Climate Horizons 17 (Have you read Rebecca Solnit?)
News, Views and Solutions in an All-of-the-Above World
Greetings!
We hope your 2024 is off to a good start! We’ve vetted and selected a range of worthwhile climate-related news and information and resources for you.
Something a little different to start this issue, as we’d like to introduce you to author and activist Rebecca Solnit, if you’re not familiar with her writing and work already.
We highly encourage you to read a few of the selected pieces from Rebecca that we’ve highlighted below. You’ll be glad you did.
From climate one:
Rebecca Solnit is a writer, historian, and activist. She is the author of twenty-five books on feminism, environmental and urban history, popular power, social change and insurrection, wandering and walking, hope and catastrophe. She co-edited the 2023 anthology "Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility."
…
A product of the California public education system from kindergarten to graduate school, she writes regularly for the Guardian, serves on the board of the climate group Oil Change International, and in 2022 launched the climate project Not Too Late.
Just a few selected writings for you to start with:
The Guardian (July 26, 2023)
We can’t afford to be climate doomers
It often seems that people are searching harder for evidence we’re defeated than that we can win
The New Statesman (July 17, 2023)
Why climate despair is a luxury
Those facing flood and fire can’t afford to lose hope. Neither should we.
Washington Post (March 15, 2023)
What if climate change meant not doom — but abundance?
The Guardian (January 12, 2023)
‘If you win the popular imagination, you change the game’: why we need new stories on climate
So much is happening, both wonderful and terrible – and it matters how we tell it. We can’t erase the bad news, but to ignore the good is the route to indifference or despair
The Guardian (November 18, 2021)
Ten ways to confront the climate crisis without losing hope
It’s easy to despair at the climate crisis, or to decide it’s already too late – but it’s not. Here’s how to keep the fight alive
And finally, the last piece we list/link here is a wonderful, short essay from 2017. If you read it once, you will probably read it more than once!
Harpers (November 2017 issue)
Preaching to The Choir
And as a PDF file from the Harpers archive
Climate One TV: Rebecca Solnit on Why It’s Not Too Late
"Some days I think that if we lose the climate battle, it’ll be due in no small part to this defeatism among the comfortable in the global north, while people in frontline communities continue to fight like hell for survival."
— Rebecca Solnit
• SELECTED NEWS and INFORMATION:
A few recent news items, usually in the form of a headline and link, along with a short description or excerpt.
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NASA Video on YouTube (January 12, 2024)
NASA and NOAA on 2023 global temperature ranking, climate events
Climate researchers from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will release their annual assessments of global temperatures and discuss the major climate trends of 2023
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Carbon brink (January 12, 2024)
2023's unexpected and unexplained warming
And a look forward to what 2024 might have in store
Explaining 2023’s unusual heat: Scientists did not expect 2023 to be all that exceptional at the start of the year. As Carbon Brief reported at the start of 2023, four different groups provided temperature predictions for the year prior to any data being collected – the UK Met Office, NASA’s Dr Gavin Schmidt, Berkeley Earth and Carbon Brief’s own estimate.
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The Guardian (January 10, 2024)
US oil lobby launches eight-figure ad blitz amid record fossil fuel extraction
The American oil lobby has launched an eight-figure media campaign this week promoting the idea that fossil fuels are “vital” to global energy security, alarming climate experts.
“US natural gas and oil play a key role in supplying the world with cleaner, more reliable energy,” the new initiative’s website says.
The campaign comes amid record fossil fuel extraction in the US, and as the industry is attempting to capitalize on the war in Gaza to escalate production even further, climate advocates say.
Launched Tuesday by the nation’s top fossil fuel interest group, the Lights on Energy campaign will work to “dismantle policy threats” to the sector, the American Petroleum Institute (API) CEO, Mike Sommers, told CNN in an interview this week.
The ad blitz – which uses images of farm vehicles, footballers under floodlights and concert goers holding phones lit up – comes after US oil production reached a record high in 2023, which was also the hottest year ever recorded.
