Bloomberg Green reporter. How do we live now? More reporting than opinions, but any that slip through are my own. Stories: https://t.co/eIuIZiReQn
9,390 followers 498 following 198 posts
view profile on Bluesky 
NEW: Bloomberg obtained 100s of pages of agency emails & other docs via FOIA, shedding new light on how disaster-related misinfo affects the govt's emergency response, sucks up resources & puts staff at risk. with @zhirji.bsky.social @jasonleopold.bsky.social www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
🚨Hot off the press🔥 LIGHTS OUT How Trump's war on climate science is weakening the US A feature about the White House's "cluster-bomb approach" to dismantling the world's most sophisticated scientific apparatus. By @zhirji.bsky.social @blkahn.bsky.social and me 🎁🔗 www.bloomberg.com/features/202...
Glaciers in Central Asia have long managed to withstand rising temperatures and changing weather patterns. But now, the outlook is worsening. My latest for @bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
I love this so much
This summer, I visited Glen Kenny's heat lab in Ottawa to see where he -- and many others -- repeatedly put their bodies on the line to better understand how high heat can damage the human body and how to keep people safe. Full story @bloomberg.com with gift link: www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
New: Some of the world's best chefs are switching to induction for reasons that are nothing to do with climate and everything to do with how they run their professional kitchens. Featuring some (hopefully) mouthwatering dish descriptions - I'm no food critic but I did my best! Gift link:
Had a fun time writing about bread and circuses vs. bread and roses and whether in crises we're allowed to have fun. www.meditationsinanemergency.com/circuses-vs-...
Extreme heat is taking a toll on the US’s aging bridges. Here comes the "bridge doctors" who enlist AI and automation to detect hidden dangers before it's too late. My latest for @bloomberg.com (read on for free for 7 days) www.bloomberg.com/news/feature... #infrastructureresilience #climatetech
Millions are confronting a terrifying reality: When sweat can’t evaporate, heat kills. Incredible on-the-ground reporting & photos by colleagues in India. Gift link:
Something for the weekend.. Did you know you could go 'wild' swimming in Canary Wharf? What London's most unlikely open water swimming spot tells us about how work & life is changing. Gift link:
On the left: Nate Cavanagh, a 28-year-old DOGE staffer and college dropout. On the right: Mohammad Halimi, a 53-year-old exiled Afghan scholar. This is the story of how DOGE targeted Halimi on social media. Then the Taliban took his family. 🧵
Great story about how Europe's tourism industry is changing because of climate change. We always take our summer holiday in September now in part because no kids & it's cheaper but also because peak summer heat in southern Europe just doesn't sound that fun to me any more
‘What if the real doomer scenario is that we pollute the internet and the planet, reorient our economy and leverage ourselves, outsource big chunks of our minds, realign our geopolitics and culture, and fight endlessly over a technology that never comes close to delivering on its grandest promises?’
!!! A church will be moved down the road on Tuesday! It'll be live-streamed. It's wild. It's in Kiruna, Sweden's most northern town (I've been there): the whole town is being moved to get to iron ore under it. The church is wooden and square, inspired by Sami tents. lkab.com/en/events/th...
no worries! really great piece
'In many ways, the summer of 1976 was Britain’s first real taste of a new normal.' Really great data-packed story and thread here about the mythical 1976 heat wave and what it tells us about climate change.
Netflix should do "Senescence"
I know summer downpours are the hardest thing to predict, because you don't know where exactly the energy is going to build up sufficiently to create lightning/rain
I love the anecdote about the golf cart driver distracted by their phone *nearly* crashing, as proof that these vehicles are dangerous. Because we know phone distraction has never caused a proper car to crash, definitely not
Very interesting that if you don't use words like 'EV' or 'micromobility' or 'bicycle' people really love small electric vehicles that allow them an escape from the hassle of driving an SUV
Some of the most commonly prescribed & over-the-counter drugs share the same little-known side effect: increasing the risk of heat-related illness. Examples range from antihistamines (i.e. Benadryl) to diuretics (i.e. chlorthalidone), and many more. Gift link: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
New from me: Two major UK heat pump installers have been told not to run their ads again without information about who is eligible for government subsidies. Ruling follows a similar decision last week about Octopus's heat pump ads. Gift link:
New from me & @bloomberg.com colleagues @priazrocha.bsky.social & Eamon Farhat: A fresh salvo in a series of very public disagreements between Centrica and Octopus Energy. And of course it's about heat pumps. Gift link:
If you're in the UK, have a search here: www.froglife.org/what-we-do/t...
