power plants have been massive, one-of-a-kind complexes that take years to build and supply power to thousands of people. But this model may not work to meet the planet’s future energy needs.