RELATED:
Eco Business (November 21, 2023)
Coal industry body rebrands to ‘FutureCoal: The Global Alliance for Sustainable Coal’
The association says that the sector has allowed “anti-coal sentiment” to divide it for too long. The rebranded body is pushing for an “inclusive” international policy framework that supports the rights of coal producers.
The World Coal Association, the trade body for the coal industry, has changed its name in a bid to revamp the image of the dirtiest fossil fuel and attract new members.
I know so many people who feel hopeless, and they ask me, “What should I do?” And I say: “Act. Do something.” Because that is the best medicine against sadness and depression.
— Greta Thunberg
• GOOD NEWS and SOLUTIONS:
One or two or a few items that highlight either real and notable progress being made somewhere or information about a few of the many solutions that are out there and available today.
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HEATED (January 11, 2024)
Yes, climate activism can win
Here are four different ways activists went about achieving real climate progress in 2023
The list is not intended to be a comprehensive collection of climate wins of last year, nor is it meant to be a look at the oft-described “best” ones. Rather, it’s simply meant to show you a handful of different routes through which actual progress was achieved, to give you a closer look at how it’s done.
None of these examples focus on individuals acting alone. That wasn’t on purpose, but it is illustrative of how change happens. Yes, there can be extraordinary individuals who spark a movement. But climate change is a planetary-scale problem. It can only be solved by collective action.
The most important thing to remember is that each of the groups listed below are made up of ordinary people, all of whom took small steps that mattered to them. Eventually, over a period of years, they wound up making a big difference.
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The Guardian (January 11, 2024)
World’s renewable energy capacity grew at record pace in 2023
IEA report says 50% growth last year keeps hope of achieving Cop28 climate target of tripling clean energy capacity
Global renewable energy capacity grew by the fastest pace recorded in the last 20 years in 2023, which could put the world within reach of meeting a key climate target by the end of the decade, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The world’s renewable energy grew by 50% last year to 510 gigawatts (GW) in 2023, the 22nd year in a row that renewable capacity additions set a new record, according to figures from the IEA.
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CNN (January 10, 2024)
US climate pollution fell in 2023 as country shutters coal-fired power plants, new data shows
A new report says that ongoing improvements in solar and wind tech will keep driving steep cost declines that make them even more competitive against fossil fuels.
Planet-warming pollution in the US decreased nearly 2% in 2023 even as the economy grew, according to new data from the nonpartisan Rhodium Group.
The falling emissions, driven largely by retirements of dirty, coal-fired power plants, put US climate pollution at its lowest level since 1991, Rhodium analyst Ben King told CNN. But the numbers also show the nation is nowhere near hitting the aggressive climate targets laid out by President Joe Biden at the start of his first term.
RELATED:
The Guardian (January 4, 2024)
Germany’s emissions hit 70-year low as it reduces reliance on coal
Country emitted 73m fewer tonnes of greenhouse gases in 2023 than year before, study reveals
• THINGS YOU CAN DO:
Some readers of the book Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility (highlighted above), asked the editors, Rebecca Solnit and Thelma Young Lutunatabua, what they could do about climate change. The pair has added a chapter with practical advice on how to get involved.
What Can I Do about the Climate Emergency?
(A LOT! HERE’S HOW!)
Everybody’s practical guide to what they can do against climate chaos and for a just and thriving natural and human world
• INTERNET RESOURCES & SOCIAL MEDIA CONNECTIONS:
There are a lot of great resources on the web and social media — people, groups and pages. In each newsletter, we suggest one or two you might want to check out (on the web or Facebook or Threads or Instagram or any number of other sites).
This week, we’re highlighting DeSmog: “Clearing the PR pollution that clouds climate science with award-winning investigative environmental journalism”
This site offers a wide variety of current and investigative, national and international news about our climate crisis. Here are links to some specific sections:
• Science Denial • Social Justice • Agriculture • Politics and Policy • Activism • Transport • Finance • Opinion & Analysis • All Articles
DeSmog News ON THREADS
DeSmog ON FACEBOOK
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I love Solnit's work! Thank you for collecting and sharing it