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This coverage is made possible through a partnership between Grist and BPR, a public radio station serving western North Carolina. The Tennessee Valley Authoritys (TVA’s) quarterly meeting in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, opened with a triumphant video homage to its work during Winter Storm Fern. Energy had come through, yet again, to defeat extreme cold. The montage credited this to the utilitys coal workhorses, then noted that nuclear provided uninterrupted power and hydro responded instantly. The list ended there, despite years of promises that the agency would bolster renewables and battery storage. The message was clear: Solar had been unceremoniously dropped from the mix, and coal, which the agency had been phasing out, was back. What the video hinted at, the board made official. Its seven members unanimously dropped renewable energy as a priority, ended diversity programs, and granted two of the agencys four remaining coal plants a reprieve. The decision followed the seating of four members selected by President Trump, breaking months of paralysis that followed the termination of three Biden appointees. The changes, made during the February 11 board meeting, signal more than a routine policy reset for the nations largest public power provider. They will slow the TVAs shift away from fossil fuels just as electricity demand is spiking, raising questions about future costs, pollution, and the role of federally-owned utilities in the countrys energy transition. For years, TVA planners had mapped out a future without coal. That is now on hold. The Kingston Fossil Plant in Roane County, Tennessee, was scheduled for retirement in 2027, with all nine of its units slated for demolition and replacement with an energy complex of gas generation and battery storage. All of them will remain online alongside the gas plant, but renewables are no longer part of the picture. The board also shelved plans to scuttle the Cumberland Fossil Plant in Stewart County, Tennessee, in 2028. These moves come despite the agencys 2025 Integrated Resource Plan, which called for retiring the two facilities because of Kingstons high cost and challenged condition and Cumberlands lack of flexibility. The Kingston coal plant was also the site of a devastating 2010 coal ash disaster, the largest industrial spill in U.S. history. The board defended its decision by citing energy affordability for the Tennessee Valley. As power demand grows, TVA is looking at every option to bolster our generating fleet to continue providing affordable, reliable electricity to our 10 million customers, create jobs, and help communities thrive, agency spokesperson Scott Brooks said in a statement. Left unsaid was the fact that a coal-fired power generation unit at the Cumberland Fossil Plant failed during last months storm. Much of TVAs load growth comes from the rise of artificial intelligence, said CEO Don Moul, and data centers account for 18% of its industrial load. During the same meeting, the board allowed the company xAI, owned by Elon Musk, to double the amount of power it draws from the grid. For former board member Michelle Moore, one of the Biden-era appointees President Trump fired in March, the shift aligns squarely with the administrations priorities. It also signals, she said, that the utility is no longer fulfilling its mission to provide affordable power, economic development, and environmental stewardship across the seven-state Tennessee Valley. The politics in Washington may change, she said. But the TVAs mission does not. That independence has at times put the Tennessee Valley Authority at odds with presidents of both parties. The utility resisted Trump administration pressure to keep coal plants open, continuing to retire facilities based on economic reasons. But it also fell short of President Bidens decarbonization goals. Moore worries ordinary ratepayers are no longer an active part of TVAs decision-making. Typically, a shift as monumental as turning away from renewable energy would have been subject to a lengthy review with input from communities throughout the region, something that simply will not occur now. This is one more indicator that the public power model is being eroded and is at risk, Moore said. Last month, the TVA said it would streamline how it reviews the ecological impacts of its projects, allowing some to move ahead with far less, if any, scrutiny. The move follows a broader rollback of the National Environmental Policy Act under President Trump that grants greater discretion over such considerations to entities like the TVA. For nearly 60 years, the law required an assessment of the environmental impacts of federal projects. Over the past several years, the TVA board has faced pressure to make decisions based on stringent environmental regulations, said board member Wade White. The TVAs willingness to join the Trump administrations push to revive the coal industry has rankled locals and environmentalists. In the first year of his second term, President Trump lifted Environmental Protection Agency restrictions on the industry, used emergency executive orders to keep aging coal plants open, expanded mining, and ordered the Pentagon to buy electricity from power plants that use coal. The president has since received an award from industry executives dubbing him the Undisputed Champion of Clean, Beautiful Coal. From a public health standpoint, its a nightmare. Coal is one of the worst things you can imagine for the environment, said Avner Vengosh, a professor of environmental quality at Duke University who leads a coal and coal ash research group. Mining destroys ecosystems and poisons groundwater, polluting rivers and streams with sulfuric acid. Burning the fossil fuel releases fine particulate matter, impacting the health of nearby residents. A 2023 study in the journal Science found that coal plants caused nearly half a millon excess deaths between 1999 and 2020, and a Sierra Club report notes that TVA coal-fired plants were the nations deadliest. People are upset, they feel like were going backwards, said Amy Kelly, a Sierra Club campaign manager. The fact that these plants are from the ’50s and ’60s, and were just going to prop them up with Band-Aid solutions to appease the current administration is going to cost people. Even some coal plant operators agree. A Colorado utility is suing to close a facility, calling a federal emergency order to keep it online unconstitutional. For those who live near the two plants the TVA just saved, the decision is, in Joe Schillers words, a betrayal. Schiller, a retired college professor, has lived near the Cumberland plant for 30 years. It contradicts everything theyve told us about the plants in the past, he said. Even so, he added, its a beautiful area. Moments before, his wife had called him outside to admire the sandhill cranes flying by. Its not like you look around every day and say, Yep, that Cumberland plant is slowly killing me, Schiller said with a laugh. Although it probably is.
