'This really demonstrates how easy it is for misinformation to spread,' said Fisch-Friedman, who is 27. She originally thought the answer was “wind power.” The controversy began Sunday night after the Times posted the Monday crossword online and Molly Fisch-Friedman, an analyst at the environmental group Climate Nexus, solved the puzzle and began fuming about 47 across.įisch-Friedman, who has been doing crosswords since she was in middle school in New Jersey, was incredulous that the Times would imply that coal is an environmentally friendly energy source. “The fact that that filtered down to something like The New York Times crossword puzzle is an example of how these approaches by industry are ultimately successful at influencing our discussions and approach toward climate,” Hastings-Simon said in an interview.

Sara Hastings-Simon, a University of Calgary physicist and Times crossword aficionado, said there was “such a violent reaction” to the crossword clue because promises of “clean coal” have been used “as this delay tactic, as a way to say we don’t need to do anything else” to address climate change. The Times’ backtracking shows the fading acceptance in the Biden years of the once-popular phrase “clean coal.” The Energy Department has abolished the Office of Clean Coal and Carbon Management established under President Trump, who romanced about “beautiful, clean coal.” And the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity recently changed its name to America’s Power. “For the Times to actually embrace coal is a mortal sin - and I’m Catholic.” “They got pounded by their base,” former coal lobbyist Fred Palmer said in an interview.

It’s also a minor humiliation for Will Shortz, the legendary New York Times puzzle editor who, according to the puzzle constructor, changed her original clue and inserted the error over her objection.

Nytimes puzzle