helenczerski

helenczerski, 2 months ago to climate

I have just discovered that those odd waste/recycling bins that are all over the oldest bits of Bergen, Norway, link to an UNDERGROUND PNEUMATIC WASTE TRANSPORT SYSTEM. The waste collects for a bit and then WHOOSH... it's off to the recycling centre. All underground. No bin lorries (garbage trucks), fewer road vehicles, less noise... amazing. @davidho says that my (considerable) excitement about this is entirely unreasonable. I disagree.
https://www.envacgroup.com/how-it-works/the-envac-system/

#climate #waste #Norway

helenczerski, 1 year ago to climate

Planet Earth has two fundamental rules:

1. Energy flows through (in from sunlight and then radiated away into space some time later - Earth is just a temporary stop-off)
2. Stuff/atoms/matter goes round and round

Every decision we make about a sustainable future should bear those in mind. We can’t change these rules, so we have to choose what we do to work within this system, like the rest of nature does. And this illuminates a lot of issues (see following posts). #climate #Earth #Energy

helenczerski, 1 year ago to books

Just finished this, and I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in the UK parliamentary system and UK democracy. It’s a very readable deep dive into what does and doesn’t work at the moment (only published last month), and although it’s depressing along the way, it points to some relatively straightforward fixes at the end. We can change this if we choose. Read it and tell your MP! #books #democracy #Parliament

helenczerski, 1 year ago to climate

I love the idea of cities that are far more people-centred than most today, with properly flexible travel options and fewer cars… and maybe we’re not that far away (and not just in Utrecht). Today I had a large box to collect from my sister, so I had a nice run across London to her house, then a cup of tea, and then a PedalMe e-cargo bike arrived to take me and the box home. And it was FUN. More of this! #cities #bikes #ecargo #climate

helenczerski, 2 months ago to random

Colleagues at UCL just shared this with me and it's GREAT. It's an open letter from Tim Berners-Lee, pointing the way towards a much fairer and better web. Do share with those who still need convincing to move from Xs of this work to here and BlueSky!

https://webfoundation.org/2024/03/marking-the-webs-35th-birthday-an-open-letter/

helenczerski, 8 months ago to Futurology

I got a question today about desalination plants in Cornwall and the damage they might do to the ocean. My answer was that no-one should be considering desalination in the UK. The problem is that we manage our existing freshwater resources incredibly badly, wasting huge amounts for absolutely no reason. Everyone should read Tim Smedley’s book The Last Drop to find out how, and we all should be angry about it - it’s not just about sewage, but the entire water system. #water #UK #desalination

helenczerski, 4 months ago to books

I've been meaning to post this pair of books for a while. They complement each other perfectly with everything you need to know about the material world - both where it comes from and where it goes to. Both great, but the combination is even better. They're both brilliantly written & a joy to read (well, from a writing perspective - the message isn't always comfortable).

#books #climate #environment #science #materials

helenczerski, 4 months ago to science

Well, the picture at the top isn't one I sent them and completely mis-represents the situation (it was constantly stormy and there was no sea ice!), but here's the piece I wrote for the Observer about the five weeks I just spent on a research ship in the Labrador Sea with 21 colleagues, measuring air-sea gas transfer and the mechanisms behind it:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/jan/07/ocean-breathing-climate-crisis-carbon-oxygen-helen-czerski-blue-machine

#science #ocean #ship #OceanBreathing

helenczerski, 11 months ago to random

A thought, from a discussion this morning: one of the problems our society faces is that kindness is local (reinforced by small communities and reliant on individuals helping each other - multiple small events) and therefore not easily scalable, while competitiveness is extremely scalable. But kindness and humanity are the most important things in life. We all need to keep putting small local effort in to make sure the important stuff is at the forefront. #ideas #humanity

helenczerski, 10 months ago to Energy

It’s a windy day and just look at the UK’s electricity mix: 70% renewables and only 8% fossil fuels. And those numbers are only going to improve with time. Hooray! #energy #climate #renewables

helenczerski, 10 months ago (edited 10 months ago) to random

The framing of the discussion here shouldn’t really be “modernisation” - new systems that work better for most people are fine - it’s about de-humanising the railways, just like all the other systems. The jobs issue is separate (and serious). Humans sometimes need things the system hasn’t thought of sometimes. And that requires a human.

"Plans for mass closure of railway ticket offices in England confirmed"

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jul/05/plans-for-mass-closure-of-railway-ticket-offices-in-england-confirmed?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

helenczerski, 9 months ago to random

I was not expecting Sellotape to make me ponder the definition of “plastic” today. But my departmental stationary cupboard has “zero plastic sellotape” (similar to Scotch tape, if you’re from the USA).

Plant-based things can be made non-biodegradable, bamboo fabric being the obvious eg - it’s rayon, which contribute to plastic marine waste & doesn’t decompose. And this “zero-plastic” tape will only compost in an industrial composter.