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Reading or sending emails may seem like an innocuous task, but sometimes, this simple act can trigger a dramatic bodily response. Like forgetting to literally breathe. Many of us have heard of sleep apnea: the condition where breathing gets interrupted during sleep. Dora Kamau, Lead Mindfulness and Meditation Teacher at mental health app Headspace, told Fast Company. Email apnea is a similar ideajust happening in the middle of your workday, When we’re intensely focused on a task, the brain will “switch off” certain unconscious functions to redirect its processing power to the task at hand. In that state, a lot of people unknowingly alter their breathing, taking short sips of breath, or sometimes holding it altogether. The term for this phenomenon was first coined by Linda Stone in the late 2000s in an article published by HuffPost. After noticing her own breathing became shallow when sat at her computer checking her emails, she decided to invite 200 participants to take part in a study at her home. She found that 80% of the participants also breathed more shallowly when stationed in front of a screen. Those who didnt had received some kind of formal training in breathing as either athletes, dancers or musicians. When we open an inbox, scroll through a feed, or get pulled into something on a screen, our nervous system shifts into low-grade alert mode, explains Kamau. In these moments, the body is doing what has been designed to do: to protect us. Its a human, biological response to perceived uncertainty, threat or danger, which in the modern world, an overflowing inbox can feel like. If you dont think you do this, the tricky thing about email apnea is that its easy to miss, because it happens in the background of something else youre doing, says Kamau. Do you reach the end of a work session feeling inexplicably tired, even if you havent done anything physically demanding? Do you suffer from tension headaches or a tight feeling across the shoulders and chest? Do you find yourself taking a big, involuntary sigh or deep breathing without really knowing why? These are all signs of email apnea. That sigh is your body self-correcting, trying to restore balance after a period of shallow or held breath, says Kamau. When we hold our breath or breathe shallowly for extended periods, carbon dioxide builds up in the bloodstream, signaling to the body to stay on high alert. Even after you’ve closed the email, that stress response keeps running, holding on to that tension long after your laptop is shut. It also negatively impacts cognitive function, Kamau explains. When we’re not breathing fully, we’re not getting optimal oxygen to the brain, which means decision-making, creativity, and focus all take a hit. Ironically, the very things we need most at work. Next time youre racing to hit inbox zero, take a beat and notice your breath. Slow diaphragmatic breathing, expanding the lungs fully and breathing into the stomach, signals to the body it can relax. It reduces the heart rate, lowers blood pressure and can even help us make better decisions. Its also important to designate mini-breaks to keep email apnea at bay. At Headspace, we just created and launched a Pomodoro timer specifically designed with this in mind, says Kamau. Making micro-adjustments to the way you sit can help, too. Hunching over a screen compresses the lungs and makes full breathing physically harder, she says. Simply sitting up slightly, rolling the shoulders back, and dropping them away from the ears creates more space for the breath to move in our bodies.
