Nick Brooks

I saw how the Greens channelled voters’ anger – and fused it with hope. That’s why they won in Gorton and Denton | Owen Jones Starmer called the byelection a battle for the nation’s soul. This result shows Labour has lost that – and I think it will lose much more, says Guardian columnist Owen Jones

I really like this combination of analysis and opinion from Owen Jones. The opening paragraph is just perfect. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...?

Mapping tipping risks from Antarctic ice basins under global warming - Nature Climate Change Climate change threatens the future of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. Here the authors show that individual drainage basins have different thresholds and loss patterns, suggesting the need to consider the d...

⚠️"A first threshold, potentially as low as 1–2 °C above pre-industrial levels, triggers the long-term collapse of ~40% of marine ice volume in West Antarctica"

I.e. The Paris Agreement target locks in approximately 2.1 metres sea-level equivalent from WAIS alone.

🌊

Happy 27th February to all my Sahrawi friends.

Screen shot of article with image of tree in flooded landscape.

My latest piece for our local paper, this time on #resilience, with a focus on #food and #nature, and the need for it to include #adaptation. I got in a subtle dig at #Brexit as something that makes us less resilient to food shocks and shortages. Also online at www.edp24.co.uk/news/2587874....

Normal Brendan O’Neill nonsense. I would expect nothing else.

One on left is a black dog and above it the words “Reality”. Below it is “I chased a squirrel” One the right is a black dog and above it says “LinkedIn”. Below it says, Proud to announce that I effectively executed a rapid-response squirrel displacement strategy to mitigate potential yard intrusions. Humbled by the unwavering support of my family and local stakeholders. This experience reinforced the importance of vigilance, ownership, and continuous improvement. Looking forward to scaling this impact in future engagements.

😂

These so-called "patriotic" 🇬🇧newspapers who brought you Brexit were never really patriotic at all.

They are driven by a disdain for Britain's European neighbours, and a fawning obsession with America.

They do not really want 🇬🇧 to be sovereign. They're content being a 🇺🇸vassal.

The image shows fourty-four annular (ring-shaped) translucent turquoise blue glass beads strung on a modern circular thread and displayed against a black background. The glass beads were found in 1885 when a farmer ploughed up a cremation urn at Kongehøj in Denmark. The urn broke and was found to contain burnt bones, the 44 blue glass beads and two gold spiral rings. Recent analysis shows the beads were made in Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), indicating far-reaching trade in luxury goods some 3,000 years ago.

Something lovely for the weekend!

Beautiful blue glass beads from the late Bronze Age 💙

Ploughed up by a farmer in Denmark in 1885, analysis shows the beads were made in Mesopotamia, pointing to long-distance trade in luxury goods some 3,000 years ago.

📷 National Museum of Denmark

#Archaeology

I just wrapped up Garama's training Climate Change for #Archaeology & #Heritage Specialists for the University of Cologne, to build #adaptation literacy & showcase the relevance of archaeology & heritage for adaptation.

If you need something similar, get in touch or go to garama-training.com

Open courses Our Adaptation Literacy and Adapting to Climate Change courses are run online and in-person and are open to anyone. They equip you with a detailed understanding of climate change adaptation and res…

Details of our updated #AdaptationLiteracy & Adapting to Climate Change training courses are now online, with virtual courses planned for the first quarter of 2026. Contact us to register an interest. garama-training.com/open-courses/
#climatechange #adaptation #resilience #training #courses

World still on track for catastrophic 2.6C temperature rise, report finds Fossil fuel emissions have hit a record high while many nations have done too little to avert deadly global heating

With current pledges, the world's on track for 2.6°C of warming in 2100 compared to preindustrial levels.

10 years ago, before the Paris agreement, it was 3.6°C

20+ years ago, we thought it would be 4-5°C

So 2.6°C is better, but the problem is that climate impacts are way worse than we predicted.

‘It is the scariest of times’: Margaret Atwood on defying Trump, banned books – and her score-settling memoir At 86, she’s a literary seer and saint – and queen of the Canadian resistance. So what does the writer make of our dystopian world?

This makes me kinda proud.

"The Handmaid’s Tale came about thanks in part to a winter spent in a fisherman’s cottage in Blakeney, Norfolk, in 1983, which was so grim she abandoned the novel she was working on.”

www.theguardian.com/books/2025/n...?

