Jonathan Koomey

Even if oil prices get back to “normal,” the disruption should be a wake-up call to move faster on alternative energy sources. If blocking one sea lane is all it takes to send gas prices soaring, then we need to move away from fossil fuels — fast.

I agree that it’s silly to claim that LLMs Can’t Do Anything (obviously they can do many things). I also think it’s silly to claim LLMs Can Do Everything (obviously they can’t).

regardless of how one feels about that, this is a very scary time to need a job and people are reacting accordingly

Gullible, Cynical America The trouble with believing anything and nothing at the same time

The data economy has made us dumber in ways that also make us vulnerable to authoritarian takover. We are have become both cynical and gullible in the sense we think we are too jaded be fooled and as a result are tricked more easily www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Third Way and the other billionaire backed centrist groups spend all their time and energy shitting on other Dems. Pundits, some hill staffers and a few DC orgs gobble up their messaging. But they're increasingly out of sync with Dem voters

Map snapshot depicting the predicted relative anomalousness of surface temperatures from the ECMWF ensemble over the Western U.S. in about a week from now. A a huge region of bright orange and red colors (depicting extremely high warm temperature anomalies) is centered right in the middle of the map, and covers essentially the entire region.

Lots of buzz online about an upcoming major March heatwave for the American SW & California. And in this case, it does indeed appear increasingly likely than an extremely anomalous and even record-breaking heatwave may envelop much of the SW about a week from now.

Winning the Oil Endgame - RMI This independent, peer-reviewed synthesis for American business and military leaders charts a roadmap for getting the United States completely, attractively, and profitably off oil. Our strategy integ...

We wrote this book in 2004. Maybe people will finally get the message this time. AB Lovins, EK Datta, OE Bustnes, JG Koomey & Nathan J. Glasgow. 2004. Winning the Oil Endgame: Innovation for Profits, Jobs, and Security. Old Snowmass, Colorado: Rocky Mountain Institute. www.rmi.org/insights/kno...

When DOGE Unleashed ChatGPT on the Humanities

It was wrong and harmful - and quite possibly unlawful - to cut already approved NEH grants because Donald Trump hates "DEI."

But the way DOGE went about doing it was even dumber than you probably imagined.

They fed abstracts into ChatGPT and demanded an answer in fewer than 120 characters.

Every stage of plastic use — from production to disposal — harms human health In a recent study published by The Lancet Planetary Health, researchers examined the health costs of pollutants released by plastics across their full lifecycle and emphasized the need for internation...

Study: "Every stage of the plastic lifecycle contributes to human health threats including global warming, air pollution, cancer, and disease, with primary plastic production and plastic burning causing the greatest harm." 🌎🧪 www.ehn.org/plastics-hum...

“just speaking personally, I find dumping each load of hand-harvested electrons into my car deeply satisfying. It’s my own personal middle finger to all the right-wing oil barons and murderous petrostate dictators.” prospect.org/2026/03/06/e...

Multiple Tankers Under Attack in Gulf Waters as US-Iran Conflict Escalates More tankers came under attack in Gulf waters on Thursday as the U.S.–Iran war escalated, and Iranian drones entered Azerbaijan,…

Multiple Tankers Under Attack in Gulf Waters as US-Iran Conflict Escalates

"Oil prices extended their rally on Thursday, with Brent climbing 3% and WTI rising 4%. They have both jumped 16% since the war started on Saturday..."

www.marinelink.com/news/multipl...

the news can be factual and accurate without being boring. and it should be.

people betting huge sums on other people's death is some straight-up black mirror shit

but the person dying and then the betting firm finding a fine-print loophole to not pay them anyway is what elevates this to high art

I doubt it's a coincidence that this happened the day after Rep. Gonzales was forced into a runoff in his primary.

The House GOP leadership must have realized he can't be saved from this scandal* and it's better to replace him now than have him get beaten in the fall.

Looks like a great reference. Many thanks!

Direct human health risks of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide - Nature Sustainability A review of studies on exposure to elevated CO2 concentrations in air suggests that health damages, such as inflammation or reductions in cognitive abilities, can occur at levels as low as 1,000 ppm.

Results are accumulating that exposure to CO2 has heatlh effects at lower levels than previously thought, but we're not going to drop dead at such levels. @joeallenjoe.bsky.social can better speak to this topic.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

How Talks Between Anthropic and the Defense Dept. Fell Apart

NYT’s reporting on the DOD-Anthropic dispute sheds more light on how the Pentagon planned to use Claude for mass surveillance of Americans: by collecting and analyzing commercial bulk data.

So what is this commercial data? And how might Claude be used to collect and analyze it? 🧵 1/

Iran war live: Iran warns will attack ships trying to pass Hormuz; drones hit US embassy in Riyadh Tehran’s ability to disrupt transit in the Hormuz Strait has rattled markets and choked global trade. Trump says the military campaign against Iran could last longer than four weeks, and the U.S. emba...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he expected the war against Iran was ‘not going to take years,’ as the conflict widened with Israel attacking Iran-backed Hezbollah targets in Lebanon and Iran hitting Gulf states that host US bases. Follow our live coverage: reut.rs/4tW44U6

Effects are likely to be worse for people with existing kidney disease. Also regional variations (see Phoenix CO2 dome).
ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1998PhGe...

False solutions: How do fossil fuel companies reproduce their power through the energy transition In response to mounting political and social pressure to transform their business models, the fossil fuel industry is attempting to portray itself as …

This paper is excellent and shows how the fossil fuel industry deploys false solutions- CCS, hydrogen, and CDR- in order to further entrench and protect fossil fuel hygemony

I do recall seeing some stuff about in the midst of the pandemic.

I'm not going to try to figure it out. Perhaps, @linseymarr.bsky.social or @corsiaq.bsky.social have some insight on [CO2] health impacts on humans.

Submariners are typically younger and healthier than the gen pop though.

Here's another one showing cognitive effects: Satish, et al.. 2012. "Is CO2 an indoor pollutant? Direct effects of low-to-moderate CO2 concentrations on human decision-making performance." Environ Health Perspect. vol. 120, no. 12. Dec. pp. 1671-7.

Thanks for this. Other studies show different effects, but this looks like a credible one.

I've read that, but I've also read contradictory stories about submariners operating at a couple times that concentration.

These limits are for toxic effects, but Joe Romm cited studies indicating reduced cognition at 1000 ppm.

NIOSH REL (recommended exposure limits)
TWA 5000 ppm (9000 mg/m3) ST 30,000 ppm (54,000 mg/m3)

OSHA PEL (permissible exposure limits)
TWA 5000 ppm (9000 mg/m3)

TWA = time-weighted average concentration for up to a 10-hour workday during a 40-hour workweek

This says nothing about the study you cited, though.

I remember Joe Romm citing toxic effects of CO2 above 1000 ppm but don't have the refs handy.

Peripherally related: Permentier, et al. 2017. "Carbon dioxide poisoning: a literature review of an often forgotten cause of intoxication in the emergency department." International Journal of Emergency Medicine. vol. 10, no. 1. 2017/04/04. pp. 14. [https://doi.org/10.1186/s12245-017-0142-y ]

This is respectfully disingenuous beginning with which viewpoints they overwhelmingly choose to platform and hire on the opinion side.

In addition to that, there's a difference between sharing viewpoints you disagree with and sharing viewpoints that are based in lies.