Talking to these lovely filmmakers prompted me to look up toad crossings near where I live. It's a nice opportunity for some volunteering, if you're in the market for that. (gift link):
that looks like a useful study & very recently published too - thanks
If anyone knows where I can find good, up-to-date numbers showing how much air conditioning we actually have in the UK/other European countries, I'm all ears. What I've found is all either incomplete, a guesstimate or a decade plus old. It's a much harder story to tell without good data!
Montse Aguilar was a healthy 51-year-old woman when she started her shift cleaning streets in Barcelona at around 2:30 p.m. on June 28. Some time before 11 p.m., Aguilar dropped dead in her apartment. Free read via @bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
The Central Texas areas pummeled by recent storms have long earned the reputation as the “Flash Flood Alley.” Yet only a fraction of homeowners there have flood #insurance. Here's why. My latest for @bloomberg.com w @eroston.bsky.social and Kyle Stock #Texasflood www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Apropos of nothing, here's a story about this chart: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
London's sweltering underground - where every day is a heat wave. Great & very timely story by my colleague @joewertz.bsky.social (gift link):
Not just hot. Very hot. The UK is currently 5.3C warmer than average for this time of year. In some places, it's 11C warmer than average. 11! istheukhotrightnow.com
New from me, with Yinka Ibukun: A newly-launched index seeks to measure both a country's climate vulnerability and its ability to access the finance it needs for resilience. It's designed to help funders best direct a dwindling supply of climate adaptation money. (gift link)
NEW: War and climate change are existential threats that need to be battled at the same time and often with the same tools, experts say as NATO allies meet in The Hague this week FREE read via @bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Zonal pricing is likely to be dropped by UK government (gift link for story by Bloomberg colleagues):
10 years ago today, we dropped a thing that people still ask me about regularly. The question "What's Really Warming the World?" still has the same answer. With Blacki Migliozzi, in conversation with NASA GISS geniuses @climateofgavin.bsky.social and @drkatemarvel.bsky.social 🎁🔗
Landmark EU law clamping down on corporate greenwashing is all but dead, after Italy pulls support Story by @mariannegros.bsky.social and @karlmathiesen.bsky.social HT @carbonbrief.org www.politico.eu/article/eu-c...
I was just in NYC for the 1st time in a while. The subway is great! It's very cheap and you can just tap in with your card! You can get a lot of places really quickly! I saw almost no fare-jumping (a lot less than in London)! The cars are roomy! The trains are regular! And it's *air conditioned*!
Holy smokes this chart from Bloomberg NEF.
Most people would keep phones and other electronics away from liquid, but some data centers are starting to operate their servers inside liquid baths for better cooling. My latest for @bloomberg.com 🎁 link valid for 7 days www.bloomberg.com/news/feature... #datacenters #energy #climatetech
SCOOP: DHS Sec. Kristi Noem directed the Federal Emergency Management Agency to prepare a memo on how to abolish itself and create a re-branded, radically smaller disaster response organization, according to a copy of the document reviewed by Bloomberg News. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Would you rather spend money on literally anything you want or on replacing/rebuilding things post-disaster? There's less choice. 3% of GDP in the last year—$1T—has gone to a "stealth tariff on consumer spending." The climate economy has arrived. 🎁🔗 www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
How to deal with shortage of skilled workers: - Increase immigration - Poach from others - Retrain existing workers - Train new workers Immigration is out of favor. Poaching is limited. Retraining is not easy. Training takes years. No easy way out! 🎁 link www.bloomberg.com/features/202...
NEW: Spain is the only European country openly talking about the need for more migrants to boost economic growth and the falling birth rate. And it's a human rights issue too, officials say. FREE link via @bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
We are running a new series on the Zero podcast about the unusual or little-talked-about bottlenecks holding back electrification. The first episode is out today. 🎁 link www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
A Swiss glacier collapse mostly destroyed an Alpine village on Wednesday. The Alps have warmed about 2C since the pre-industrial period, with many glaciers losing half their mass since 1900. By colleagues @lauramillan.bsky.social and @joewertz.bsky.social (gift link)
Exclusive: The Federal Reserve has disbanded a number of internal groups studying financial stability threats posed by climate change
Climeworks built its first demo plant Orca in 2021 with a nameplate capacity of 4,000 tons of CO2 capture, but even its best month of performance it has only reached about 65%. Why? Find the answers in my interview with the CEO Jan Wurzbacher. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
see also: sleep apps, meditation apps, mental health apps, yoga apps, mindfulness apps...
