Simon

I might not agree with everything he has said or done, but I still have huge respect for Captain Paul Watson and his movement.

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If there are going to be climate-justified subsidies for owning electric cars, there should be subsidies for not owning cars at all. Discuss.

Sometime during this past summer, the electric mower broke down, and our lawn wasn't cut for a really long period - and it was great! The small plot of lawn was quickly filled with flowers and various grass species. And it started to teem with life. First with lots of butterflies, bees, and insects. Then we noticed how more and more small birds came to visit. I guess to hunt for food and play around in the long grass. Even a hedgehog came to visit us most nights! It's amazing how little effort was required to bring back nature and wild life. The photo below shows how it looked just after a couple of days without moving the lawn. Have you tried something similar?

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You’re not supposed to pick them up, why else are they called leaves

This is outrageous! When Bayer acquired Monsanto back in 2018, the manufacturer promised that it would make Roundup safer by removing the cancer-linked glyphosate from its weed-killer products by 2023. But an analysis, by Friends of the Earth, of the new Roundup shows that the weed killer is actually 45 times more toxic to human health. "With the new formulations of Roundup, Bayer had the opportunity to make us safer, but it did the opposite," Kendra Klein, deputy director of science for Friends of the Earth, said in a press release. "Bayer's willingness to deceive the public and disregard our health as it continues to cash in on the Roundup brand name is outrageous." The analysis shows that the cancer-linked glyphosate remains in Roundup and that it contains new and even more dangerous chemicals: Read the full report here.

This past August, the world's largest floating wind turbine, the OceanX, was installed on the open sea off Hong Kong, China. The OceanX is unique because it's the first ever platform that's been successfully built with two wind turbines on it. The dual-turbine has a total capacity of 16.6 MW and is expected to produce 54,000 MWh annually, which is enough to supply electricity to 30 000 homes. And it's absolutely huge! The OceanX is installed on a floating platform in the shape of a Y and reinforced with high-tension cables, it weighs about 16,500 tons, and reaches 219 metres at its highest point and has a maximum width of about 369 metres in the air. The OceanX wind turbine can resist wind speeds of up to 161 mph (260 km/h) and waves as high as 98 feet (30 meters) in Category 5 hurricane conditions. And what's even more impressive is that it can still generate electricity under such harsh circumstances. And yes, it has already managed to withstand a "super typhoon".

Meteorologist John Morales broke down in tears while giving his forecast for Hurricane Milton's progress on WTVJ in South Florida. Watch: Excerpt: "It is an incredible, incredible hurricane. The pressure has dropped with..." He looks down at his screen and continues in a shaky voice: "... it has dropped by 50 millibars. In ten hours." His voice breaks. The faster the air pressure in a hurricane drops, the faster it strengthens. "I apologize. It's just terrible." In an interview afterward, he told the New York Times that he began to cry out of shock at the hurricane's rapid development, compassion for the victims, and ultimately over his frustration at humanity's failure to reduce global warming, which is behind the increasingly extreme weather. "To see what I've known would happen [to] unfold before your very eyes when you've been trying to warn people about this and urging action on climate and not getting enough of that — it's just frustrating," he later said to People. Amazing, we're at that time in history when meteorologists cries over climate change on TV...

OPEC claimed in its annual World Oil Outlook (WOO) that there was "no peak oil on the horizon" and that phasing out oil was a "fantasy". The Saudi-led oil cartel concluded in its report that oil and gas make up well over half of the global energy mix today and, according to their assessment, the demand for oil and gas will continue to increase until at least 2050. For oil alone, OPEC expects to see demand reaching over 120 million barrels a day by 2050. "What the Outlook underscores is that the fantasy of phasing out oil and gas bears no relation to fact," OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais said. "A realistic view of demand growth expectations necessitate adequate investments in oil and gas, today, tomorrow, and for many decades into the future," he added. OPEC expects that the demand for all energy sources will continue to increase, with the exception of coal. And while the largest increase is expected to come from renewable energy sources, mainly wind and solar, the share of oil and gas in the energy mix will remain high. According to the report, oil will remain the largest with a total share at above 29 percent in 2050. Following renewables, OPEC expects that natural gas will have the second-largest increase. Coal demand is forecast to decline due to stringent national climate and energy policies, the report concludes. Future energy demand (mboe/d = million barrels of oil equivalent a day): Renewable energy sources will grow by 43 mboe/d (expanding from 9.6 mboe/d in 2023 to 52.4 mboe/d in 2050). Natural gas will grow by 20.5 mboe/d. Oil will grow by by 16.7 mboe/d. Coal will decline by almost 29 mboe/d between 2023 and 2050. The increased demand for energy is driven by a rising world population and a growing demand from primarily India and other non-OECD countries. The strongest energy demand will come from petrochemicals, road transportation and aviation, the report assesses. Obviously, the reports' forecast is completely contrary to previous assessment from the International Energy Agency, which projects that the demand for oil will peak as early as this decade thanks to renewable energy and electric cars. Just last month, IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol told news media that the demand for oil is slowing down. He attributed this decline in oil to the growth of electric cars and the weakening of the Chinese economy. In 2023, Birol said that "the peak in fossil fuel demand is moving even closer" and that the transition to clean energy is accelerating. In a few days, IEA's annual flagship report, World Energy Outlook, will be released. We'll see then what kind of projections IEA will make of future energy demand and growth - and if it's in line with OPEC's grim projections.

