For now seems to just be a display of whatās possibleā¦
Professor at the University of Ottawa studying contentious CLIMATE POLITICS. Especially interested in aviation/high-speed rail; nuclear debate; green/de-growth; meat production/consumption; and all things CanadašØš¦. Co-Host http://EcopoliticsPodcast.ca
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For now seems to just be a display of whatās possibleā¦
Yeah itās hard to reconcile the dryness with the lack of fire. Though a) the dry weather largely came later once a lot of vegetation had a good dose of rain; and b) as you say, a necessary ingredient is an ignition source, and with the lack of rain storms comes lack of lightning.
Super interesting to see the spatial dynamics involved in this yearās wildfires. Much of Ontario, Quebec, Nunavut, and Labradorās boreal unscathed.
True. The following line seem important too though: "In particular, our simulations did not consider potential increases in research investment and technological innovation driven by economic growth (e.g., GDP), which may enhance future yields beyond what is projected here."
Link to paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
New paper on climate & food security in sub-Saharan Africa generally expects yield *increases* (with some exceptions and a whole lot of spatial variation). The panel below shows total mean yields and relative yield changes compared to baseline 1981ā2015, for a) SSP2ā4.5; b) SSP3ā7.0; and c) SSP5ā8.5
Looks like Stella lol
"China dominates the global trade of battery components, with 88% of the worldās cathode and 96% of anode production capacity in 2024, according to BNEF."
The Ocean: āPffā¦ You humans, you think you can conquer all! You inhabit all the continents; send rockets into space; put a flag on the moon; climb the tallest mountains; and sail the widest seasā¦ but youāll never leave your mark at my deepest depths!ā Humans: āHold my beerā
Open Access paper here: iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
š New from @rahmstorf.bsky.social team: āThe IPCC report found that the crucial Atlantic Ocean circulation #AMOC will weaken. Now some of the models have been continued beyond year 2100 and reveal a high risk of full shutdown.ā
Some kind of metaphor for racism as an ideology burning your country to the ground (ICE agents arrest migrant firefighters)
Donāt forget the Fascism checklist!
Itās a projection. Not a real person. A hologram.
So was I
šFound a strange holographic professor pod at my uniā¦
Adding to list of class assignments that are very hard to do with AI
New study evaluates the precision of the IPPCās sea level rise estimates from 30yrs ago: āHere we show that the mid-range projection from the Second Assessment Reportā¦ was strikingly close to what transpired over the next 30 years, with the magnitude of sea-level rise underestimated by only ā¼1 cm.ā
š£ Environmental Politics Article of the Year Award 2024! The award for Volume 33 goes to @ryankatzrosene.bsky.social and @apasek.bsky.social for their article āSpiral-scaling climate action: lessons from and for the academic flying less movementā. environmentalpoliticsjournal.net/editorial-an...
Fall semesterās right around the corner... Hereās to another year of learning from brilliant students!
Speak for your own dog please
Climate scientists: It would be prudent to transition our energy systems from carbon-emitting fossil fuels to cleaner non-GHG emitting energy sources as quickly as possible. AP Ragebait: Have you considered replacing your dog with 100 rabbits?
Part 2 of my deep dive examining how and why many parts of North America used to have greater wildfire burn rates... and how climate factors in: thetradeoff.substack.com/p/part-2-man...
Part 2 of my deep dive examining how and why many parts of North America used to have greater wildfire burn rates... and how climate factors in: thetradeoff.substack.com/p/part-2-man...
Proud to be a part of this group effort coordinated by @andrewdessler.com Link: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
Some climate skeptics making a big deal about Arctic Sea Ice EXTENT no longer declining since 2005. What about Arctic Sea Ice VOLUME? One could say it's also plateaued since around 2010. But honestly, you could have said the same from early 1980s to early 1990s and you'd look a complete fool today:
Another piece Iāve been working on for a whileā¦ many parts of North America used to burn as much (or even more) than present, but climate change is also making wildfires worseā¦ so how do we explain this? I spoke to experts and dive into the details:
Come read our ~award winning~ analysis of the academic flying less movement!
Do you have a write-up I could see? Is it linked in to climate change?
Link: thetradeoff.substack.com/p/north-amer...
Another piece Iāve been working on for a whileā¦ many parts of North America used to burn as much (or even more) than present, but climate change is also making wildfires worseā¦ so how do we explain this? I spoke to experts and dive into the details:
Me!
Any chance us fellow academics can see it?