🛰️👩🚀 BREAKING: There's a new space agency in town! African nations have set up their own space agency to close the continent's climate and weather data gap. It's a big step toward improving early warnings systems for extreme weather events FREE via @bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
For 25+ yrs, the Arctic Council helped keep the region "High North, low tension." But now 7 NATO countries + Russia ring it, making collaboration tough. (Trump's aspirations for Canada and Greenland don't help). The new SAO Chair, a native Greenlander, spoke to us. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
This chart is incredible, have used it myself in the past. www.ft.com/content/f867...
Removing these public mapping tools “is actually dumbing down the way the government works,” says Robert Verchick, a climate legal expert at Loyola University. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
EXCLUSIVE: Europe is rearming and one country is using defense money to beef up the army's ability to fight climate change. I found it's a growing trend Read the story for free here: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
ICYMI from the weekend: @lauramillan.bsky.social and I looked at why most of Spain's rooftop solar owners weren't shielded from the effects of the blackout - and why most Europeans have panels that don't work when the power is off. Gift link:
Danish wind turbine company Vestas released its earnings statement this morning. The company, which does a lot of business in the US, said that tariffs are likely going to drive up power prices www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Climate "pragmatists" suggest the energy transition is too expensive. But burning fossil fuels is far more costly. The $87 trillion in damages corporate America alone is inflicting on us is just the start Gift link to my @opinion.bloomberg.com column www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...
www.justgiving.com/page/rhcc-vs...
David's cricket team is playing the Royal Household CC in Windsor in his memory on Saturday, and they're hoping to raise money to support the British Heart Foundation, to help others like him. Please donate if you can.
It's still unclear what exactly caused Spain's blackout Monday. But frequency data shows that the grid was already under stress for at least a half hour before the system broke. www.bloomberg.com/news/article... #energysky
New: If you're thinking about putting solar panels on your roof, here's how to navigate the chaos of Trump tariffs, declining state subsidies and the collapse of big national solar companies. With @mchediak.bsky.social. Free link. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Kids are anxious about the climate, don't trust their government to help, and increasingly don't want to have kids of their own. There's a simple solution, and it's the opposite of what Trump is doing Gift link to my column for @opinion.bloomberg.com www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...
🎙️ TODAY: On Earth Day, Bloomberg journalists will answer questions about how the climate tech industry is navigating Trump's policies and tariffs. Join our Live Q&A at 10:30am EDT: bloom.bg/4jetMNW
I think that's true in both cases, tbh!
Heat pumps vs gas boilers is to Britain what induction stoves vs gas stoves is to America. It's not that there's less controversy, it's just about different things.
Niche question: can anyone recommend a good cavity wall insulation company that covers south London? Having just suffered through winter in a freezing cold extension with empty cavity walls, I'm keen to get it sorted before the weather turns again..
🚨Renewables + storage is expected to make up 50+% of power capacity needed by 2035 to meet data center demand. But almost 2/3 of additional electricity generation will come from fossil fuels, BNEF said in its latest report. With @mchediak.bsky.social and Josh Saul www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Heat pumps are great, but they can't work for all types of use cases. Especially so in space-constrained housing. So what then for a clean alternative? @oliviarudgard.bsky.social writes about UK's experiments with heat batteries. Gift link: www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
The EU is planning to outline its roadmap to phase out Russian fossil fuels in early May www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
New: Cargo ships transport 80%+ of the global trade in goods, accounting for 3% of greenhouse gas emissions. With low-carbon fuels years away, shipping companies are embracing high-tech sails, onboard carbon capture and smart buoys to cut emissions. Free link. www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
Spain is ignoring calls to reconsider its nuclear decommissioning plans, betting renewables and battery storage will make up for the upcoming energy shortfall. It migh be able to pull it off Free link to my latest on @bloomberg Green www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
New from me: Electrifying heat at home is a tough challenge. So is balancing a grid juggling growing demand and intermittent supply. Could heat batteries hold an answer to both questions? Gift link:
New: Two interesting rulings out from the UK's ad regulator this morning. One oil company has had an ad banned, the other has had an ad allowed. Here's what the two rulings tell us about where the ASA is drawing the line between what's allowed and what's not in green claims (gift link):
Really interesting story on what it's like to live in a coal-dominated society, with all its knock-on health effects and costs
Paul Schramm led CDC's climate health program up until yesterday. That's when his entire team got axed as part of agency-wide layoffs. I spoke with Schramm about the layoffs, the work his climate health team did, and what happens now @bloomberg.com (gift link): www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
I’ve written for @thespectator1828.bsky.social about people’s stories in focus groups of how they’ve turn inward and become less social since the pandemic and the risk it leaves us lonelier, more isolated less cohesive and less open to new experiences. www.spectator.co.uk/article/were...
