Saturday is my day to catch up on my renewable energy and climate solution videos and articles. I thought Simon Clark’s latest video was comprehensive enough to share. Not to mention, the model he created is mesmerizing.
****
And a reminder, if you need some feel-good viewing, Roots So Deep is now a $10 rental for 90 days. I cannot recommend it strongly enough. Good science, good people, good news.
It’s probably a fool’s request, but try and keep the doom and gloom out of this thread. Honestly, I don’t care. I won’t be around to referee, but I really think there are folks out there who need a respite from the constant, unrelenting comments on how awful everything is right now.
Everything is NOT awful. There is still beauty in the world and good people in the world. It takes discipline to find it and encourage the goodness. Give your souls a break, take a breath, and find something good to focus on, if just for today.
Climate Scientist Michael E Mann & historian Timothy D Snyder:
Doomerism is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.
It is how authoritarians win. Let’s try to fight the doom
Not an open thread
laura
We’ve had a taste of Spring here in Sacramento, warm afternoon temps and I’m seeing cherry blossoms, apricots, along with other flowering trees and shrubs- the scents are subtle yet fragrant. Hummingbirds and scads of small flying visitors have been spotted right out my back door. Seasons are shifting from winter to spring regardless of (gestures broadly to all that tsurrus). I’m leaning hard into nature as a counterbalance and reminder that life insists on going on.
WaterGirl
My unconscious brain has decided it’s already spring, even as I put on my down coat to go outside!
There is one moment every February where I go from knowing in my head that spring will eventually come, to somehow knowing in my heart that it is. That happened early last week.
mali muso
I have the opposite of a green thumb (brown thumb?) but I signed up for a little gardening series at my work last week. We will meet once a month and a colleague who is a master naturalist in their free time will guide us through planting and growing some native plants. Even though this is pretty far out of my wheelhouse, I wanted to challenge myself to try a new thing and to be engaged in something like “touching grass”. We shall see if my little seeds survive into wee sprouts soon!
TaMara
@laura:
@WaterGirl:
Because of the altitude, we green up slightly later than many areas, but it also means, when the sun is out, even if there is a chill in the air, it can be gloriously warm in the sun.
All week, we’ve had 60s and I’ve happily thrown open the windows for an hour or so.
TaMara
@mali muso: ❤️
trollhattan
@laura:
The mosquitoes certainly agree. Think there are about eleventy types ATM. Makes enjoying the soft evenings a challenge.
Baud
It’s like, I’m right here people!
NeenerNeener
I’ve had my back door open to air out the house a few times in the last week. What a difference after months of winter. And the days are getting longer so my solar panels are generating more energy. I haven’t had an electric bill over $9 since I put them in last spring, not even in Dec/Jan/Feb.
I received one of those bird feeders with the solar camera for my birthday, and the bluebirds are eating the dried meal worms as fast as I can fill the feeder.
Josie
I have babied my tomato and eggplant potted plants through our two freezes here in Houston and have put them back out to enjoy our week or two of spring weather. I have found that some will produce for a second season if they don’t get frozen. I also have some seeds planted just in case things go awry. Always the optimist.
WaterGirl
@TaMara: We aren’t greening up at all where I am in Illinois, but we did have a couple of days this week where I could leave the screen door to the porch open for a few hours.
That’s probably what did it for me. :-)
Matt McIrvin
At this point, the climate-mitigation situation in the US doesn’t doom the world, it mostly hurts us. The rest of the world can go on without us.
H.E.Wolf
Thank you for the good news, and the chance to open the virtual windows and breathe the air of approaching spring!
Kelly
Sunshine and a forecast high near 60 here in the western Cascade foothills. Today’s project is wheelbarrowing dirt from where our raised beds used to be to the new spot. The old spot is destined to be my new garage/shop.
Kosh III
We’ve had a week of warm temps, even hit low 70s one day. Still chilly at night or in the shade. No greening up yet. We’re entering roller coaster weather, hot one day cold another. I opened the windows twice this week to air out the place.
As to climate, I try to be optimistic, I do follow this blog as it’s done by reputable climatologists and not Republicans. I can usually follow the technical stuff or at least look at the nice charts and graphs. I admit it can be hard to be upbeat but I do my best.
https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/
Kosh III
Today is my first day on Traditional Medicare Plan G and Part D. I paid a whopping $1.88 for Gabapentin 300mg this morning when I did the shopping at Kroger I usually do on Friday.
SC54HI
Thank you for the respite, @TaMara.
Sunny day forecast here so I will be doing laundry since I hang it out to dry. We are still experiencing some vog – Thursday was almost overcast due to the vog, even though with a full sun – but it seems to be dissipating. Hoping I will get to Hawaiʻi Island before long so I can see the current eruption.
