Beth Chajes

What's the deal with balcony solar? Cora Stryker joins me to explain how "plug-in" solar took Europe by storm and is finally, via Utah (?), making its way to America.

Today on Volts: I've had more requests to cover this than almost any other topic in the pod's history, so now, at long last, balcony solar! We dig into how "plug-in solar" took off in Europe & how it's making its way to the US, starting in Utah. Backyard DIY types rejoice!

Environmentally, Offshore Wind Is … Fine | Hakai Magazine How often can you say that about an energy generation system?

If you _do_ want to know the true science on the environmental consequences of offshore wind development, we did a story based on two different systematic reviews, plus a bunch of other studies, in this piece:

hakaimagazine.com/news/offshor...

Trump EPA moves to abandon rule that sets tough standards for deadly soot pollution The Trump administration is seeking to abandon a rule that sets tough standards for deadly soot pollution, arguing that the Biden administration did not have authority to set the tighter standard on p...

The Trump regime wants to make us less healthy and more dead.

One more lobby meeting to report! Many thanks to Alexandra and Montgomery from @bluntrochester.senate.gov's office for a great conversation about fixing our forests and our energy permitting process in the U.S. We appreciate your time and your dedication! #GrassrootsClimate

It gives me hope to work with this great team of citizen advocates and meet with such dedicated congressional staffers!

I Want You to Understand Chicago Politics Chicago 2025-11-08 I want you to understand what it is like to live in Chicago during this time. Every day my phone buzzes. It is a neighborhood group: four people were kidnapped at the corner drugstore. A friend a mile away sends a Slack message: she was at the scene when masked men assaulted and abducted two people on the street. A plumber working on my pipes is distraught, and I find out that two of his employees were kidnapped that morning. A week later it happens again. An email arrives. Agents with guns have chased a teacher into the school where she works. They did not have a warrant. They dragged her away, ignoring her and her colleagues’ pleas to show proof of her documentation. That evening I stand a few feet from the parents of Rayito de Sol and listen to them describe, with anguish, how good Ms. Diana was to their children. What it is like to have strangers with guns traumatize your kids. For a teacher to hide a three-year-old child for fear they might be killed. How their relatives will no longer leave the house. I hear the pain and fury in their voices, and I wonder who will be next. Understand what it is to pray in Chicago. On September 19th, Reverend David Black, lead pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, was praying outside the ICE detention center in Broadview when a DHS agent shot him in the head with pepper balls. Pepper balls are never supposed to be fired at the head because they can seriously injure, or even kill. “We could hear them laughing as they were shooting us from the roof,” Black recalled. He is not the only member of the clergy ICE has assaulted. Methodist pastor Hannah Kardon was violently arrested on October 17th, and Baptist pastor Michael Woolf was shot with pepper balls on November 1st. Understand what it is to sleep in Chicago. On the night of September 30th, federal agents rappelled from a Black Hawk helicopter to execute a raid on an apartment building on the South Sho…

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer.

He is a computer safety researcher.

And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine.

In under 1600 words.

aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

A majority of the days the government has ever been shut down, Donald Trump was president. www.howtoreadthisch.art/red-versus-b...

It's unbelievable how hard this administration is fighting to keep millions of Americans hungry.

Beshear: Let me be clear. The president has both the funding and the authority to fund snap during a shutdown. In fact, every other president in every other shutdown has done so. People going hungry in this instance is a choice that this president has made.

As results roll in from yesterday’s Election Day, take a look at this article from @heatmap.news about the role clean energy played in key races nationwide 👇

For years, Australians have been been installing solar panels at a rapid clip. Now that investment is paying off. The Australian government announced this week that electricity customers in three states will get free electricity for up to three hours per day starting in July 2026.

The Solar Sharer plan will be available to everyone in New South Wales, South Australia, and in the southeastern part of Queensland to start; more regions will be added later. Households won’t need to have solar on their rooftops to qualify, though they will need a smart meter installed. The plan will help those who live in apartments or don’t have a suitable rooftop to benefit from their neighbors’ panels, Bowen said. Although the government hasn’t said which hours in the middle of the day will qualify, the hours between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. are the most likely candidates. Customers will have to opt in to the new plan, which is meant to encourage people to shift their energy use to peak solar-production hours. Smart appliances can help people make the most of this by allowing them to time charging their EVs or running loads of laundry.

How's this for energy abundance? Millions of Aussies will start receiving three hours of free power each day in 2026. This is what happens when you make rooftop solar less than a buck a watt!!

