Congratulations to our friends at ExxonMobil, once again the largest company in the world. I think we can all agree that this is a deserved promotion, given how much more ExxonMobil brings to our lives than does Apple. How much more good ExxonMobil does for the planet. Capitalism, guys: It works.

Reuters explains what happened:

Exxon Mobil briefly overtook Apple as the largest U.S. publicly traded company by market value on Friday as shares of the technology giant continued to fall.

Apple shares traded down 2 percent on the day at $441.31, down from a high above $700 set in September, for a market value of roughly $416 billion. Exxon shares, flat on the day at $91.33, added to a market value of about $416.5 billion.

Apple has closed the day as the largest company by market capitalization since late January last year, when it passed Exxon.

Or, in English: A publicly traded company's market cap is its value calculated by multiplying its share price by the number of public shares it offers. As of a second ago, here's what that looked like for each company.

In his inaugural address this week, President Obama committed us to get back to work on the challenge of a sustainable energy future. “We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations,” he said. But will this reignite the debate on climate change or have three widely publicized stories already done that for us? Data shows that 2012 was the hottest year on record in the US, starting last March with a heat wave in parts of the nation that kick started a severe drought in …

The election is over, the inauguration is complete, and it is time, as President Obama said in his inaugural address, to "answer the call of history." That means taking bold action on climate change. As President Obama embarks on his second term, many are already discussing his legacy. Will he be the president who stood by while the climate crisis unfolded? Or will he be our generation’s Abraham Lincoln, rallying the nation to tackle the fundamental moral challenge of our time? The president sounded all the right notes on Monday:  We will respond to the threat of climate change ... knowing that …

In the ongoing saga that is the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, it’s clear that supporters of the dangerous project are getting anxious.  Perhaps they’re seeing the writing on the wall that this project is nowhere near a sure thing, thanks to themassive resistance to the pipeline, the scientists throwing their weight in opposition to it, and the new studies out showing even greater negative effects if built. Or perhaps they’re looking ahead to the wave of people planning to descend upon DC in opposition to the pipeline and in favor of strong climate action on the 17th of February. In the latest attempt to influence …

I was fired up by President Obama's remarks on climate and clean energy in his second inaugural address -- and gauging by the huge cheer that went up from the crowd, it sounded like the hundreds of thousands of people on the National Mall were, too. The day after that inspiring call to action by our President, the Sierra Club is announcing a milestone in the steady progress we’ve been making for two years to tackle climate disruption by moving America beyond coal. Today, the Sierra Club and Warren Buffett's MidAmerican Energy Company announced a landmark settlement that requires the …

A story in the Minneapolis Star Tribune highlights the increasingly common use of 100 meter wind turbines for new wind power projects, up from the previous 80 meter standard.  The technological change grabs more wind energy, with consistently higher wind speeds at higher altitudes, meaning states can get even more power from a similar number of turbines. In our 2010 report Energy Self-Reliant States, we illustrated the potential for state self-reliance on wind power with the following map, using NREL data that assumed turbine heights of 80 meters (and a minimum capacity factor of 35%, to be conservative).  The following …

By Janet Larsen The world produced 2,241 million tons of grain in 2012, down 75 million tons or 3 percent from the 2011 record harvest. The drop was largely because of droughts that devastated several major crops—namely corn in the United States (the world’s largest crop) and wheat in Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Australia. Each of these countries also is an important exporter. Global grain consumption fell significantly for the first time since 1995, as high prices dampened use for ethanol production and livestock feed. Still, overall consumption did exceed production. With drought persisting in key producing regions, there is …

Breaking: Cuccinelli and Dominion Move to Repeal Virginia’s Clean Electricity Standard Proposed legislation would harm environment and, opponents say, constitutes a confession that Dominion has accepted $77 million from ratepayers without properly fulfilling intent of current law RICHMOND—Dominion Virginia Power has informed environmental groups that the company has reached a tentative agreement with Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to support legislation that would effectively repeal the state’s signature clean energy law.  The move, environmentalists said, would not only harm the environment but also represents a de facto admission of guilt by Dominion. The company has already accepted $77 million from …

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli wants to be president. He wants it so bad that he can't drink coffee anymore because all he can taste is the White House. (I just made that joke up; feel free to use it for a small fee.) Last time Cuccinelli appeared in these pages, it was for his tax-dollar-funded campaign to discredit climate scientist Michael Mann. He's since written a book called The Last Line of Defense which is about the "fight for liberty." The cover of it looks like marble, which seems like a weird metaphor.

Anyway, part of freedom-fighter Ken Cuccinelli's plan to fight for freedom and America all the way from Richmond to Washington is revoking renewable energy incentives. Freedom! Eagles! From the Associated Press:

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and the state’s largest electric utilities are proposing to repeal financial incentives for using renewable energy after a report last year found that the millions of dollars in bonuses haven’t yielded the intended environmental gains and have contributed to increases in customer bills.

Under the agreement announced Tuesday by the attorney general’s office, Dominion Virginia Power and Appalachian Power would no longer be eligible to receive the bonuses called “adders” for using sources of renewable energy or building new power plants that use fossil fuels. Incentives will still remain for nuclear and offshore wind, but the bonuses would be reduced.

The agreement does not, however, repeal the state’s voluntary goals that utilities have 15 percent of their generation coming from renewable sources by 2025. And utilities can still seek to recover the costs related to reaching those goals, officials said.

This column was co-written by Beyond Coal Director Mary Anne Hitt and National Program Director Sarah Hodgdon. Each week in our blogs, we celebrate the grassroots heroes of the fight for the planet. Today, we are joining forces to celebrate the life of an extraordinary hero and friend. Neither of us will ever forget where we were the moment we got the call that Becky Tarbotton had died in a freak swimming accident in Mexico. At that moment, we were assuredly among dozens of others around the country who were receiving similar phone calls, and who were sinking into stunned …