Let's TALK climate

Loud, clear. No more hushing.

I woke up this Earth Day morning in Santa Barbara, California—which is appropriate, since the offshore oil spill here in 1969 was one of the galvanizing events for the first Earth Day 56 years ago. People got mad, they squawked, and government began to listen. We should never forget what they accomplished—in 18 months Congress had adopted the suite of laws (Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, EPA, etc) that the Trump administration is still trying to gut. And within five years those laws had begun to work. The air is far cleaner than it was, thanks to them. You can swim in far more lakes and rivers, thanks to them. Because they got loud.

We face a more complicated moment today, of course. The ecological crisis of our time is not caused by something going wrong—an engine spewing small amounts of carbon monoxide into the air—and not easily fixed by adding a catalytic converter to the tailpipe. Global warming is the result of things going as they’re supposed to: a “clean-burning” engine emits just water vapor, and lots and lots and lots of carbon dioxide. But that co2 traps heat, and is now warming the planet disastrously. To fix it we have to replace an energy system that runs on fossil fuels with another that runs primarily on the sun. And we have to do it fast.

I flew here yesterday, and for my carbon sins got a clear-sky view of pretty much the entire western United States. It was, as always, majestic—to fly above the Grand Canyon is to glimpse deep time. But it was also almost unbelievably sad. I’ve been telling you that this was the hottest winter, by far, in the history of the West. But to see it is different. I flew over peaks where I’ve glissaded down snowfields in June and there was not an inch of snow to be seen. Lake Mead from above looked like a bathtub with the plug open. Sere brown and tawny withered gold as far as you could see, and with it the scary promise of what will come this summer, the smoke that will rise and the flames that will burn orange against the night.

Temperatures are higher than they’ve ever been, even before El Niño breaks above our heads this summer. And yet we’re talking very little about climate change in our national conversation. There are many reasons for that—the most obvious is that the constant psychic assault from the president leaves so little room to think about anything else. But there’s also been a concerted effort among Democrats and some of their environmental allies to stay away from the topic on the grounds that it will distract from or undercut messages about “affordability” which are supposed to be the ticket to electoral success in the fall.

I’m committed to that electoral success—my calendar for the months ahead is mostly red districts, where Third Act is busy trying to move the needle with older voters. And I understand the concerns, but I think they’re basically wrong, and that talking straightforwardly about the climate crisis is both politically useful, and an excellent way to take on affordability. And I also think that human beings just need to be discussing the single biggest thing happening on planet earth, especially since we’re causing it.

The so-called “climate hushing” among Democrats is a product of political consultants looking at polling data. As Claire Barber explained in an excellent essay last month

The Searchlight Institute, a Democratic think tank run by veteran Democratic political strategist Adam Jentleson that opened its doors in 2025, made waves with its focus on shifting Democratic messaging away from progressive causes, like climate and LGBTQ issues. The think tank is pointed in its stance on climate messaging. A report released in the fall reads, “The First Rule About Solving Climate Change: Don’t Say Climate Change.”

“While battleground voters overwhelmingly agree climate change is a problem, addressing it is not a priority for them,” the report said. Similar to the American Mind Survey, Searchlight found that a majority of Americans believe that climate change is a problem, but rank it below other key issues, like affordability. Searchlight also found high partisan (Democratic) association with the terms “climate” and “climate change” and suggested jettisoning mentions of both altogether.

The phenomenon really dates, I think, from the 2024 presidential campaign, and Kamala Harris’s abbreviated run for the White House. Climate campaigners were perfectly happy to shut up during that run for an obvious reason: Joe Biden had given them, in the Inflation Reduction Act, most of what DC could provide: a massive infusion of funds for the energy transition we require. The job was to pull Harris across the finish line so that her administration could continue the work well underway with the IRA. We failed at that: her message, on the politics of joy and the dangers of Trump ran aground on frustrations with inflation. Climate played no discernible part in the election; I’m not sure any issue played a part in the election, save a kind of general kvetchy grumpiness, and a sense that normal people were being squeezed.