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This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps. More than 600,000 podcasts released 27 million episodes in 2025. Keeping up with even a tiny fraction of those 70,000-plus daily releases is impossible. So Ive been exploring new ways to keep up with audio: podcast summaries, audio digests, and cool new tools for finding and saving audio highlights. Podsnacks: Get podcast summaries by email Get podcast summaries delivered to your email with Podsnacks. Catch up on shows you dont have time to listen to. The free digest includes AI-generated summaries drawn from 25 of the most popular news, business, and tech podcasts. For $5/month, you can get a daily digest of any five podcasts you want. Snipcast is an alternative that offers 2 summaries a month for free or 50 episode summaries for $8/month. TL;DL by Headliner: Listen to podcast digests If you want to listen to podcast summaries, try TL;DL. Pick up to five podcasts to summarize in 5, 10, 15, or 20 minutes. I like that its not just an AI-voiced synthesis, but includes excerpted audio clips. You can always click through to hear the full episode. Caveat: Expect to wait at least five minutes for each summary, and its still in beta. I run into occasional errors. Examples: Listen to this summary from my recent podcast interview with Azeem Azhar. Or try this summary of an episode of Shankar Vedantams terrific Hidden Brain podcast. Snipd: My favorite podcast app Snipd keeps improving. I rely on it mainly because it lets me save highlights from podcasts Im listening to by tapping my AirPods. The app also provides detailed podcast summaries so I can decide what to listen to. Among the new features I like most: Skip intros and outros that clutter up many podcasts. AI chat with any episode to ask for best quotes, must-listen moments, key takeaways, clarification of a complex idea, or whatever else you want. I love the new mentioned books tab. It shows all the books discussed on a particular podcast. Click on a cover to learn more about the author and to see a list of podcasts where that book was discussed. Search by guest. Find and listen to all the podcasts where your favorite author/musician/guru has been interviewed. Listen and highlight audiobooks. Connect a Libro.fm audiobook account and import books with one click to listen to and highlight on Snipd. (Libro supports your local bookstore.) Alternatively, find free public domain audiobooks at LibriVox. You can manually upload your own audiobooks. Podcast Magic: Save a key audio moment When youre listening to a podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts and want to save a highlight, take a screenshot and email it to podcastmagic@sublime.app. Podcast Magic will email you back an audio clip and transcript of the key moment to save or share. Its a clever way to easily save and share a quote or anecdote. Example: One show I highlighted recently was Audio Flux, which The New Yorker picked as one of the 10 best podcasts of 2025. The all-star audio duo commissions and spotlights bold short-form audio stories. (You can also follow Team Audio Flux on Substack.) Listen Notes: Search for podcast mentions With Listen Notes, you can find podcast episodes where youre mentioned. Type in your name or the name of your organization and search. Or look for interviews with a favorite author or musician. Other useful features: Curated Lists: See recommendations from publications, like the 6 healthcare podcasts or 7 podcasts for bookworms the NYTimes recommended. Listen Later: Make and share a curated podcast playlist. The playlist has an RSS feed that you can add to any major podcast player. Heres a playlist of a few shows I like. Heres a longer list of my favorites. Podchaser is a good alternative when youre looking by topic. I discovered new podcasts about tennis and classical music. Also try the new advanced search by combining terms. EarBuds Podcast Collective, founded by podcast guru Arielle Nissenblatt, shares well-curated podcast recommendations. Each week a guest picks five shows to recommend. Example: 5 podcasts about bodies and how we see ourselves. Also: CBCs Podcast Playlist (RIP) was a great show featuring highlights from all sorts of podcasts. The archive is full of great episodes. Perplexity Voice Mode for Web, iOS, and Android When I dont have my computer, I prefer searching with my voice over thumb typing on my phone. Querying Perplexity verbally when Im walking or when my fingers are freezing is convenient because it answers with audio quickly and accurately. I can ask follow-ups for clarification or elaboration. These iterative search conversations let me steer the exploration toward whats most useful. (iOS and Android) Example: Here’s a screenshot of Perplexitys short reply when I asked what voice search is useful for. Tip: Ask Perplexity for its sources to verify its results; voice searches dont surface those unless you ask. Voicebox: Collect audio feedback Create your own inbox for voice input. Give anyone your Voicebox link or QR code, and they can leave you an audio message. No typing, no downloads, no forms to fill out. They just share their thoughts in a simple voice memo. Its like an answering machine for the digital era. Voicebox is marketed as a B2B tool, but anyone can use it as an individual. Try it: Leave me a voice message about one thing you do that AI will never be able to replicate. Optionally, include your name and email. Send an audio note: Tuttu is a super simple free site where you can record and share a voice note. Then email a link to that audio or embed it. Heres a quick example I recorded about 3 ways you can use Tuttu. Alternative: VideoAsk is a slick tool for collecting video or audio feedback instead of a dull form. You can gather 20 minutes of input each month for free. Collecting 100 monthly minutes costs $24/month billed annually. Rover AI: Get audio briefs to answer questions Rover is an early-stage app that answers your questions with AI-generated audio briefs. Type in a query, wait a few minutes, then listen to your 2-3 minute audio conversation between two AI hosts. Unique feature: Choose from three alternative responses to your query. Example: Listen to a short audio debate about whether Jonathan Franzen is overrated or a genius. Alternatives: NotebookLM, which Ive written about, does a fantastic job of creating audio summariesor even debatesexploring complex topics. And Huxe, which I wrote about last week, creates useful personalized audio updates. Rover is an earlier-stage experiment, by contrast, focused on brief audio answers to eclectic queries. Become a tester to try it out. This article is republished with permission from Wonder Tools, a newsletter that helps you discover the most useful sites and apps.
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