Month: December 2025
Trump EPA Erases Climate Change from Web Pages
Problem solved.
The Environmental Protection Agency has removed references to human-caused climate change from its website — tweaking some pages to focus on the “natural processes” driving climate change and wiping other pages from the internet.
In October, the EPA page on “Causes of Climate Change,” for example, included a statement from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that noted, “It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean, and land.”
That clear statement has been deleted from the page, which now mentions only climate changes from natural sources, such as volcanic activity and variations in solar activity.
“This is, I think, one of the more dramatic scrubbings we’ve seen so far in the climate space,” said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist with the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources, in an online live chat with reporters and followers. “More and more pages have either been completely removed from the public internet — or perhaps worse, have been replaced with inaccurate information.”
Another page, which once described the key indicators of a changing climate — such as rising seas and shrinking Arctic ice — has been deleted entirely.
Continue reading “Trump EPA Erases Climate Change from Web Pages”ABC News Report Gets it Right on Soaring Energy Prices
ABC gets it right. Utility bills rising due to aging infrastructure, Data Center driven demand, rising gas prices following increased exports, cancellation of renewable tax credits and clean energy projects.
The amount of money Americans are paying for their energy bills has increased since President Donald Trump took office earlier this year, according to a new report.
In the U.S., electric bills have increased 13% in 2025, according to Climate Power, a climate advocacy organization whose national advisory board features prominent Democratic politicians and activists. Climate Power analyzed data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
The report pointed to the massive spending bill Trump signed in July, which it claims is “driving up utility costs and destroying jobs by removing cheaper, cleaner energy sources from the grid, all while funding new tax breaks for the oil and gas industries.”
Projects that were canceled or delayed since Trump’s election have led to a loss of 24,958.5 megawatts of planned energy generation, which could have powered more than 13.17 million homes, according to the report.
Prices are expected to spike even further, especially as rising energy demands are driven by data centers and extreme heat, the study said.
Continue reading “ABC News Report Gets it Right on Soaring Energy Prices”Ain’t Got no Home: Automating Affordable, Climate Resilient Homes
The housing and climate crises are deeply intertwined: climate change worsens housing affordability through climate disasters (floods, fires) causing damage, displacement, and insurance hikes, while housing contributes to emissions through construction and energy use.
This creates a cycle where vulnerable, low-income communities face greater risks, with growing needs for climate-resilient, affordable housing, necessitating integrated solutions like green building codes, urban planning for resilience, and energy efficiency upgrades.
Cuby integrates seamlessly into the existing processes of homebuilders by vertically integrating general contracting services, supervision, and labor. Working with us allows homebuilders to access a turnkey solution that can reduce the skilled labor hours needed to build homes by up to ten times. This reduction significantly increases their margins, production volume, and cycles. Additionally, it enables the delivery of higher quality, cost-effective, efficient, and climate-resistant homes, greatly valued by end-users.
When floods hit my hometown in Kenya last year, it was the poorest communities who suffered most. In Nairobi, where more than 3 million people live in vulnerable homes made of wood, sheet metal and concrete — many in low-lying flood plains — the waters faced little resistance. Entire homes were swept away as people slept.
From tragic flooding in Mexico to record-breaking heat waves in India. Urban communities are on the frontlines of climate extremes, bearing the brunt of escalating impacts. And while they have long been hubs of innovation and climate leadership, they cannot tackle this crisis alone.
Continue reading “Ain’t Got no Home: Automating Affordable, Climate Resilient Homes”Pro-fusion, or Just Con-Fusion: Is it Here, or Still 30 Years Away?
Standing joke on fusion energy, “It’s been 30 years away for the last 50 years.”
Tabletop “cold” fusion seems like a myth, so we have to wait for someone to make a star in a bottle. One company seems to have convinced Microsoft to sign on, and claim they can power a data center, in this decade. (Helion. See above)
Today we announced that Microsoft has agreed to purchase electricity from Helion’s first fusion power plant, scheduled for deployment in 2028. As the first announcement of its kind, this collaboration represents a significant milestone for Helion and the fusion industry as a whole.