‘You can’t eat electricity’: how rural solar farms became the latest battlefront in Britain’s culture war Reform UK is exploiting opposition to solar panels – but most farmers are more worried about climate change.

92%: the percentage of funding for Nigel Farage's far-right political party Reform UK that comes from fossil fuel interests.

Across the world, anyone blaming immigrants, etc, it's all just a smokescreen to allow the rich to keep on getting richer by killing our planet.
share.google/W2gwfc0XVpUy...

So, I thought I’d try using the built-in Wordpress assistant to generate an image for one of my web-pages, as it didn’t want to upload an actual word cloud I’d generated. I think my job’s safe for now.

‘A broken system full of criminality and death’: the podcast lifting the lid on what happens to the UK’s rubbish Turkey’s recycling centres treat vast amounts of the UK’s waste – and rely on refugees who work in conditions so unsafe that hundreds have died. A new podcast uncovers the sinister side of what happen...

Think of this when you do your plastic recycling. Better to avoid plastic altogether where you can. www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...?

I think we missed each other. I was at the party last night but couldn’t justify paying a conference fee to take 3 days off work when I’ve just come back from 6 weeks holiday!

Mildly related is impressive.

Indeed, catastrophic climate change, including a decent chance of shutting of the Atlantic circulation and plunging the UK & northern Europe into a mini ice age as the rest of the world eats the resulting excess heat, is the explicit policy choice of the right, and they want us to vote for it.

Our next Norwich (UK) (Climate) Emergency Drinks gathering will take place tomorrow (Thu 12 June) from 7:30pm. If you fancy mixing with people working on, active about, or just interested in climate & related issues, send me a message and I'll give you the details.

The UK's latest foreign policy error On 1st June, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) released a UK-Morocco Joint Communiqué realting to an ongoing strategic dialogue between the two countries. The Communiqué included...

I've written a short piece on LinkedIn about the UK's recent endorsement of #Morocco's autonomy plan for occupied #WesternSahara, and why this is a major foreign policy error. It links to the much longer article on my blog. www.linkedin.com/pulse/uks-la...

A bit of both, I’d say.

"Libertad" spelt out in petroglyphs near Tifariti, in the Liberated Territories of Western Sahara.

The 1 June UK-Morocco #JointCommuniqué announced by #DavidLammy & the #FCDO states that #Morocco’s 'autonomy plan' is “the most credible, viable and pragmatic basis for a lasting resolution of the dispute” in Western Sahara. It isn't. Here's why. nickbrooks.wordpress.com/2025/06/06/l...

My latest article, in response to the strategic dialogue between the UK and Morocco, announced on 1st June.

Development as Domination: Settler Tourism in Western Sahara and the Commodification of Occupied Territories in Trumpist International Law [Andrea Maria Pelliconi is a Lecturer in Human Rights Law & Global Justice at the University of Southampton, where she researches demographic engineering, displacement, and inter…

Happy to share my first piece in @opiniojuris.bsky.social on "Settler Tourism in #WesternSahara and the Commodification of Occupied Territories", where I take aim at @ryanairofficial.bsky.social & others and draw comparisons with Trump's plans for Palestine as Riviera
opiniojuris.org/2025/05/23/d...

The 1990s adoption of neoliberalism by the centre left really ought to be seen for what it is: the successful capture of liberal politics by what is straightforwardly a eugenicist, far-right ideology. It's just that almost no one did the reading.

Scientists Tally Oil Majors’ Climate Damage With Eye to Legal Liability New research breaks down economic losses from global warming and attributes them to individual companies. It could bolster lawsuits against big emitters.

OUT: You can’t connect extreme weather to climate change

5Mn AGO: You can’t connect extreme weather to fossil-fuel companies

IN: 🎁🔗⤵️
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Carbon majors and the scientific case for climate liability - Nature A transparent and reproducible scientific framework is introduced to formalize how trillions in economic losses are attributable to the extreme heat caused by emissions from fossil fuel companies, whi...

This is research for impact - great support for climate litigation. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Trump has now sold out the Ukrainians, the Palestinians, and the Sahrawis, in each case giving the occupier exactly what they want with no push-back. Not exactly hard-nosed negotiation from an expert deal maker. Rather spineless capitulation by a weak mind too easily impressed by aggression.

The Day After Tomorrow is better each time I watch it. Sure, the science is beyond dodgy, but its treatment of the political economy of climate inaction, differentiated vulnerability, fragility, embedded adaptive capacity, and complex impacts, is exemplary.