š Thatās a right angle
Bit of colour on the horizon tonightā¦
Hey, just got word that my co-authored article (with Dr. Anne Pasek, Trent University) was awarded Environmental Politics Best Article of the Year! Here's a link to the Open Access version: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Wuh? 2023 was the driest year globally (on land) in 122 years? š¤·š»āāļø
š¤ What happens when you divide the total wildfire burn area for each year in Canada by the total number of wildfires across the country? Oh.... Using this metric (so-called 'average wildland fire size') the three 'worst' years in the CIFFC's record would be 2023, 2025, and 2024.
New Canadian flag just dropped
Itās been a tough few days
Oopsies
The US signed & ratified the UNFCCC 33 years ago. It's still a party and will remain so despite Trump's withdrawing from Paris. It was crystal clear to all signatories that collective action was required to tackle climate change. Every signatory agreed to do their part. Sad to see shifts since then.
š As per HeatMap, DoE Secretary is planning to publish corrective reports about the prior National Climate Assessments: āWeāre reviewing them, and we will come out with updated reports on those and with comments on those reports.ā The man is on a mission to Make Fossil Fuel Combustion Great Again.
Apparently breathing in this air is equivalent to smoking 77 cigarettes per dayš³
Wildfire smoke was so bad in Fort Mac over the weekend that visibility was only a few hundred feet. PM2.5 was at 1700Āµg/mĀ³ ā ļøā ļøā ļø
Congrats to @devoncantwell.bsky.social for successfully defending her PhD dissertation, āWho leads and who follows? A study of norms in global city climate governanceā! (Also my first PhD student to defend).
Finally wrote this up... open.substack.com/pub/thetrade...
Imagine we all drove EVs and then someone came along and proposed an ICE vehicleā¦ Video credit: Nic Cruz Patane (link in Alt text)
Iām old enough to remember when these guys said BP stood for āBeyond Petroleumā. Turns out it was actually Blatant Poppycock
Yeah I think that could be part of it.
Wow, this is actually surprising. 2024 still holds the record for most flights in a single day, and 2025 is largely tracking alongside 2024 for number of flights. Is the growth of the global aviation industry plateauing?
Itās about inequality: āThe lessons he has drawn are often striking: people are fundamentally egalitarian but are led to collapses by enriched, status-obsessed elites, while past collapses often improved the lives of ordinary citizensā
If someone had told me 20 years ago that by 2025 Iād be able to take quality shots of the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxy with my pocket phone Iād have told them to gtfooh
So far this year Canadian wildfires have burned an area (much) larger than the total area of Nova Scotia and PEI combined.
When you find an awesome spot in your community you never knew existed š¤©
UN Report finds UN writes too many Reports
Timeline cleanse: Found this black swallowtail perched on a blade of grass
Cool I found a tweet that represents exactly how I felt in June of 2016
5) So, final takeaway? We ARE at a renewables cost tipping point. Theyāre cheaper, faster to deploy, and they're doing relatively well. But... they should be doing better! Governments arenāt moving fast enough, and we risk (somewhat) squandering the opportunity the market is handing us. /fin
4) This quote by the Director General of IRENA after the first report connects the two: He notes that despite a relatively positive economic context for renewables growth, the political context could make the picture less rosy in reality. And that's where the Ember report comes in.
3) So, do these reports contradict eachother? Not really. In some ways they are complimentary! The IRENA report notes how renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels in most of the world. The Ember report notes how governments still arenāt planning to build enough of them...
2) The headlines come from 2 different reports: First, a report by IRENA highlighted how new renewables are now cheaper than fossil fuels in most of the world. Then, Ember published a report warning that governments arenāt ramping up their targets fast enough to meet global pledges.
You may have noticed some seemingly competing news stories about renewables lately. News stories LAST WEEK pointed to a 'positive tipping point' for renewables. This week it's failing to meet renewable targets. What's going on? Mini š§µ
How does this compare to house cats?
Ouch. āIf we plan restoration targets to match future climatic conditions and consider state transitions of currently natural ecosystems due to climate change, the potential for natural climate solutions related to ecosystem restoration is close to zero.ā
I would deeply enjoy supervising a PhD thesis about this advertisementā¦ please get in touch š (Yes, itās a real advertisement!)
Just heard from sister in law in Yellowknifeā¦ thereās literally ash falling like snowflakes from the sky
I would deeply enjoy supervising a PhD thesis about this advertisementā¦ please get in touch š (Yes, itās a real advertisement!)
