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After federal funding for renewables evaporated this year, the future path of the energy sector has been unclear. But even in uncertain times, companies are advancing the technology needed to push for a clean-energy transition—while also accommodating for a new grid that needs to keep up with the huge power demands of the wave of data centers coming online. From new battery tech to all-day solar power to better ways to track emissions and more, these innovations can help see the sector through this precarious period. Exowatt For generating solar power even when the sun isn’t shining Exowatt’s P3 unit is a power plant in a 40-foot-long shipping container. The unit uses…

You’re already juggling competing deadlines, back-to-back meetings, and strategic priorities. Then the Slack message arrives: “Hey, can you just take care of this?” It’s not in your job description. It’s not aligned with your goals. And it’s not the first time. Whether it’s managing logistics, picking up someone else’s project, or being asked to take notes again—many workers are routinely handed tasks that fall outside their role. Often, it’s framed as being a “team player.” But over time, these extra asks can add up to chronic overwork, blurred boundaries, and a stalled career trajectory. Handling these situations well isn’t about being difficult—it’s about being…

I-P-Go! Shares of Navan, a travel-tech firm based in Silicon Valley, hit the exchanges on Thursday. The company priced its initial public offering at $25 per share, raising roughly $923 million. The $25 per-share price is within the $24–$26 range the company zeroed-in on last week, when it also announced it would sell nearly 37 million shares of common stock. The IPO puts Navan’s valuation at around $9.2 billion. Navan shares will trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker “NAVN.” Founded in 2015, the company bills itself as “an all-in-one business travel, payments, and expense management platform that makes travel easy for frequent travelers,” helping customers fin…

When Sergey Brin spoke at Stanford University’s school of engineering centennial celebration recently, the Google co-founder was open about his career mistakes. “When you have your cool new wearable device idea, really fully bake it before you have a cool stunt involving skydiving and airships,” he joked, referring to the infamous Google Glass flop. But one misstep he admitted to might surprise a lot of people who dream of the day they can quit their 9-to-5. “I actually retired like a month before Covid hit, and it was the worst decision,” Brin said. He was such a failure at retirement that he has since returned to everyday work at Google, spearheading its effort…

We’re more than half a decade removed from pandemic lockdowns—when remote work profoundly upended the 9-to-5—yet the preference for workday flexibility endures, a new report shows. According to the recently released ninth annual State of Hybrid Work report from Owl Labs, a video conference tech company, 65% of workers are interested in a concept the report refers to as “microshifting”: “structured flexibility with short, nonlinear work blocks matched to your energy, duties, or productivity.” In other words: breaking up your work shift into a bunch of tiny ones. Perhaps you log on at 6 a.m. to get a head start, then take a break for a midmorning Pilates class befo…

Former President Joe Biden returns to the national stage Tuesday to elevate liberal concerns that President Donald The President’s agenda is threatening the health of Social Security. The 82-year-old Democrat has largely avoided speaking publicly since leaving the White House in January. That’s even as The President frequently blames Biden for many of the nation’s problems, often attacking his predecessor by name. Biden is expected to fight back in an early evening speech to the national conference of Advocates, Counselors and Representatives for the Disabled in Chicago. While Biden has made a handful of public appearances in recent weeks, Tuesday’s high-profile address…

No Mow May encourages homeowners to stash the lawn mower each spring and let flowers and grass grow for pollinators and water retention. And if your neighbor’s lawn already looks like a wildflower field most of the time, it could be more intentional than passersby might assume. The movement has expanded to “Let It Bloom June” and the fall version: “Leave the leaves.” Conservation and horticulture groups say year-round low-mowing while selectively leaving native plants to grow can save huge amounts of drinking water and lead to lasting and impactful ecological changes. When Amanda Beltramini Healan moved into her Nashville ranch house in 2016, the yard had been manicured…

Never underestimate the news media’s ability to amplify the mundane with urgent-sounding headlines. If you follow the twists and turns of the retail industry as closely as we news-watchers do, you may have noticed recently that the simple act of closing for the Easter holiday has been rebranded as a “retail blackout.” If you’ve been at all confused by this oversold terminology, here’s a brief explainer to help break it down: What’s happening? Over the last week or so, a number of news organizations—mostly from outside the United States—have reported on a so-called “retail blackout” that is set to take place on Sunday, April 20, which is Easter Sunday. E…

X owner Elon Musk was privately messaging with Reddit CEO Steve Huffman while also putting public pressure on the social media company’s content moderation efforts, The Verge reported Thursday. Two months ago, several Reddit subreddits started to block links to X in protest of Musk appearing to give the Nazi salute. Musk called the efforts “insane,” while a Reddit spokesperson at the time clarified that Reddit itself wasn’t imposing a ban on the links. A few days later, Musk claimed that Reddit users who were calling for violence against members of his Department of Government Efficiency were breaking the law. Musk has been a vocal critic of content moderation on…