Layer8Problem
Very glad to see you posting TaMara!
zhena gogolia
Thank you, TaMara!
zhena gogolia
@Baud: You joke, but it’s true. You lift me up every day.
zhena gogolia
I read some brilliant stuff by my student this morning.
I hope that’s not OT?
West of the Cascades
I moved to SW New Mexico three years ago and installed solar panels on my house within a few months, and now look forward to this time of the year as “the time when my array starts generating more power than I use.” Typically I accrue credit from about the end of February to early November, and then have about four months where I draw more off the grid than I generate.
I’ve lived most of my life fairly far north (north of the 40th parallel – Buffalo, NYC, Chicago, most recently Portland, OR), so have always welcomed the Winter Solstice as the time that the light started to return — now I have another “big turnover” date to look forward to at the end of winter! And get to feel like I’ve started to do a little bit personally to help mitigate the climate crisis.
Mousebumples
@zhena gogolia: sounds like good news to me!
TaMara
@zhena gogolia: I think it’s a lovely addition!
zhena gogolia
@TaMara: Students are keeping me alive.
MCat
Thank you, TaMara!!! I didn’t know about that movie but I’ll definitely watch it. Hope to hear more from you soon. I remember when you adopted Bixby. How are all your pet babies?
MountainBoy
Saturday morning report from the CO central Rockies (8000 feet elevation): it was 25 degrees at sunrise, Sunny & warm now probably hit 60 later.
Nothing goes outside into the ground/ garden overnight here until the first week of June…well at least in the past.
Some folks could not imagine living in this climate, but I despise mosquitos and high humidity (having grown up in FL).
Thanks for this thread TaMara!
.
Lurker Dan
I don’t comment much (hence the name!) and you might not even be around to read this by now, but let me say I very much appreciate your climate change posts and find them a very useful resource.
There’s still dire news aplenty and you don’t gloss it over. It’s your tone of wary optimism and framing of “this is a gigantic problem and people are doing something about it” instead of “we’re all screwed, go dig a bunker” that makes the difference. Thanks, and please keep posting.
HopefullyNotcassandra
The scent of jasmine fills our night air. Most of the day, our birds sing their courtship songs. The season of the blooming purple trees is almost here. The air is crisp and an enormous healthy improvement from the smogs of yesteryear. It is beautiful nearly everyday. We are blessed to be alive in this place.
RevRick
In two weeks, we will launch our Climate Hope Affiliate campaign in the PA-7 Congressional District, a program sponsored by the United Church of Christ Environmental Justice Ministry. The aim is to create relationships with local media and our U.S. Representative and Senators, so that we may move opponents into neutral positions, those neutral to supporters, and supporters to advocates.
We hope to have a team of 20+ to engage in an intentional, ongoing and sustained effort on behalf of climate change legislation. Short term, we want to defend as much of the Inflation Reduction Act as possible.
As Rev. Brooks Berndt, UCC Environmental Justice Minister puts it, “When so many feel powerless, this empowers those who understand the intersection between climate change and societal injustice, and seek to address them.”
MagdaInBlack
Yesterday in Chicagoland was sunny, breezy and warm (by our standards here.) I think it may have hit 60. I think we all enjoyed the sign winter is basically over. My parts delivery drivers were a wee bit more full of cheerful bs banter than usual. Today is sunny and very pretty, tho a wee bit chillier, but I will take it.
And on a personal Yay me, I got a good hair cut for the first time since prepandemic and OMG having short messy hair again feels so damn good, esp in yesterdays breezy weather.
Thank you for these posts TaMara, you know I love them =-)
Ruckus
Good Stuff!
AM in NC
Such good stuff to marinate in – thank you climate hero TaMara!!!
Today in our next of the woods, it was time to cut back the knock-out roses and butterfly bushes planted by the previous owner of my house. I’ll be moving the rosemary, oregano and lavender to the sunnier, drier side of the front garden next week, after the rain comes through.
Also, watching my seeds sprout this week was soul-filling. It feels like good magic every time. Every single time.
TaMara
@Lurker Dan: Thank you!
TaMara
@RevRick: I love this. Please keep us (I’d love an email update for sure) on your group.
I know I sound like a broken record, but Peter Byck’s documentaries, “Carbon Nation” and “Roots So Deep” are studies in reaching people where they are…
Thanks for all you do!
TaMara
@MagdaInBlack:
@Ruckus:
@AM in NC:
Thank you all (and anyone I might have missed rereading the comments)
David_C
I spent the last two days at a local Climate Summit, where various local and state leaders discussed the progress we’ve made in decarbonizing the economy and building sustainable infrastructure. I represented our local collection of faith-based climate stewardship organizations. Lots of other businesses, government, and NGOs were there. Progress is being made from the ground up.