If it looks like plastic and quacks like plastic…
#plastic

helenczerski, 10 months ago to philosophy

Is the whole Twitter disaster really just a philosophical experiment, along the lines of the Ship of Theseus thought experiment? If you replace all the bits, is it still the same thing? “Twitter: Elon Musk says he wants to change company’s bird logo” #philosophy #birdsite https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/jul/23/twitter-elon-musk-says-he-wants-to-change-companys-bird-logo?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

helenczerski, 9 months ago to books

“It’s ungrateful, frankly, to think that the only good thing about the ocean is that it’s where fish live. The fish are very nice, but if you just look at the fish, you’re missing 99% of what’s happening. The ocean is not nothing. It defines our planet.”

Blue Machine is moving across the pond (out in the US on October 3rd) and Publishers Weekly were nice enough to interview me about it.

https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/authors/interviews/article/92999-waterworld-pw-talks-with-helen-czerski.html

#books #ocean #climate

helenczerski, 9 months ago to climate

The earthworms in North America are invaders. There used to be native earthworms, but they were wiped out by glaciers around 10,000 years ago and all the current worms arrived accidentally (via humans) from Europe and Asia in the past few centuries.

https://ecosystemsontheedge.org/earthworm-invaders/

And now global warming is causing “global worming”, as worms spread northwards into a warmer Arctic:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/14/climate/invasive-worms-arctic-environment.html

The consequences aren’t clear yet. But it’s a lot of change.

#climate #Earth #worms

helenczerski, 6 months ago to Florida

What's interesting about Florida is that they are generally suspicious of electric cars, and yet they've got electric micromobility TOTALLY sorted. There are golf carts everywhere. There are apparently even new developments where they have double-width sidewalks with a separate track for golf carts.

#EVs #Florida #micromobility

helenczerski, 3 months ago to photography

This evening I had the pleasure of opening this wonderful photography exhibition at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, timed to coincide with the 200th anniversary of the RNLI (on Monday). It focuses on the women in the RNLI, and it’s great. Do go! It’s free…

https://www.rmg.co.uk/whats-on/national-maritime-museum/women-of-the-rnli
#RNLI #RMG #photography #London

helenczerski, 11 months ago to random

Just been sent this about weird right-wing tech bro idealogies: https://washingtonspectator.org/understanding-tescreal-silicon-valleys-rightward-turn/ I think the reason these tech bros are so “worried” about super-intelligent computers crushing humanity is that if they were given the capability and the opportunity, they can’t imagine themselves doing anything other than crushing all lesser beings. It’s a worldview based on power play and a complete lack of humanity. They need to sort out their own insecurities before being allowed out into the world.

helenczerski, 11 months ago to random

Today is World Ocean Day, and while we celebrate the ocean, we need to rethink our relationship with it. The blue of our blue planet isn’t just a colour - it’s a critical part of our own identify as citizen of this planet.

We cannot afford to speak of the ocean as though it is simple or empty or worthless. We have to see this dynamic engine as a critical part of our existing planetary life support system, in whose shadow we are privileged to live.

#Ocean #WorldOceanDay

helenczerski, 4 months ago to Podcasts

Just found this, all about how planned obsolescence came about (it really was planned, and enforced, early on). I'd never heard the term "psychological obsolescence" before either - us thinking things are old because there's a newer shinier one. And I love that they included the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and the Shoe Event Horizon at the end. Well worth a listen.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001tqj9

#radio #podcasts #climate

helenczerski, 3 months ago to random

Why do politicians find it so hard to keep their climate promises? In today’s Rare Earth (broadcast on BBC R4 at 12, & widely available as a podcast after that), we’ll be investigating the problem, and looking for workable solutions.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rare-earth/id1725984063

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001vbt0

helenczerski, 3 months ago to ocean

awwww... there's a pygmy squid, and here's a lovely short comic story describing how researchers are trying to help it survive difficult conditions.

https://hakaimagazine.com/videos-visuals/pastoral-preferences-of-the-pygmy-squid/?omhide=true&utm_source=Hakai+Magazine+Weekly&utm_campaign=1403f0a3e9-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_09_06_COPY_03&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0fc1967411-1403f0a3e9-121628661

#ocean #squid #science #comics

helenczerski, 3 months ago to climate

OMG, and there we have it. In a historical paper describing an argument from the 1840s about whether sewage systems should be one-way (and just take stuff "away") or circular (and spread sewage on the field to feed more people) this line about the disagreements between Edwin Chadwick and engineers like Bazelgette sets out reason that so much of modern engineering has caused environmental problems - it's been all about local solutions and not systems.

#climate #environment #history

helenczerski, 3 months ago to Energy

Ooh, I've just seen the final schedule of sessions for the FullyCharged & Everything Electric LONDON show on March 28th, 29th and 30th: https://uk.everythingelectric.show/london and we have a FANTASTIC show for you. We'll be covering all the big questions about the future of energy and transport, with lots of new topics and amazing exhibitors. And it's definitely not just about cars - plenty of home energy, micromobility and society-level stuff. Do join us!

#energy #London #climate #electric

helenczerski, 1 month ago to books

I'm only 20% of the way through Fire Weather, but it's already the best book I've read this year by miles. It's a stunning story about our relationship with oil & fire, absolutely beautifully written, 🧪 plus stuff like this:

"One way to visualise a tank of gas is to imagine a mass of ancient plant matter weighing as much as 15 blue whales..."

#books #climate #oil #science