As the Paris Agreement on climate change was being signed on Earth Day, scientists and media outlets sounded a steady drumbeat of sobering climate change news.

According to studies, the first three months of 2016 have been the hottest ever recorded, Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is slowly being bleached to death and Greenland’s ice sheet is melting faster than scientists have ever seen. “The strongest hurricane on record for both the Northern and Southern Hemisphere, unprecedented continuing drought in California, the warmest start to a year that we’ve ever seen, on the heels of what was the warmest full year on record for the globe,” said Michael Mann, a Pennsylvania State University climate scientist.

The climate agreement, signed by officials from 174 countries, is a pledge to cut greenhouse gas emissions and slow the warming of the planet.

More: The Washington Post

Secretary Moniz Disputes ‘War on Coal’ by Obama

Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said the Obama administration has not declared war on coal, as many critics say, but is committed to using innovation to breathe continued life into the fuel.

“Make no bones about it,” he said, “we start with the assertion, the commitment, that we are talking about a progressively lower carbon future. But we have not abandoned coal as part of that future.”

Moniz was speaking at a University of Kentucky forum focused on energy innovation. He noted the administration’s investment of billions of dollars for research on carbon capture and storage, including $6.5 billion in tax credits for the technology. If the administration wanted to kill off coal as a fuel, he said, “we wouldn’t have put $6 billion into CCS.”

More: Lexington Herald-Leader

Virginia Officials Ask FERC to Reject Pipeline Route

The Augusta County Board of Supervisors asked FERC to reject an alternate route for the $5 billion, 550-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline, saying the proposed pipeline would have a negative impact on the county.

The developers of the proposed pipeline, designed to bring natural gas from Appalachian shale plays, had already shifted the route to avoid going through the Monongahela and George Washington National Forests. But Carolyn Bragg, the August County board chair, says the new route goes through land with protected conservation easements, and near protected water sources. In a letter addressed to “Chairman” Cheryl LaFleur, Bragg also complained that no public hearings for the new routes had been held.

A spokesman for Dominion Resources, the pipeline’s developer, said the route has already been changed several times after consultation with the U.S. Forest Service.

More: The News Virginian

Army Still Undecided on Dominion Tx Project

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said it believes the need still exists for a 500-kV transmission line by Dominion Virginia Power despite contrary research by opponents, but it isn’t yet prepared to approve a plan to build the line, which would cross over the James River.

Dominion says it needs to import power to areas that were formerly served by two units at its now-retired Yorktown generating station. Consultants for the National Parks Conservation Association have concluded that the line isn’t necessary.

The corps has called for more study before making a decision.

More: The Virginia Gazette

Lower Wind Speeds Slow Wind Power Growth in US

Wind generation grew by only 5.1% in the U.S. in 2015, the smallest annual increase since 1999, due primarily to a change in weather patterns in the West, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Those same weather patterns, however, resulted in higher average winds in the central part of the country, pushing up wind generation totals in the heartland.

Construction of new wind farms continues apace. Wind capacity grew 12.9%, a greater growth rate than the two previous years, with 8.1 GW installed. The agency said wind is projected to supply more than 5% of U.S. electricity generation in 2016.

More: Energy Information Administration

US NatGas Production Continues to Climb

U.S. natural gas production hit a record high of 79 Bcfd in 2015, up about 5% from the previous year, despite continued low prices for the fuel, according to the Energy Information Administration. While production dipped in much of the U.S. gas fields, increased production in five states — Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Oklahoma and North Dakota — more than made up for any decrease.

Pennsylvania’s growth rate slowed from the previous year — dropping from 2.6 Bcfd in new production in 2014 to 1.5 Bcfd of new production. But it still reported the fastest-growing production rate in the nation.

More: Energy Information Administration

DOE Tasked to Study Albedo Modification

The U.S. Senate wants the Department of Energy to study the value of using reflected sunlight to fight global warming.

A proposed spending bill would fund the department with an undetermined amount of money to examine whether climate change trends could be reduced by increasing the amount of sunlight reflected from the Earth’s surface back into space.

Harvard University scientist David Keith was promoting the study on reflectivity. “Ignorance is not a good basis for making decisions, so learning more about this is extremely valuable even if we find out that it will never work,” he said.

More: Science

Army Ammo Base Switching From Coal to Natural Gas

The Army is building a $60 million, natural gas-fired generating plant to replace a 77-year-old coal-fired unit at its Radford Army Ammunition Plant. The announcement came a day after protesters gathered outside U.S. Rep. Morgan Griffith’s Christiansburg, Va., office to protest the open burning of hazardous waste at the plant.

The Army pointed to its switch to natural gas from coal as an example of its commitment to the environment. It also said it recently received $7 million to design and build an enclosed incinerator and close the open-burn unit.

“We absolutely take our obligation to the environment very seriously,” said Lt. Col. Alicia Masson, the base commander.

More: The Roanoke Times

Environmental Groups Sue Four Corners Plant

A coalition of environmental groups and the Navajo tribe last week announced it had formally filed suit against the U.S. government for extending operations at a New Mexico coal plant and its associated mine.

The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for Arizona against the Interior Department’s Office of Surface Mining and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, among others, over a July decision to allow the Four Corners Power Plant and Navajo Mine to operate until 2041. The 52-year-old power plant and coal mine is in the Navajo Nation, about 15 miles southwest of Farmington, and operated by Arizona Public Service.

The owners plan to shut three of five generation units, reducing its capacity from 2,100 MW to 1,540 MW. Opposition groups argue that the 25-year extension did not take into account the assessment of clean energy alternatives and environmental risks. The groups also cite the recent string of bankruptcies, shutdowns and regulations facing the coal industry.

More: The Durango Herald

Spurned in ND, Nuke Waste Firm Looks to SD

A group sponsoring a federal study to explore for an underground nuclear waste storage site is scouting potential properties in South Dakota after North Dakota rejected a plan to study sites there.

Battelle Memorial Institute, the nonprofit research firm behind the Department of Energy project, has planned two public meetings in Spink County to explain the exploration.

Battelle says its deep borehole test will not involve any radioactive waste. Its purpose is to find deep underground rock layers that may be suitable for the storage of nuclear waste in the future.

More: The Associated Press