**Insurance is like a shared emergency piggy bank.** Families pay money into it, and it is supposed to help fix their homes when something bad happens.

In California, big wildfires have damaged many homes. A warming planet makes fire danger worse, and many houses were built in places that burn easily. Some insurance companies now charge more or stop protecting homes.

Lynn’s house stayed standing after a fire, but smoke and ash damaged it badly. She stands outside its boarded-up windows wearing flowery trousers. Her backup insurance helped pay for somewhere else to stay, but not the repairs she needed. She had to borrow money.

**Two people want to lead California’s insurance watchdog:**
- **Ben Allen** wants insurance companies to stay, follow better rules, and help make homes safer.
- **Jane Kim** wants the state government to run a shared disaster-insurance program. Some people worry about how to pay for it.

Both want families to get better help. Neighbors and workers are also making homes harder to burn by changing building materials and removing nearby things that catch fire. Whole neighborhoods need to work together.

**The wordplay:**
- “Cover band” usually means musicians playing other people’s songs. Here, “cover” means insurance protection! Darker green places on the map have more homes using the backup plan.
- “A tale of two markets” borrows a famous book title to describe how insurance works differently in safer and riskier places.
- Lynn’s remark about burning her house is an upset, bitter joke about not getting help—not a safe suggestion.

Power plants are big factories that make electricity for lights and homes—not plants with leaves! Some burn coal or gas, releasing gases that warm Earth and pollution that can make people sick.

A rule made under President Biden says certain power plants must catch much of their planet-warming gas, run less, or close. President Trump’s government wants to remove that rule, but the change is not final.

Georgia Power is keeping some coal plants running longer and building more gas-powered machines, partly to power buildings full of computers. An expert warns that removing the rule could more than double the warming gas from those new machines.

The company says it wants dependable electricity that people can afford. Health and nature groups are asking a court to stop the change because they worry about people and Earth.

Tuvalu is a skinny strip of land with homes and trees, surrounded by blue water. As Earth gets warmer, ice on land melts and the sea rises. This can flood low islands.

World leaders agreed that **island countries should still count as countries even if their land goes underwater**. They should also keep their rights to the ocean around them, including places to fish.

Philip Davis, the leader of the Bahamas, wants countries to help protect island communities. Money could pay for sea walls, coastal trees that soften waves, or moving people somewhere safer. But this agreement does not provide extra money by itself—more work is needed.

“Land being swallowed by water” means water is covering the land. The ocean doesn’t really have a mouth!