Heron Power raised $140 million to build a 40GW solid-state transformer factory. That single number matters: the U.S. grid faces a transformer bottleneck measured in years of backlog, and solid-state designs are smaller, faster to produce, and more controllable than the century-old iron-core units currently choking grid expansion. This is infrastructure funding, not software, and it is one of the clearest signals that grid hardware is finally attracting serious capital.
Not Boring's 181st Weekly Dose of Optimism also introduces a recurring science segment from Ulkar Aghayeva, co-author of Frontier of the Year 2025, a scored review of 202 scientific developments ranked by probability of generalization and potential impact. The segment is paywalled for not boring world members and represents a methodological approach to science coverage: probability-weighted, not hype-weighted. That framing alone is worth understanding before you read the underlying stories.
The full issue spans grid hardware, scientific breakthroughs, and, per the editors, aliens. The Aghayeva addition signals a structural shift in how Not Boring is covering the frontier, moving from narrative essays toward scored, repeatable scientific tracking. Read the original to see which breakthroughs scored highest and why the transformer factory is the most consequential grid story most people have not followed closely enough.
[READ ORIGINAL →]