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Sparks

This Is a Bad Year to Go Apple Picking in Virginia

A drought has hit the state’s mountainous west, putting orchards in jeopardy.

Apple picking.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

I tried going apple-picking in Virginia over the weekend, but when we pulled up to the farm one of my friends had found online — a small family-run place called Paugh's Orchard — the owner told us a drought in the region had pretty much rendered the apples useless.

“If they don’t get any bigger than they are right now I can’t imagine anyone would want to pick them,” the orchard’s owner told a local news station back in August. That prediction came true; by the time we pulled up at her farm a month later, she’d started bringing in apples from other areas to sell to customers.

Drought.gov map of Virginia drought.Drought.gov



Virginia is the country’s sixth biggest producer of apples, with most of its orchards in its mountainous western region. According to the Daily News-Record, another local outlet, the apples that have grown in this part of the state are smaller than last year, which makes them harder to pick, which in turn increases labor costs for farms that hire seasonal apple-pickers. And orchards that rely on income from people like me rolling up to pick their own apples are finding themselves without apples worth picking. That is, as my colleague Matthew noted, bad for the Instagram grids of influencers who live in the region and thrive on fall content, but more importantly it’s another example of the ways climate change is making small-scale farming — a hard enough business already — tougher than ever.

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Sparks

Interior Department Targets Wind Developers Using Bird Protection Law

A new letter sent Friday asks for reams of documentation on developers’ compliance with the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act.

An eagle clutching a wind turbine.
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The Fish and Wildlife Service is sending letters to wind developers across the U.S. asking for volumes of records about eagle deaths, indicating an imminent crackdown on wind farms in the name of bird protection laws.

The Service on Friday sent developers a request for records related to their permits under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, which compels companies to obtain permission for “incidental take,” i.e. the documented disturbance of eagle species protected under the statute, whether said disturbance happens by accident or by happenstance due to the migration of the species. Developers who received the letter — a copy of which was reviewed by Heatmap — must provide a laundry list of documents to the Service within 30 days, including “information collected on each dead or injured eagle discovered.” The Service did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Solar for All May Be on the Chopping Block After All

The $7 billion program had been the only part of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund not targeted for elimination by the Trump administration.

The EPA blocking solar power.
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The Environmental Protection Agency plans to cancel grants awarded from the $7 billion Solar for All program, the final surviving grants from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, by the end of this week, The New York Times is reporting. Two sources also told the same to Heatmap.

Solar for All awarded funds to 60 nonprofits, tribes, state energy offices, and municipalities to deliver the benefits of solar energy — namely, utility bill savings — to low-income communities. Some of the programs are focused on rooftop solar, while others are building community solar, which enable residents that don’t own their homes to access cheaper power.

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Grassley Holds Up Trump Treasury Nominees to Protect Renewables Development

Along with Senator John Curtis of Utah, the Iowa senator is aiming to preserve the definition of “begin construction” as it applies to tax credits.

John Curtis and Charles Grassley.
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Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley wants “begin construction” to mean what it means.

To that end, Grassley has placed a “hold” on three nominees to the Treasury Department, the agency tasked with writing the rules and guidance for implementing the tax provisions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, many of which depend on that all-important definition.

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