"Rooftop solar installations cost about $840 (U.S.) per kilowatt of capacity before rebates." 🤯
🔌💡

This Whole Thing Really Snuck Up On Us Looking back, and ahead, on the anniversary of a White House warning.

It has been 60 years, to the day, since LBJ released a report to the public about pollution. I wrote about appendix Y4 of that report.

"The climatic changes that may be produced by the increased CO2 content could be deleterious from the point of view of human beings."

Good thread!

Listen to Jigar Shah. Gates has been misguided in his climate messaging for some time now, and some of us having been calling him out on this for more than a decade:
www.livescience.com/53861-bill-g...
www.newsweek.com/right-path-f...

The entire world was ready to reduce shipping emissions. Then Trump stepped in. After Trump threatened countries with tariffs and visa restrictions, a first-ever global carbon tax is left to an uncertain future.

The entire world was ready to reduce shipping emissions. Then Trump stepped in.

grist.org/transportati...

#Shipping #Ships #Transportation #Climate #Geopolitics

@hcrichardson.bsky.social asked us to pitch in with 11/4 elections. If you have one of the 52,000 elections in the ballot - vote. And help out!

Please read 👇👇👇

The economics are clear: The push to build fossil fuels to power data centers is going to hurt people and one way to address that harm is by demanding these centers be built with clean, cheap, fast-to-build energy sources like wind and solar. From @profgalloway.com

This is who is paying for the destruction of the White House East Wing, per @wsj.com

Altria Group Inc.
Amazon
Apple Inc.
Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corp.
Caterpillar Inc.
Coinbase Global
Comcast Corp.
Hard Rock International
Google
HP Inc.
Lockheed Martin Corp.
Meta Platforms Inc.
1/3

Fact-checking a Trump administration claim about climate change and crops » Yale Climate Connections A recent Department of Energy report falsely states that rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere will boost agricultural yields. In fact, climate change is much more likely to make food scarcer...

🌱🌻🌾Sadly, extra carbon dioxide often doesn't mean better crops. Here is a fact-check from our own @dananuccitelli.bsky.social yaleclimateconnections.org/2025/10/fact...

US helps sink world’s first global carbon tax | CNN A fierce Trump administration push to stop the global shipping industry from paying for its own climate pollution appears successful.

We're disappointed that the Trump administration took such a strong oppositional stance to the IMO's exploration of a carbon price on global shipping.

Pricing carbon pollution is smart, effective policy, and we remain committed to building more support for it in the U.S.

The Day 7 Million Americans Marched and Their Media Looked Away A European’s View on American Media’s Crossroads Moment

Yesterday, 7 million Americans marched in history’s biggest protest. But while the world watched, some of the U.S. media looked away. A battle over truth and democracy.

A thousand writers: “SEE IF I WRITE THIS YOU TELL ME IT’S TOO ON THE NOSE”

A great #NoKings rally and march today in Newark, Delaware!

Military Plans to Fire Artillery Over California Freeway on Saturday

NYT confirms our reporting from days ago - which the WH said was fake news - that Trump and Hegseth are pulling a stunt to fire artillery rounds over I-5 between SD and LA onto Camp Pendleton as a stunt, one of the busiest highways in America. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/18/u...

Taylor Swift's Vintage Otter Shirt Leads to Swifties Donating Over $2 Million to Monterey Bay Aquarium A Monterey Bay Aquarium shirt Taylor Swift wore in her 'Life of a Showgirl' film has led to a fundraising campaign that's raised over $2 million.

Taylor Swift Fans Donate Over $2 Million to Aquarium Over Otter Shirt

Three Reasons I Still Have Hope for America This weekend's "No Kings" rallies stand as an important corrective amid a dark moment

"To me — as someone who cares deeply about the future of American democracy — the rallies stand as an important expression of love for the United States and the idea and dream that the US has represented for 250 years."

From @vermontgmg.bsky.social

www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/why-i-have...

For Tolkien fans, a timely passage for No Kings Eve, from WH Auden’s review of Lord of the Rings.

For Expertise to Matter, Nonpartisan Institutions Need New Communications Strategies To avoid irrelevance when they are needed most, experts and nonpartisan analysts must rethink not just their channels of communication but also their theory of influence.

I want to highlight this excellent piece by @noupside.bsky.social and @rachelkleinfeld.bsky.social on the rapidly shifting information & media landscape. Domain experts and the institutions that support them must rapidly change tactics to meet the moment.