climate crisis
On ‘tomorrow sorrow’: How we grieve the future today
Humans have the capacity to grieve the world ahead, knowing how much is going wrong today. But tomorrow sorrow can make us stronger actors.
Eco-friendly transportation? The good, the bad, and the pipe dreams
The saying about putting a fox in charge of the hen house grossly underestimates human ingenuity. We are not foxes, and so we have the ability to be much cleverer custodians of institutions we’re still destroying.
How to spare billionaires from terrorist attack
A radical eco-activist group arises in India after a terrible heat wave kills tens of thousands. The Children of Kali are firm in their declaration to the world: Change with us now, or suffer the wrath of Kali.
So this is 90 seconds to midnight
Reading Time: 4 minutes On January 24, the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists officially moved the hands on the Doomsday Clock, which for three quarters of a century has been used to depict humanity’s risk of global disaster from nuclear war. When the clock was first
COP28’s climate cop-out, and what comes next
Reading Time: 11 minutes Ignore the media claims of a “landmark” climate deal. COP28 failed to produce outcomes in word or in action or in funding that would get the world back on track for meeting key climate targets. Now what?
Can we ever truly combat climate change in a world at war?
Reading Time: 6 minutes According to The Guardian, which has not given up on its war counter since February 24, 2022, we are now over 572 days into the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Every day, this media outlet and many like it try to keep the world aware of the fact that, even if our terminology dif
The struggle for a more global response to climate change
Reading Time: 10 minutes On September 9, scientists and other protesters involved in the Extinction Rebellion (XR) launched their latest direct action by marching daily on the Utrechtsebaan, which is part of the A12 highway around the Hague, in the Netherlands. 2,400 protesters out of around 10,000
Do we have the technology to ease our melting ice sheets?
Reading Time: 11 minutes This past year, news outlets have been reporting that initial predictions for polar ice melt were overly optimistic: ice sheets are melting much faster than models for the 2021 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report suggested. Irrespective o
How do we make protests work for climate change reform?
Reading Time: 10 minutes One frightfully “woke” day in April 1970, some 20 million US citizens across 2,000 colleges and 10,000 grade schools participated in a “teach-in” about environmental crisis and stewardship. Some took part in active demonstrations, cleaning up facets of their communities or m
Is real carbon sequestration possible under capitalism?
Reading Time: 11 minutes Given the incentives in capitalism, the “stick” approach to climate change isn’t working. Could a new currency provide a carrot to reframe our priorities?
Broken heat records—and the promise of more
Reading Time: 4 minutes Another set of broken heat records has devastating implications—not only for human thriving in the coming years, but also the inability of consequences from past failings to stir global action to some better end.
As clean transportation tech moves forward, is the human side ready?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Over the next five years, US public agencies will spend billions to clean up the transportation sector. A large share of that money is earmarked for training blue-collar workers in disadvantaged communities on the specific tasks of sustaining a zero-emission economy. While th