Billy Evans, the partner of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, is currently in the process of raising money for his own startup. It’s a blood-testing company. According to reports from NPR and The New York Times, both of which spoke with anonymous sources close to the venture, 33-year-old Evans has already raised several million dollars for a new “stealth” startup focusing on diagnostics and health testing. Prior to this news, Evans first came into the public eye back in 2018 when he began dating Holmes, who is currently serving out an 11-year federal prison sentence for committing fraud through her infamous blood-testing company Theranos. Over the weekend, …

The odds of winning the lottery are about one in 300 million. If you have a tattoo of an old Mountain Dew logo on your body, your odds of winning Mountain Dew’s new sweepstakes are much, much higher. The soda’s owner, PepsiCo, is launching the contest to celebrate Mountain Dew’s new logo hitting store shelves. It’s asking people who have a tattoo of the old Mountain Dew logo to upload a photo to social media and tag Mountain Dew for a chance to win a trip for two to Las Vegas to get a tattoo of the new logo. Last year, Mountain Dew retired its jagged, abbreviated “Mtn Dew” logo introduced in 2009 for a new logo that spells out the citrus soda brand’s entire name.…

It can be tempting for business leaders to overly rely on data to drive their decision-making. But so often that approach can sacrifice the human connection that’s needed between leaders and their employees and customers. At Fast Company’s annual Impact Council meeting last week, Elyse Cohen, chief impact officer of the Selena Gomez-founded beauty brand Rare Beauty; and David Ko, CEO of mental health and sleep assistance platform Calm, took to the stage to discuss why leading like a human is so important, particularly at a time of striking technological advancement. Data-driven human connection Although Calm leverages AI, the company predominantly uses those …

European Union watchdogs fined Apple and Meta hundreds of millions of euros Wednesday as they stepped up enforcement of the 27-nation bloc’s digital competition rules. The European Commission imposed a 500 million euro ($571 million) fine on Apple for preventing app makers from pointing users to cheaper options outside its App Store. The commission, which is the EU’s executive arm, also fined Meta Platforms 200 million euros because it forced Facebook and Instagram users to choose between seeing ads or paying to avoid them. The punishments were smaller than the blockbuster multibillion-euro fines that the commission has previously slapped on Big Tech companies in antit…

There were 30,000 fewer U.S. drug overdose deaths in 2024 than the year before — the largest one-year decline ever recorded. An estimated 80,000 people died from overdoses last year, according to provisional Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data released Wednesday. That’s down 27% from the 110,000 in 2023. The CDC has been collecting comparable data for 45 years. The previous largest one-year drop was 4% in 2018, according to the agency’s National Center for Health Statistics. All but two states saw declines last year, with Nevada and South Dakota experiencing small increases. Some of the biggest drops were in Ohio, West Virginia and other states tha…

MANDAN, N.D. (AP) — A North Dakota jury on Wednesday found Greenpeace liable for defamation and other claims brought by a pipeline company in connection with protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline. The nine-person jury awarded Dallas-based Energy Transfer and its subsidiary Dakota Access hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. The lawsuit had accused Netherlands-based Greenpeace International, Greenpeace USA, and funding arm Greenpeace Fund Inc. of defamation, trespass, nuisance, civil conspiracy, and other acts. When asked if Greenpeace plans to appeal, Senior Legal Adviser Deepa Padmanabha said, “We know that this fight is not over” and said the…

When Paule Tenaillon was head shoe designer at Chloé, she was responsible for designing hundreds of shoes a year. With each design, she had to consider many factors: The Chloé aesthetic, trends, heel height, materials. But there was one issue she didn’t think much about. “Comfort was never a consideration,” Tenaillon says. “Nobody ever asked me to make a comfortable pair of shoes. But it bothered me, because it’s important to me to wear shoes that are comfortable.” Now, Tenaillon is on a mission to make the most uncomfortable shoe in the world comfortable. Her shoe label, Nomasei, is releasing a stiletto model for the first time, full of small design tweaks that …

The cost of a multistep skincare routine can quickly add up. But have you ever wondered what would happen if you simply stopped? This weekend, a TikTok creator went viral for discussing her controversial “Caveman Method,” which she claims is helping restore her skin barrier after years of picking at her skin. In a video that has since racked up nearly 10 million views, Tia Zakher announced she had cut out everything from her beauty routine—even water. “What you are seeing is dead skin that’s going to flake off eventually while healthy skin forms underneath,” she posted in response to questions about the texture on her face. In a separate video, she explain…