Deirdre O’Connell

"Real Zero has one definition.

You commit to phasing out fossil fuels and you do it without relying on offsets, carbon capture and storage, and any other technology that does not exist yet.”

- Dr @shantabarley.bsky.social, Fortescue Chief Climate Scientist

#auspol

love this new york times clip. they recently did a story about how sesame street's set has changed over the years, along with our urban politics.

IG nytimes

The Renewable Illusion: Why Fossil Fuels Keep Winning Global renewables hit records in 2024, but fossil fuel use still rises. Here’s why solar’s surge isn’t enough—and what the latest energy data really shows.

1. This is something I've been saying for 25 years, but it's hard to get many people to listen. What counts is not the new energy sources you add, but the old ones you retire. Unfortunately it's politically easier to build renewables than to shutter fossil fuels.🧵
www.forbes.com/sites/rrapie...

Why rivers need human rights The Story · Episode

New podcast: why rivers need rights

A discussion of the river Test being granted 'personhood' by the local council, the wider nature rights movement and how our waterways got into such a mess

open.spotify.com/episode/7eKN...

The Reconstruction

The Texas Flash Flood Is a Preview of the Chaos to Come Climate change is making disasters more common, more deadly and far more costly, even as the federal government is running away from the policies that might begin to protect the nation.

Crazy that @abrahm.bsky.social has so few followers here.

The guy is an oracle at a time when we could really use oracles. www.propublica.org/article/texa...

Got damn

First Nations calendars boost solar forecasting accuracy by up to 26 pct, study finds Researchers in Darwin added First Nations seasonal calendars to solar irradiance forecasting and came up with some vastly improved results.

Researchers in Darwin added First Nations seasonal calendars to solar irradiance forecasting and came up with some vastly improved results.

🩸 No one is immune to PFAS contamination
Ministers & EU Commissioner @jessikaroswall.ec.europa.eu had their blood tested for #PFAS found in nearly every European
Led by Denmark’s Environment Ministry @heunicke.bsky.social, @eeb.org & @chemsec.bsky.social to expose this growing pollution crisis

The science behind Texas’ catastrophic floods At least 95 people died in the flash floods. The disaster has the fingerprints of climate change all over it.

The science behind Texas’ catastrophic floods | Grist grist.org/climate/the-...

Remembering What the Parks Forgot An Indigenous historian and former park ranger reflects on the National Park Service and how its relationships with Native people have changed.

“My felt ranger hat hangs on the wall in my university faculty office to this day as a reminder of that period in my life,” writes Ryan W. Booth (Upper Skagit Tribe) in #AHAPerspectives. 🗃️

Raskin: "If you can opt out of mandatory classroom readings bc it offends your religious objections, you can do it bc it offends your philosophical beliefs... you're gonna have a lot of cases where ppl say 'Our family doesn't believe in evolution. We don't want our kid in class when it's taught'"

The Second Emancipation: Nkrumah, Pan-Africanism, and Global Blackness at High Tide by Howard W French In this magisterial account, journalist French (Born in Blackness) revisits the history of the Pan-Africanist movement through t...

Honored to be giving the first public reading from my new book, The Second Emancipation (out 8/26), at the Schomburg Library's Centennial Festival today at 1. www.publishersweekly.com/9781324092452

The scientists warning the world about ocean acidification – ‘evil twin’ of the climate crisis There’s frustration among researchers that falling pH levels in seas around the globe are not being taken seriously enough, and that until the buildup of CO2 is addressed, the consequences for marine ...

The scientists warning the world about ocean #acidification – ‘evil twin’ of the climate crisis - www.theguardian.com/environment/... "until the buildup of CO2 is addressed, the consequences for marine life will be devastating"

Murray Watt’s climate masterclass: How to destroy the planet while pretending to save it Watt’s North West Shelf approval exposes the deeper dysfunction at the heart of Australian environmental governance: where the laws are weak, the incentives perverse, and real power lies with…

Watt’s North West Shelf approval exposes the deeper dysfunction at the heart of Australian environmental governance: where the laws are weak, the incentives perverse, and real power lies with the fossil fuel lobby

YouTube video by Larry Lozuk Fortress Dwellers @ Scarborough 5-18-2025

The Fortress Dwellers at Scarborough Faire.
youtu.be/R7i6B1v7xYU?...

Definitely uk

"Approval of the North West Shelf extension would be easily one of the worst decisions ever made by an Environment Minister in Australia's history," said @grogsgamut.bsky.social.

They say it can’t be done, but here we are, California is generated 106% of California’s entire state electricity demand from renewables.

California has a population bigger that 154 other countries around the world. It’s the 4th largest economy, in the world.

Let that sink in.
#energysky #greensky

In ‘Cancer Alley,’ a Battle Over Who Gets to Measure Air Pollution

In ‘Cancer Alley,’ a Battle Over Who Gets to Measure Air Pollution - The New York Times www.nytimes.com/2025/05/23/c...

Gen A.I. is designed to erode your critical thinking skills. Its sole purpose is to make you offload anything worth doing so you become reliant on it.

"If this was somewhere else in the world, there would be a national outcry.

"The pollutants that are coming out of those Woodside stacks are actively degrading the rock art surfaces.

"It's incontestable."

🎙️Professor of Archaeology Benjamin Smith
#savemurujuga #auspol

The Ghosts of John Tanton Climate change and anti-immigrant hate are colliding, foretelling a volatile future.

www.propublica.org/article/john...

Gideon's Chariots invasion is wiping Gaza inch by inch. No arrests, no injuries—just mass executions of youth aged 14-50. Air, land, and sea attacks to erase every tunnel, every soul. We are human too. Save Gaza. Mercy for Gaza. #ProtectUs #Humanity
🇵🇸

The Road to Trump’s Embrace of White South Africans

The insanity of it all. It's like up is down.
www.nytimes.com/2025/05/14/u...

Not sure about the “best lives on the planet” bit

🧵 on Mississippi's HB1193:

This last week of the semester, in my seminar on race and racism, we're reading Linda Martin Alcoff's The Future of Whiteness.

But also, this week marks the 'legal birth' of Mississippi's HB1193.

I'm not a lawyer and I'm very tired, so excuse me if this is a stupid question:

But if the principles of birthright citizenship *were* ever dismantled ... what's the theory for how citizenship would be determined?

American War A special series from The Verge that confronts the legacy and mythmaking of the Vietnam War, 50 years after the fall of Saigon.

In Vietnam, the war is called "the American War."

The Verge's package commemorating the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon is now fully live: www.theverge.com/cs/features/...

Paris said au revoir to cars. Air pollution maps reveal a dramatic change. Air pollution fell substantially as the city restricted car traffic and made way for parks and bike lanes.

Paris said au revoir to cars. Air pollution maps reveal a dramatic change

Air pollution fell substantially as the city restricted car traffic and made way for parks and bike lanes.

www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solu...