New "clean truck" standards have been proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Transportation to improve fuel economy and reduce pollution from the nation's freight trucks and buses.

TNT is deploying seven 3.5-tonne electric express delivery vehicles for its operations in and around Amsterdam and Rotterdam, The Netherlands, as a partner of Freight Electric Vehicles in Urban Europe, an urban e-mobility project supported by the European Commission. FREVUE seeks to demonstrate to industry, consumers and policy makers how electric vehicles can meet the growing need for sustainable urban logistics.

Fracking is creating a new dividing line between the nation's red and blue states.

Hydraulic fracturing has contaminated some drinking water sources, but the damage is not widespread, according to a landmark U.S. study of water pollution risks that has supporters of the drilling method declaring victory and foes saying it revealed reason for concern.

Although gas prices are temporarily low at the pump, long-term energy costs are on the rise. According to State of the World 2015 contributing author Nathan John Hagens, a former hedge fund manager who teaches human macro-ecology at the University of Minnesota, nations are papering over those costs with debt. Higher energy costs are leading to continued recessions, excess claims on future natural resources, and more-severe social inequality and poverty.

In 2014, renewable energy accounted for 9.8 percent of total domestic energy consumption. This marks the highest renewable energy share since the 1930s, when wood was a much larger contributor to domestic energy supply.