ClimateNick 🇬🇧 🇯🇵

I’m sure seatbelt advocates and air pollution regulation advocates had a hard time, but who would want the world prior to those things?

Comes down to bad politicians as well. The point of politicians is to lead people to accept change for the better, but it’s mostly cowards or careerists who don’t care and want an easy ride.

The Guardian view on Kemi Badenoch and the Iran war: confusion reveals a lack of serious thinking | Editorial Editorial: The Tories and Reform UK have abandoned British interests to become ideological satellites of radical US cons

Exactly this ⬇️

"The Tories and Reform UK have abandoned British interests to become ideological satellites of radical US conservatism."

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/mar/11/the-guardian-view-on-kemi-badenoch-and-the-iran-war-confusion-reveals-a-lack-of-serious-thinking

Net zero means we need to decarbonise fully, which is not possible with gas boilers still in place, so in the end the argument is somewhat academic as we must do both.

This is the largest oil supply shock in history in mb/d
The enemy gets a vote. Iran is now delivering pain to Trump via multiple paths
(1) Gulf Kings
(2) Financial meltdown
(3) AI tech oligarchs
(4) Fuel, fertilizer, food disruptions
Read our Polycrisis Dispatch:
buttondown.com/polycrisisdi...

Agree - I really hope they are driving as hard a bargain as possible. And if US asks, they can ask where the tomahawks and Patriot missiles are. Or ask about the Russian shadow fleet. Etc.

“Of course, there are other ways we can reduce oil consumption – electric bicycles, which we also cover here on Electrek, have reduced oil consumption even more than electric cars have, and sold in greater numbers globally.”

Thanks for the excellent insight. The more I learn about the grid, the more arcane and complex it appears to be!

I had heard that batteries had exceeded expectations in performance in Australia for balancing, so hope it can succeed here too.

I see thank you. Is balancing something batteries can help with?

So forcing gas away from setting the price won’t result in lower energy prices overall?

How important is the balancing mechanism in influencing overall cost?

Europe’s impotence extends to energy The political momentum behind decarbonising the continent’s energy system has dissipated

War in Iran exposed that Europe failed to stand up to a business lobby that slowed decarbonisation

It committed a "strategic error of slowing a transformation necessary for security & independence....truth is that rearguard action on fossil dependence is bad for business"
www.ft.com/content/a6be...

Fear of cities = luxury beliefs of the well-off.

Denmark responded to 1973 oil crisis by reducing car-dependency. Let's do that now. - Streetsblog Chicago "The government had to introduce car-free Sundays. And then people realized that the car-free Sunday was the best day of the week."

FYI the 1970s oil crisis was the impetus for Copenhagen turning into a cycling city

Cor, sure would feel great right now if we were self-sufficient in renewable energy, and laughing at all the rubes reliant on global oil supplies. We'd have a bit of a swagger in our step today.

a man singing into a microphone with the words " i won 't do " written below him ALT: a man singing into a microphone with the words " i won 't do " written below him

Observing the timeline of people, understandably, freaking out about oil prices rising due to Iran and how it’ll impact their mobility. There is one solution that can help, but appears utterly beyond the pale for many: switch to an electric car.

By 2050 not 2030

I don’t think the argument is very convincing without quantities, figures and timelines. Meanwhile there’s renewables, home insulation and heat pumps as more immediately impactful on the demand side.

Left me with questions - how much more gas can be extracted and how much of a difference would this make? Future projections only show a small sliver of additional production against a backdrop of precipitous decline (extraction rate fall of 95% by 2050). +How quickly can additional gas come online?

I was going to say, every female Tory leader wants to do the Maggie thatcher photo op in a tank thing. Ok well 2 out of 3, I don’t think May did one.

My fave is still when Jim Carey posted a joke about Mussolini being hung up in a public square when he was executed, then Mussolini’s grandchild replying that this was insensitive.

Cruel Intentions - watched it as a teen - Ryan Phillipe is cool, he did some bad things but so tragic he died once he’d started turning it around. The step sister is the villain.

10 years later - wow yikes, that man is a groomer, revenge porn and date-rapist. He is absolutely not redeemable wtf.

and how deeply deranged and brainwashed many have become by MAGA, toxic media and social media content and conspiracy theories with poor awareness or even interest in what’s going on in the world. It’s so much worse than I realised.

But seeing what is playing out now, deeper divisions than almost any other country, a system that is totally incapable of holding the powerful to account, zero consequences for the most heinous crimes, the compliance and complicity of the Democratic Party,

As a gay man they told me with a few exceptions, I would need to stay along the East or West coast to be welcomed if I ever visited. I think they may have been exaggerating, because I was only getting the perspective of those who had left and didn’t want to go back.

I made so many US friends when working overseas. I always wondered why so many were from Ohio. My friends looked at me like I was stupid. “Because they are escaping Ohio!”

What it’s like looking at any US political polling. It’s taken a while for it to fully sink in how badly the US is broken as a country. And I say it with no joy whatsoever.

Absolutely right

Again, as with Guardian article, Mahmood's reliance on false/deliberately misleading claims about her "earned settlement" proposals suggests that she knows she can't defend them on the merits, in principle or in practice.

800!! ffs

Attack piece in the spectator - a sign Miliband is doing a good job.