COAL:
• Bloomberg Philanthropies announced it will invest an additional $30 million to help reduce US reliance on coal, while recipient Sierra Club set a new goal to close half of the country’s coal-fired power plants by 2017. (Guardian; The Hill)
• More trains carrying volatile crude oil pass through Chicago than anywhere else in the country, passing through and sitting idle for hours in low-income, largely black and Latino Chicago neighborhoods. (Midwest Energy News)
• Michigan State University’s president announced Wednesday that the school intends to stop burning coal by the end of 2016. (The Daily Climate)

FRACKING: Levels of cancer-causing radon gas in Pennsylvania homes have increased as the fracking industry has expanded, a new study shows. (USA Today)

SOLAR: Utilities in the Northeast stand to lose as much as half of residential sales by 2030 as customers install solar and battery-storage systems and generate their own power, according to a report by the Rocky Mountain Institute. (Bloomberg)

ARCTIC DRILLING: Attorneys for Shell has asked a federal court to remove six Greenpeace activists who boarded a vessel carrying an oil-drilling rig leased by Shell and bound for Seattle, then the Arctic.

ETHANOL: The ethanol industry is pressuring Republican presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz of Texas to support the federal ethanol blending mandate. (The Hill)

CARBON TRADING:
• A new study from a clean energy advocate is urging Virginia to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative as a low-cost, low-hassle way for Virginia to comply with EPA’s impending Clean Power Plan. (ClimateWire)
• A petition drive in underway in Washington state for a 2016 ballot initiative that would phase in a $25-per-ton tax on carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels starting in July, 2017. (Oregon Public Broadcasting)

EMISSIONS: The Arctic’s melting permafrost could release 160 gigatons of greenhouse gases, which is less than humans are expected to emit from fossil fuels in coming decades but large enough to really matter for the planet. (The Washington Post)

POLITICS:
• T-Mobile announced Wednesday it has severed ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council. (National Journal)
• Wisconsin’s Board of Commissioners of Public Lands voted Tuesday to enact a staff ban on discussing or acting on climate change. (Bloomberg)

HAWAII: Maui’s mayor said he is considering turning Maui Electric Co. into a public utility in order to help the island adopt renewable energy at a faster pace and save customers money. (The Honolulu Star-Advertiser)

CALIFORNIA:
• A far-ranging California climate change measure cleared its first legislative hurdle Tuesday, with billionaire environmental benefactor Tom Steyer on hand to trumpet the bill’s economic benefits. (Los Angeles Times)
• The mayor of Los Angeles on Wednesday unveiled an ambitious plan to transform car-centric LA into place where people get around on bikes, buses, trains and by walking. (Associated Press)