The pandemic babies who were born in 2021 will probably never see a world that resembles the one we’re inhabiting now. For those who think we’ll have established a colony on Mars by then and will be shuttling humans that direction, I say wake the fuck up and take care of the planet you’re already living on. JFC.
Good interview with Greg Jackson CEO of Octopus Energy.
"I think the energy transition used to sound like quite a complicated process. The reality is that it just boils down to electrification. We need to electrify everything we can and then be generating as much electricity as we can from renewable resources.
Now, underneath that, there may be a whole lot of policy priorities. But electrification has got to be the one word"
In the 1880s, the mark of consumption among elites was replacing gaslights for electric ones. Today it is the replacement of electric ones for useless decorative gas lights that constantly burn. We see these in many wealthy neighborhoods in Chicago.
I really don't know about the mechanics of this system. Nor do I know anything about the people. Just always find such fixtures strange.
This BBC graph of average sea surface temperatures since 1979 should have (but hasn't) spurred our politicians into action to actually do something. Clearly there was a tipping point in May 2023, which has certainly been evident in the UK due to the last 12 months of even more unusual weather.
Where are our leaders when we actually need them? We need a general election, a hung parliament, and some #Green representation in government.
In the context of explaining my transition into ecological research, I am regularly facing questions / comments from both scientists and non-scientists, as to whether engaging in scientific research aiming at understanding the ecological or climate crises we are facing is (still) an effective and timely thing to do to address these crises. This post attempts to […]
@Francois It seems to me that the research questions that would be the most effective against the #ClimateEmergency would be empirical models of the decision-making of corporations, governments, banks, international institutions especially at concrete events such as #COP29, and modelling of how the decisions could in reality be rational, transparent, evidence-based, participatory. Not just hypothetical "if we had a revolution" models.
People like @OliverEscobar do research in that direction.
🇧🇷 Rains, destruction, and deaths in the south of Brazil demand a new term to define a climate catastrophe. Hundreds of thousands were displaced in Rio Grande do Sul, #Brazil's southernmost state. This is the same state that endured three climate disasters in 2023 alone. 🧵
Ministers in charge of the UK’s climate policies met with fossil fuel companies and lobbyists over 100 times last year, four times as much as they did external climate scientists, campaigners, and charities.
These ministerial oil and gas industry meetings came as the government backtracked on several policies designed to meet the UK’s 2050 net zero emissions target.
The Good Law Project's legal campaign against Michael Gove’s new rules blocking energy-efficient homes will reach the High Court on 18 June.
Gove’s planning guidance undermines the power of local communities to build housing that tackles fuel poverty and the climate crisis.
"We keep doing it because we have to do it, so [the powerful] cannot say that they didn’t know. We know what we’re talking about. They can say they don’t care, but they can’t say they didn’t know"
"I think 3C is being hopeful and conservative. 1.5C is already bad, but I don’t think there is any way we are going to stick to that. There is not any clear sign from any government that we are actually going to stay under 1.5C.”
The world, especially its politicians, needs to wake up to what is inevitably going to continue to unfold over the next few decades. It's not about having a bit more rain and some uncomfortably warm summers, and a few islands we can't afford to visit disappearing under water. It's about floods, fires, storms, food insecurity, mass migration and in the worst case scenario societal collapse.
“There’s no place in the #climate negotiations for fossil-fuel companies. There is no place in the plastic negotiations for #plastic manufacturers. It just absolutely boggles my mind that anybody thinks they have a legitimate seat at the table." #pollution#climateemergency#lobbys
“It has driven me crazy in the past six years that governments are just oblivious to history. We know that the #tobacco industry lied through their teeth for decades. The lead industry did the same. The asbestos industry did the same. The plastics industry has done the same. The #pesticide industry has done the same.” #climateemergency#healthemergency#lobbys#climatecrisisisahealthcrisis
The BBC are reporting that April was the warmest ever, making it the 11th month running, and that the global average ocean temperature is increasing literally every day. However, they really need to ram some of the following points home, and they need to hold politicians to account:
even if we stopped emitting CO2 right now, this is the coolest it will be for many generations.
achieving net zero by 2050 is intended to limit average global temperature rise to 1.5°C; however, we've probably already exceeded that 25 years early, so 1.5° is impossible.
an average is an average… some parts of the planet will be much hotter, and some areas may become practically uninhabitable, including large parts of southern Europe.
even once net zero is achieved, temperatures will continue to rise for a few decades.
to achieve net zero at all we have to cut emissions very rapidly. The last 20% of savings are always harder than the first 20%, so Sunak kicking the can down the road is absolutely criminally negligent.
large parts of the most fertile areas of Britain could be underwater well before 2050.
it will cost a lot more to do nothing, not only in financial terms, but in terms of human lives, social upheaval, and the favourite subject of the British right, mass migration.
@OliverNoble@Kellys the #Greensought to be a far bigger challenge to the status quo than the SNP. The SNP want a change in governance structure to less than half a percent of the planet, while leaving corporate interests largely unaffected. The Greens want – and need – and entire overthrow of the global economic system.