Almost 200 land defenders and climate activists were murdered last year. And environmental activists are increasingly facing tougher suppression and harassment from governments in Western countries. Nearly 200 environmental activists around the world were murdered in 2023, according to a new report by the organization Global Witness. But the real number of murdered activists is most likely much higher. For the second year in a row, Colombia tops the list of countries where most climate activists and land defenders are murdered. Last year, 79 activists were killed in the country. Brazil, Honduras and Mexico were next in line. These four countries alone made up more than 70 percent of all recorded killings globally. The report, which has been released yearly since 2012, shows that Latin America remains the most dangerous region with 85 percent of the total 196 murders. But the authors of the reports notes that findings are conservative and likely incomplete. For example, in all of Africa, Global Witness recorded only four deaths and consequently warned that their figure was likely a "gross underestimate" due to difficulty in collecting information. In addition to murder, activists are also subject to "enforced disappearances and abductions," tactics which are particularly used in both the Philippines and Mexico. "We are facing difficulties in returning to our homes and communities. We are still experiencing surveillance, red-tagging, and intimidation," said Jonila Castro, a Filipino activist who was abducted by the Philippines military in 2023 and currently facing criminalization, the report said. Environmental activists are also being silenced and suppressed by legislation in several countries. The report highlights Western countries where the situation for climate activists has become increasingly tougher in recent years. The report points out the USA, EU, and the UK as examples of countries and regions which have introduced harsher legislation, penalties and "draconian levels of surveillance" for environmental protesters and activists. But it's not just governments and politicians that are actively suppressing environmental activists. The report notes that media institutions also play "a major role in tainting mainstream perceptions of those protesting against climate breakdown." In January 2024, the UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders under the Aarhus Convention, Michel Forst, emphasised his distress at observing the disparagement of environmental and climate defenders by the mainstream UK media and politicians. The result, he says, is “a significant chilling effect on civil society and the exercise of fundamental freedoms.” We've all seen how environmental activists and protesters are being portrayed by mainly right-leaning politicians and various media outlets as extremists and terrorists that must be harshly dealt with, and how they gleefully post on social media with sick enjoyment whenever environmental protesters face brutality and violence from both fellow civilians and law enforcement. If you want a fresh example, just look how human rights activists and anti-war protesters are being suppressed by Germany and other Western governments right now. These heavy-handed police tactics and anti-protest laws will most likely also be used to suppress environmental protesters and activists. Make no mistake, if democratic governments can suppress activists that are protesting against a genocide today (They are trying to silence people who are protesting a genocide. A genocide! What happened to us?), they will have no qualms about suppressing climate activists using the very same heavy-handed treatment tomorrow. Another report, by Climate Rights International, builds upon this and exposes Western governments for their apparent double-standard. The report details how democratic Western governments are increasingly using harsh, vague and punitive measures to crack down on climate protests in their own countries, while they are criticising similar tactics used by more authoritative governments and countries in the global South. “Governments too often take such a strong and principled view about the right to peaceful protest in other countries – but when they don’t like certain kinds of protests at home they pass laws and deploy the police to stop them,” said Brad Adams, director at Climate Rights International. The report highlights how Australia, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Sweden, the UK and the US frequently criticise regimes in developing countries for not respecting the right to protest peacefully. But back home, these countries' governments are increasingly suppressing and cracking-down on climate activists. These governments have themselves responded to non-violent climate protests with mass arrests and draconian new laws that have resulted in long prison sentences. In the UK, climate activists now face longer prison sentences than rapists and far-right rioters. The report also shows how politicians - and the media - have been labelling the protesters as hooligans, saboteurs and even "ecoterrorists". Governments around the world are not doing enough to stop greenhouse gas emissions from rising rapidly. Climate change is accelerating and not slowing down. We are clearly losing the fight against climate change. But rather than taking urgent measures to rapidly reduce the use of fossil fuels and halt ecological collapse, our governments are instead suppressing and stopping those who are bravely raising the alarm by taking part in non-violent protests and civil disobedience. The worse climate change gets, the more the status quo powers will escalate their crack-downs and violence against climate activists in a futile effort to cling to power and maintain order in a dying world. Dark times are ahead of us. Cover photo by Joël de Vriend.