Science

An artist’s rendering of a rare earth mining operation in Myanmar. AP’s investigation linked the supply chains of global corporate giants to the mining operations that result in environmental destruction, theft of land from villagers and money funneled to brutal militias. The abuses are likely to grow with increased demand for rare earth elements, vital to the green energy industry. (AP Illustration / Peter Hamlin)

In this photo made with an Optical Gas Imaging thermal camera, a plume of heat from a flare burning off methane and other hydrocarbons is detected in the background next to an oil pumpjack as a cow walks through a field in the Permian Basin in Jal, N.M., Thursday, Oct. 14, 2021. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

A formerly sunken boat sits high and dry along the shoreline of Lake Mead, near Boulder City, Nev., May 10, 2022. The white line of mineral deposits in the distance represents the decades-old high water mark of the reservoir which has since fallen 170 feet to record lows, revealing a virtual graveyard of watercraft and dead fish. (AP Photo / John Locher)

Workers from Craig Station, a coal-fired power plant, pose for a photograph in Craig, Colo., Nov. 17, 2021. From left: Ron Geary, Gene LeFeure, Trinidad Loya and Wes Lytle. The plant has been a source of job security for decades, but it is closing, along with the mine that feeds it. Together they employ about 300 people; all will lose their jobs according the an owner and operator of the plant. (AP Photo / Rick Bowmer)

Ash from the Cumbre Vieja volcano covers a house on La Palma, in Spain’s Canary Islands, Nov. 1, 2021. The ash is jettisoned thousands of meters into the sky; the heaviest, thickest particles eventually drift down, accumulating in banks that slowly cover doors, pour into windows, make rooftops sag. Some particles are so big that when they pummel a car roof or the fronds of a banana tree, it sounds like hail. (AP Photo / Emilio Morenatti)

With wind turbines in the foreground, steam rises from the coal-fired power station Neurath near the Garzweiler open-pit coal mine in Luetzerath, Germany, Oct. 25, 2021. Coal is the world’s biggest fuel source for generating electric power, and also the single biggest source of greenhouse gases impacting climate. (AP Photo / Michael Probst)

In this July 2021 photo provided by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society., A Chinese-flagged ship fishes for squid at night on the high seas off the west coast of South America July 2021 photo provided by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Since 2009 the number of Chinese-flagged vessels in the southern Pacific surged 10-fold to 557 in 2020, according to an intergovernmental group charged with ensuring conservation and sustainable fishing. (Isaac Haslam / Sea Shepherd via AP)

This image provided by NOAA taken Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2021 and reviewed by The Associated Press shows Oil slicks are visible at the flooded Phillips 66 Alliance Refinery in Belle Chasse, La., in an Aug. 31, 2021 photo released by NOAA and reviewed by the AP. State and federal regulators responded to the spill site on the banks of the Mississppi River after AP provided the photos of the spill and the company acknowledged a “sheen of unknown origin” at its flooded refinery. (NOAA via AP)

Michael Williams sits for an interview in his South Side Chicago home, July 27, 2021, after spending nearly a year in jail as a suspect in a May 2020 killing. Prosecutors had used ShotsSpotter evidence to build their case against Williams. “I kept trying to figure out, how can they get away with using the technology like that against me?” he asked. “That’s not fair.” His case was eventually dismissed when prosecutors said they had insufficient evidence. (AP Photo / Charles Rex Arbogast)

Misty Buckley carries dirty water from her animals’ pens to water plants in her front yard, in Klamath Falls, Ore., July 24, 2021. The family’s house well ran dry in May following historic drought in southern Oregon. Dozens of domestic wells have gone dry in the area near the Oregon-California border where the effects of drought have taken a particularly dramatic toll. (AP Photo / Nathan Howard)