I've had a like/hate relationship with Twitter, but it feels as if one of those emotions is growing stronger.
So I'm glad that I have a Substack project, free for all to read (and very glad that some people pay the modest, voluntary fee to keep it going)
An important moment: Christianity Today, the key evangelical magazine founded by Billy Graham, calls for Trump's impeachment, describing him as "a near perfect example of a human being who is morally lost and confused."
Here's the captain of the Harvard football team saluting the students and alumni who disrupted the year's big game. He's a real leader and he and his teammates deserve everyone's gratitude
An utterly crushing day for Big Oil
1) Chevron investors demand emission cuts
2) Dutch court tells Shell to cut emissions by half
3) Exxon shareholders buck the company and elect directors demanding climate action.
Thanks to all who fight--you push long enough and dominoes tumble
Manchin has taken more money from the fossil fuel industry than anyone else in DC
And the return on that investment has been enormous. Big Oil got its money worth a thousand times over.
Good golly! A few minutes ago a Boston judge acquitted 13 pipeline protesters on the grounds that the climate crisis made it necessary for them to commit civil disobedience. This may be a first in America. Details to follow, and go to
@ClimateDisobey
for some live video
Justice Kagan, in dissent:
"The Court appoints itself—instead of Congress or the expert agency—the decisionmaker on climate policy. I cannot think of many things more frightening."
Scared by that new report on climate change? Here's what you can do to help:
• Eat less meat (about 30%)
• Swap your car or plane ride for a bus or train
• Use a smart thermostat in your home, and upgrade to more efficient appliances
More:
My problem with the
@nytimes
election coverage is not mainly the dopey op-eds
It's that on one substantive story after another--Egyptian payoffs, Arlington cemetery, etc--they've failed to do the serious investigative work they're capable of.
Trump effectively gets a pass
I disagree with Liz Cheney about most things.
But she was the 3rd ranking Republican in the House, and she sacrificed her career to take on Trumpism, and I respect that act immensely.
1) Russia can only afford to fight because of its oil and gas
2) Russia's main weapon against Europe is its threat to cut off oil and gas
3) So it might be wise to stop using oil and gas now that we have workable alternatives
4) (Also saves the planet)
Watching the attacks on
@GretaThunberg
reminds me that industry and conservatives did just the same with Rachel Carson, the great environmental pioneer, in the 1960s. She was called a 'hysterical spinster.' Women have long been leading, and it's never been easy
Holy heck. The University of California system has just divested from fossil fuels. That's $80 billion, from what is the biggest and arguably best public system in the world. Thanks to all who have campaigned so long and hard--this is a breathtaking win!
New study: if we stop emissions immediately, Arctic still warms 5C/9F by century's end. We're not stopping global warming any more; we're fighting like hell for a level that civilizations might survive.
#ClimateStrike
HARVARD JUST DIVESTED FROM FOSSIL FUELS.
Because great activists never let up.
They don't use the word 'divestment,' but they said they have no direct investments left, will make no new ones, and that their indirect investments are in 'runoff mode' and will be allowed to expire
Truly staggering win in New York this a.m.: the state will divest its $226 billion pension fund from fossil fuels. That's the biggest pension fund yet, it comes after a decade of great activism, and it underlines the weakening power of Big Oil
Worth remembering that it was
@BernieSanders
who in 2016 debate was the first legit candidate to say that climate change was the greatest threat facing the world. Props to him for leading, and to others for figuring out he was right. That's how organizing is supposed to work.
If we switched to renewable energy, the number of ships crossing the ocean would fall almost in half.
Because they're just carrying coal and oil and gas
New York's old rainfall record stood for 150 years until 2021, and has now been broken three times.
Hot air holds more water vapor than cold; flooding follows fossil fuel combustion as night follows day.
When someone moans about $3.5 trillion spending over 10 years, perhaps remind them that the estimates for the cost of unchecked climate change top out at $551 trillion, which is more money than there is on earth at the moment.
It's rude to say it at the moment, I guess, but perhaps worth remembering that the North Carolina legislature literally banned using the latest science on sea level rise for coastal planning
The pictures from Colorado tonight are like when the comet hits in
#DontLookUp
So look. Long and hard.
And then get to work breaking the power of the fossil fuel industry
34 years and 40 days ago, Jim Hansen broke the news of global warming to the U.S. Senate.
Finally, today, they act
It's late, it's deeply compromised, and it's also a great victory for all who have fought so long and hard.
Such thanks to all of you, and on to the next battles
Fracking is NOT a transitional fuel, and it is dangerous to say so.
Fracking emits methane, which is about **84 TIMES** more powerful than CO2 in contributing to climate change for a generation.
This is not a joke. We either commit to the science or not.
Let's don't bail out cruise ships. They are horrible employers, floating petri dishes, and they wreck local and global environments. It's one business the world will be better off without.
I'm no lawyer, but here's my take on last 24 hrs
1) Atlantic Coast pipeline: dead
2) DAPL pipeline: in huge trouble, unless Trump's donors can persuade a court to overrule
3) KXL pipeline: blocked for long enough that if Biden wins it's all over
Such deep thanks to all who fight
BREAKING: White House likely to push federal aid for shale companies hit by coronavirus/international energy shock
Trump confidante & oil billionaire Harold Hamm lost $2 billion yesterday. Hamm reached out to admin but says he didnt make “direct" contact
Rand Paul going to the gym while waiting to find out his Covid test result is pretty much the working definition of libertarianism.
Here's how Ayn Rand put it: "I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man."