We are extremely proud to have Microsoft as our first customer! With this partnership, not only are we advancing the timeline to have commercial fusion energy on the grid, but we are also supporting Microsoft’s goal to be carbon negative by 2030. With a long history of unveiling groundbreaking technology while considering their impacts on the climate, Microsoft is the ideal customer for electricity from our first fusion power plant.
Helion Energy, a startup backed by OpenAI’s Sam Altman and SoftBank’s venture capital arm, has started construction on a site for a planned nuclear fusion power plant that will supply power to Microsoft (MSFT.O), opens new tab data centers by 2028, the company said on Wednesday.
The site in Malaga, Washington, is in the center of the state along the Columbia River, where Helion hopes to take advantage of grid infrastructure in place for the nearby Rock Island Dam hydroelectric plant.
Continue reading “Pro-fusion, or Just Con-Fusion: Is it Here, or Still 30 Years Away?”New Data Extends Global Temperature Rise
More nuance. Same mechanism. Heat trapping gases.
Planet-warming pollution rates exploded after the end of World War II. James Watt’s steam engine launched the Industrial Revolution in 1769. Before that, for thousands of years, humans were clearing forested land for farming, releasing carbon from trees and plants into the atmosphere.
The severity of global warming has long depended on your frame of reference — on what temperature you think was normal for the Earth before humans began changing it. But what year should mark that moment?
That’s what makes a groundbreaking new temperature dataset released by a group of scientists based in the United Kingdom so striking. The datasets used to diagnose the modern history of the planet’s climate — and to proclaim that the world is now very near to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) of warming — typically begin with the year 1850.
The new one goes all the way back to 1781.
This extended time frame matters because greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increased 2.5 percent between 1750 and 1850, enough to have caused some warming that the data hasn’t accounted for.
Continue reading “New Data Extends Global Temperature Rise”Ask AI: What are the Roots of Authoritarian Takeover?
I’m not familiar with the Anchor Light Substack page, but it floated to the top of my algorithm today, and I found the posting to be insightful and useful, though I don’t agree with the actions the author plans to take.
The author remains anonymous, as far as I can tell after a quick AI search.
It’s a long post, and worth a read, I excerpt key passages of interest here.
The graphic and social media inserts are mine, for illustrative purposes.
This dialogue represents a synthesis of conversations with multiple AI systems (ChatGPT and Claude) conducted on December 13, 2024, the day after my 65th birthday. The questions were mine. The analysis emerged from AI systems trained on large bodies of historical and comparative political research on democratic erosion, authoritarianism, and comparative political systems worldwide. I have edited for flow and clarity, but the substance remains unchanged. This is my final online political post. After this, I redirect my energy to local action and preparation.
Why Are Political Leaders Pushing Anti-Science Rhetoric and Easily Disprovable Lies?
I asked AI: What is your best theory as to why many on the political Right in the U.S., I’m talking political leaders, push anti-vax rhetoric, conspiracy theories, and lies easily proven false by science? What is the motive and the likely long-term intent?
The answer was uncomfortably clear: This isn’t about ignorance of science. It’s about power.
Many right-wing political leaders push anti-science rhetoric because epistemic breakdown, the destruction of shared reality, is politically useful. If you can convince a large segment of the population that experts cannot be trusted, institutions are corrupt, objective truth doesn’t exist, and loyalty matters more than evidence, then power no longer depends on performance or results. It depends on identity and obedience.
That’s the motive. The long-term intent is durable minority rule.
Science has three characteristics that are fatal to authoritarian politics:
First, it produces falsifiable claims. You can test them. You can be wrong. You must update your beliefs when evidence changes.
Second, it’s institutionally distributed. No single leader controls it. It requires peer review, transparency, and replication.
Third, it undermines charismatic authority. A scientist doesn’t demand loyalty. Data doesn’t care who you voted for.