Thatās quite an outburst: āHere we present evidence of a destructive mode of meltwater drainage in Greenland. Using multiple satellite sources, we show that a 90-million-cubic-metre subglacial flood forced its way upwards from the bed, fracturing the ice sheet, and bursting through the surface.ā
Good God š±
"The year 2023 witnessed an extraordinary surge in marine heatwaves (MHWs) across Earthās oceans, setting new records in duration, extent, and intensity, with MHW activity totaling 53.6 billion Ā°C days square kilometerāmore than three standard deviations above the historical norm since 1982."
So does this mean Guyana is the best place to ride out collapse?
The (further) privatization of climate aid thanks to Trumpā¦ āThe push for private investment comes as some richer countries cut development finance, including the administration of climate-skeptic U.S. President Donald Trump.ā
Always fun to see the International Space Station fly across the sky. Hello to the 7 people on board! (7 of 10 humans currently in space).
[That was from the Clean Energy Canada weekly e-newsletter]
Yet another set of detrimental effects of the Trump administration: Renewables deployment declines, coal use surges, electricity prices rise. Effin' morons!
A Comment in Nature today argues that the decarbonization challenge in China requires a massive scale-up of CCUS: "Chinaās solution cannot be renewables alone. It must include CCUS, not as an afterthought, but as central infrastructure, similar to roads or railways." Not holding my breath...
I see the WEF succeeded in reprogramming the Neanderthal diet
It's official. 2025 is now the third worst wildfire year on record in Canada. A study from 2018 examining fire-regime changes in Canada over the prior 57 years showed the fire season had been starting approximately one week earlier and ending one week later. Probably longer now.
Found some very aromatic wild mint and for some reason it gave me flashbacks to playing Legend of Zelda as a kid and coming across all sorts of treasures while roaming around the realmš¤·š»āāļøš
Oh thatās why: āSince 2002, 75% of the population lives in 101 countries that have been losing freshwater water. Furthermore, the continents now contribute more freshwater to sea level rise than the ice sheets, and drying regions now contribute more than land glaciers and ice capsā
Geez, scientific article titles have no chill anymore.
āProlonged exposure to soaring temperatures can cause a deterioration in our cells and tissues and speed up biological aging, according to a new and growing body of research.ā
Highly recommended! This interview with @laurieadkin.bsky.social by @ryankatzrosene.bsky.social is full of wisdom about the thorniest of topics that most people struggle to face uk to. It's full of insights that can only come from a lifetime of careful consideration when there are no easy answers
Arctic Sea Ice Extent battling for record low....
Wow... this ICJ advisory opinion is truly extensive!
I managed to figure out the 30 second exposure on this iPhone to get a Milky Way shot andā¦ holy fuck!
āIn a landmark advisory opinion on Wednesday, the United Nations' top court said countries could be in violation of international law if they fail to take measures to protect the planet from climate change, and nations harmed by its effects could be entitled to reparations.ā
As I understand it the offsets allowed under ICAOās CORSIA are biological offsets or other eligible green energy projects.
Happening nowā¦ north of Ottawaš¤©
ICAO's 'Net Zero Carbon by 2050 Target' for the International Aviation sector would see nearly a Gt of CO2 emitted each year by 2050 (which presumably would be 'Net Zeroafied' through offsets)š„“
Last year still holds the record for most flights recorded in a single day. 275,690 flights! If this year's going to take the cake it will likely be later this week.
Another study on the costs of climate change from Kotz and co.: āRecent econometric analysis confirms that abnormally high temperatures directly cause higher food prices, as impacts on agricultural production [3] translate into supply shortages and food price inflationā
Seems like one of those things were some bureaucrat just assumed the "S" was for "Synthetic" and the rest is history... š
Sustainable Aviation Fuel accounts for *less than 1%* of global aviation fuel consumption. The industry target for this year is 5%. [Note to readers: SAFs should be considered ālower carbonā, not ācarbon neutralā]
@caseynewton.bsky.social @kevinroose.com Did you see this one? Just the new Grok cheerfully recommending that someone douse themselves in gasoline and self-immolate š¬
"Our analysis suggests that over thousands of years, communities that combined herding, farming, fishing and gathering were making context-specific choices that helped them weather unpredictable conditions. They built food systems that worked with the land and sea, not against them."
This study showed that "carbon pricing is a crucial tool in the efforts to address and mitigate climate change". It was published four days after Mark Carney said in an interview during his Liberal leadership campaign that he'd 'scrap the carbon tax' if he became PM.
This study from 2023 showed that the more we know about climate change, the more we expect it to incur higher costs, generally speaking... "Here I present a meta-analysis of published estimates showing that the social cost of carbon has increased as knowledge about climate change accumulates."
I'm ready to step up to the plate in 2042 if no-one else does š