One of the biggest days in 30 years of the climate fight: NYC announces it will divest giant pension fund and sue the oil companies for damages. Earth's mightiest city now in full-on fight with its richest, most irresponsible industry
It is all but impossible to get pictures out of lower Manhattan this afternoon--the crowd, which we're estimating at 300k minimum, has overwhelmed the cellphone networks. It is big, and it is beautiful
#ClimateStrike
Trump's gross tax cut gave Patagonia $10 million, so they're passing it on to the various small environmental groups they already support. That's upstanding.
AS
@GretaThunberg
gets off her sailboat: "I’m not traveling like this because I want everyone to do so, I’m doing this to send a message that it is impossible to live sustainably today & that needs to change. It needs to become much easier."
@GretaThunberg
is good at messaging
The longer I think about
@DNC
insisting no-one hold a climate debate, the sillier it seems. We've literally never talked about this issue in a presidential debate, and we literally have to deal with it immediately. I don't understand why we shouldn't devote a night to it
It’s official. 500,000 people came out into the streets of Montreal today to join the Global
#ClimateStrike
They’re part of the 6.6 million who took part all over the world. The momentum is on our side and we are not going anywhere.
#FridaysForFuture
Fascinating: Milan will reopen its streets by turning them over to bikes and pedestrians,not cars
Deputy mayor: “Of course, we want to reopen the economy, but we think we should do it on a different basis from before."
Huge huge win, in Montana of all places, as a judge rules kids have a right to a safe climate.
This state has more coal than any state in the country, and has never denied a fossil fuel permit--but change is coming!
If you're keeping track, planet earth had the hottest June ever recorded, the hottest July, the 2nd-hottest August, and now the hottest September. Please join the fight for a livable future
Basic IPCC formula, in order
1) build massive amounts of (now cheap) sun and wind
2) Electrify everything to run on it
3) Conservation and efficiency
4) Research the hell out of the last hard stuff (planes, cement, etc)
5) Stop cutting down trees for cows (or anything else)
Holy toledo, they're talking about essentially shutting down California's power grid this weekend because of fire risk. Life in the climate crisis feels scary in lots of ways, and this is one.
PG&E now considering a power blackout in all of its California territory this wknd over extreme fire risk — an unprecedented action.
"this system will be the strongest of the year and likely will be stronger than the October 2017 northern CA fire event.”
The
@nytimes
columnist feebly trying to trash
@GretaThunberg
sums up his point thusly: "Democracy often calls for waiting and seeing."
We've been waiting for 30 years, and what we've seen are a string of the hottest years in recorded history. So maybe our democracies should...act
Shell's CEO chose the hottest day in human history to announce he was reneging on the company's climate pledges.
Thanks to the
@newyorker
for letting me call out this kind of despicable behavior
This is a mind-boggling story. The fossil fuel industry hired hundreds of actors to pretend they were citizens and testify at pubic hearings against renewable energy. And it worked.
Amazing action. Harvard Yale Game is literally peak establishment--and they were forced to think about what their investments are doing to the world. Such thanks for this leadership!
Shell CEO on climate change: “Yeah, we knew. Everybody knew. And somehow we all ignored it.”
This is beyond maddening. Not everyone knew, because the oil industry worked for 3 decades to cover it up. Your greed wasted our best chance at survival
The new Brazilian president's pledge to wreck the Amazon is a tragic reminder that environmentalists need to win a fight forever, while the other side only needs to win it once.
The uncanny confluence of Putin's invasion and the IPCC report is a stark reminder: fossil fuel powers the worst crises facing our planet.
If we use this moment to get off oil and gas, we have a fighting chance as a planet.
As GOP dopes rattle on about how we shouldn't do anything because of China,
@GretaThunberg
says quietly, 'in Sweden some people say we shouldn't do anything because of the US. Just so you know.'
Audience explodes in joyful laughter
This will turn out to be an iconic image of the global warming era. It came on the last day of the hottest decade recorded in Australia, and on earth. So far.
Americans are understandably preoccupied right now.
But a typhoon with winds gusting to 235 mph is now crashing into the Philippines--possibly the strongest storm ever to make landfall on earth. If you pray, now would be a good time
Super Typhoon Goni is about to slam into the Phillippines as about as strong of a storm as the planet can produce
If it landfalls at its current strength (195 mph with gusts to 235 mph!!) it will be the most powerful tropical cyclone on record to make landfall in world history
A crucial thing that
@AOC
@sunrisemvmt
and
#GreenNewDeal
get right about climate change is the Scale of action needed to address it (especially since we waited so long to start)
Since October, Australia's
#bushfires
have spewed as much carbon into the air as the entire country produces from every car, home, and factory in a typical eight months. Climate chaos feeds on itself now.
Huge huge huge win--Norwegian govt (an oil state) is recommending that the world's largest sovereign wealth fund Fully Divest From All Fossil Fuel. Financial Times: "this will send shockwaves through the energy sector."
For those who are wondering, this thread offers a calm and comprehensive scientific account of why climate change makes fires like the ones now shrouding California more likely and more hellish
If Northern California had received anywhere near the typical amount of autumn precipitation this year (around 4-5 in. of rain near
#CampFire
point of origin), explosive fire behavior & stunning tragedy in
#Paradise
would almost certainly not have occurred. (1/n)
#CAfire
#CAwx
Today's declaration from the WH banning Russian oil is, potentially, a turning point for the world.
If we use it to wean ourselves off fossil fuel fast, as Biden says we will, then we can take on both despots and climate destruction.
It may be a day historians look back on