Authoritarian movements cannot survive in an environment where people accept that some claims are simply false, expertise matters, and reality constrains power. So science isn’t debated, it’s delegitimized.
Anti-vaccine rhetoric is particularly effective because vaccines sit at the intersection of government authority, personal autonomy, fear of harm, complex science, and immediate bodily stakes. That makes them ideal for narrative manipulation.
Continue reading “Ask AI: What are the Roots of Authoritarian Takeover?”Daily Show Features Ice Core Expert Lonnie Thompson
Promoting a new movie about his work, “Canary”- Lonnie Thompson, one of the grandest of grand old climate scientists, is still active more than a decade post heart transplant.
He says, “I am 77 years old, but my heart is 34.”
For Climate Deniers, this episode of the Daily Show will be like sunlight to vampires, since they have no humor, and hate science.
Dr Thompson remains optimistic that we can still tackle the climate crisis.
“Canary” trailer below.
In the video below, some clips from my interview with Lonnie, along with his colleague, the late Konrad Steffan.
Continue reading “Daily Show Features Ice Core Expert Lonnie Thompson”Green Stocks Pop on Big Demand, Despite MAGA
It was supposed to be a glum year for green stocks as President Donald Trump pushed his Big Oil agenda. Instead, the sector is booming as artificial intelligence powers massive demand for all kinds of energy.
The S&P Global Clean Energy Transition Index has rallied 44% this year, handily beating a 16% advance in the S&P 500 Index. It’s also outpacing an 11% gain in the S&P Global Oil Index, which was expected to be a big winner on the back of Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” agenda.
That’s an outperformance few had expected going into 2025, when investors had fled from stocks such as solar and wind producers on worries that Trump would abandon green policies and boost production of fossil fuels.
Continue reading “Green Stocks Pop on Big Demand, Despite MAGA”2025: a Year When the Clean Transition Hung Tough
Latitude Media’s Open Circuit podcast is a reboot of the old Energy Gang pod, with Stephen Lacey, Katherine Hamilton, and one of the all time smartest people I’ve ever met, Jigar Shah, a long time solar industry pro, and until recently head of the Department of Energy’s Loan Program Office (LPO) under Joe Biden.
The recent episode had a recap of 2025, with some surprisingly upbeat takes.
I mean, look, I think that he’s not a good climate president in the sense that he believes in climate change, but in terms of capital formation, he has shaken everybody, and forced them to look at their priors, and then recommit to this moment, and everyone did. I mean, you just saw major announcements this week between NextEra, and Google, and Meta buying more gigawatts, and then the Clean Energy Buyers Alliance announcing that this has been a record year for long-term contracts of renewable energy, right? Battery storage has been on a tear, right? I mean, I just think that… Do I think that this president is good for capital formation? No, not at all. But do I think that this president has forced people to reconsider whether they’re really buying these technologies, because they’re superior to their fossil counterparts, or whether they’re actually being subsidized? Yes. And in almost all cases, they’re like, these are superior solutions to their fossil counterparts. We’re buying them because they’re better for us.
Katherine Hamilton: I think Bill Gates, you would consider the outlier in that, right?
Jigar Shah: Oh, my God. Don’t get me started, Katherine.
Katherine Hamilton: Trigger word.
Jigar Shah: You’re just bating me, Katherine.
Stephen Lacey: Katherine, have you seen states step up more than they otherwise would have, or have they suffered because of the drawback of federal funds, and…
Katherine Hamilton: Yeah, so I think that both can be true. So, a lot of these solar for all program was completely cut after funding had already gone out to the state. So, the states was just at an event in Michigan this week, and they’re like, “Yeah, we’re like setting up all the instruments we need to continue to do the program regardless. We already had all the systems in place. We had the communities gathered. Let’s do it.” So, I think it’s a little bit of trying to get things done in spite of what’s happened.
Continue reading “2025: a Year When the Clean Transition Hung Tough”