Arctic sea ice grows in winter, reaching its peak in March before starting the summer melt. This year's peak was the lowest in almost half a century. That has ramifications for the speed of global warming and for extreme weather further south. @nsidc.bsky.social www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
New: Just Stop Oil will cease its disruptive protests, claiming UK policy victory
For the past few months, I’ve been working on a story that was set to reveal this week one of the biggest bottlenecks to our clean, electrified future. Then on Thursday night, it blew up. Not my story, but the very thing—transformers—I was reporting on. Gift link: www.bloomberg.com/features/202...
Last year, shoppers spent $227 billion on secondhand apparel, up 15% from the year before and accounting for nearly 10% of all global spending on clothes, according to a new ThredUp report. Gift link @bloomberg.com: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Thing I would love to know: - why they think it's impossible - what they would do instead - how that alternative plan would bring down energy bills
It was fascinating to hear Andrew Bowie try to tread this tightrope on Today this am. We support climate action, we're proud of our climate record, but we don't think 2050 is a realistic target because energy bills are too expensive right now...? It's not very coherent as a message.
Such a lovely story about the joy of e-biking!
This story starts connecting the dots between the many ways the Trump admin's moves are *already* disrupting science + research nationwide, from climate to health to econ depts. A real team effort w/weather, health + higher ed reporters @bloomberg.com (gift link): www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
How to make sense of the world today? "Across a range of tests, the average person’s ability to reason and solve novel problems appears to have peaked in the early 2010s and has been declining ever since." on.ft.com/4kPKLr2
thanks!
Equally, people might be surprised to learn that both boilers and cars now add more carbon to the atmosphere than the power grid. That's important to understand. The things you use everyday really aren't some small, unimportant part of the picture.
Anyway, this gets to the heart of what I think about every day, which is - what is the role of the consumer, the ordinary person in all of this? And this isn't about putting everything on the individual. Everyday actions are driven by social structures. You don't make decisions in a vacuum.
Hi, if you hover over the little dots it should show you? They're all to the right of the UK (more CO2 intensive electricity)
One thing I didn't really get to go into in the story is that industrial emissions have also fallen significantly. Part of that is greater efficiency, but some of it is also offshoring. We have deindustrialised much further than our counterparts in, say, the USA or Germany
The next stage will be trickier, and relies both on massive public investment and persuading people to change - at a time when everyone's finances are stretched.
A cluster of rich nations, including the UK, have made progress towards low-carbon electricity, without the public having to change much about their lives. Less coal and more renewables means the power supply, once a major source of carbon, now emits less than cars and boilers.
New from me: In its 7th Carbon Budget, @thecccuk.bsky.social put a figure on exactly how much of the UK's carbon-cutting is directly linked to consumers between now and 2040: 37%. I looked at what's behind that number and what it says about some wealthy countries' progress to net zero. Gift link:
New: The Trump tariffs mean the cost of decarbonizing your life - heat pumps, battery storage, electric cars - just got more expensive. Here's how import taxes could show up in the price tags of green products, even those made in the USA. Free link. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
New: London's air quality improved after the low-emission zone expanded, a report from the mayor's office said. Comes as New York City faces orders from the President to dismantle its own newly-imposed congestion charging zone. Gift link:
In the UK, more than *60%* of new cars are company cars. There are tax breaks for both owner and company for company car EVs, as I wrote about in 2023. It's the main thing driving the UK EV market right now. Fascinating to see the EU following the same model.
Interesting story by @johnainger.bsky.social - Europe's EV market is increasingly boosted by company cars
Weeks into Trump II, companies are talking up the jobs they create, the costs they cut--anything but how they're helping the climate. “This isn’t a good time to put a red flag in front of the bull," says one CEO. @cocojournalist.bsky.social & @oliviarudgard.bsky.social on the rise of greenhushing:
At least 880 NOAA employees were fired today with hundreds more expected as soon as Friday. Right as there's: 🔥 a red flag warning for most of Nebraska and Iowa 🌪️ severe weather season picking up next week in the South 🔥🔥 "significant" wildfire potential for the Southwest and Southeast next month