In the wake of their defeat, Democrats have seized on “bread and butter issues,” and left supposed culture war clashes behind. That’s come at a real cost. Corporations, feeling only pressure from the right, have backslid dramatically on their climate commitments. (The big tech guys, who just a couple of years ago were noisily pledging they’d go net zero, are currently planning gas-fired data centers that Wired reports today will produce more emissions than mid-sized European countries). And journalists are, not surprisingly, wandering away from the whole area: the wonderful Amy Westervelt yesterday described a dour meeting of environmental reporters where, among other things, she learned that not just the Washington Post but also Reuters was laying off its climate desk.

Meanwhile, funders of climate journalism are largely folding, too, opting to back comms projects instead or simply stay away from anything as "controversial" as climate and journalism altogether. The cowardice is breathtaking.

As the media watchdogs at FAIR make clear, this decline in coverage is very real

Our research has found that online news coverage of climate change has been trending down. A search of the term “climate change” in Media Cloud’s US–National dataset, which indexes 248 online outlets, found that there was almost 32% less climate coverage in 2025 than 2024.

This trend is similar in TV news. A recent Media Matters (3/4/26) study found that climate coverage on major US commercial broadcast TV networks was down 35% in 2025.

In fact, they even put the decline on a chart. Powerpoint time!

What’s interesting about all this is that it’s not being driven by some change in the basic underlying politics of climate. New polling data makes clear that Americans are as concerned about climate change as they ever have been. Gallup last week reported that

Americans’ concern about global warming or climate change remains elevated compared with what it had been prior to 2017. At least four in 10 U.S. adults have expressed “a great deal” of concern about the matter throughout the past decade (except for a 39% reading in 2023). Between 2009 and 2016, worry was typically in the low-to-mid 30% range but dropped to as low as 25% in 2011.

Currently, 44% of U.S. adults worry a great deal about global warming or climate change, among the highest in the full trend since 1989, along with 46% measured in 2020 and 45% in 2017.

And another series of Earth Day polls made the numbers even clearer. Americans, in increasing numbers, think that our environment is getting worse, and that government should be doing much more about it. Gallup again:

Americans’ assessments of the environment are particularly bleak ahead of Earth Day, as a record-low 35% offer a positive rating of the environment’s quality and two-thirds say it is worsening.

More than three in five U.S. adults, 63%, think the government is not doing enough to protect the environment, and most believe environmental protection should be prioritized over economic growth (58%) and development of U.S. energy sources (57%).

The key data point here, for political thinkers, is that the increase in worry about the environment is being driven by independent voters, precisely the people who will determine how the midterms go.

And it doesn’t surprise me a bit. It’s not as if the president or his oil-soaked cabinet has made some convincing new case about the climate. He just blusters on about the “green new scam” and insists, as he did last week, that the “planet is cooling.” By this point, Americans have decided he’s an idiot—his approval ratings are now droppinginto the mid and even low 30s. If they think he’s got tariffs wrong, and the war wrong, and immigration wrong, and pretty much everything else wrong, why would they think he had the science of climate right?

So, especially as the climate disasters of this hot summer start to mount, and as the El Niño starts to scare people anew, I’d spend some time if I were campaigning making fun of the president on this score. I’d show that clip of him insisting the planet is cooling. It makes Republicans, who have supported him down the line in Congress on energy issues, look like idiots too.

But of course I’d couple it with a full-on assault about affordability, leaning not into the price of eggs, but the price of gas, utilities, and insurance. The first is tied to the war, but they are all three also about the folly of continuing to rely on our current energy system. All you have to say is: a quick move to clean energy drives down prices. If I were preparing ads for congresspeople, I’d definitely have one about how a solarized Australia will, in June, start providing electricity free for three hours every afternoon to all its citizens. Talk about affordability!

One problem with keeping quiet about climate is that it leads people to think that they’re alone in their fears. Here’s an interesting survey from last month fronm the folks at EcoAmerica.

Most Americans are concerned about climate change, but they don’t think most others share that concern. That quiet misunderstanding is one of the biggest barriers to climate action in the United States… The findings point to a striking paradox: while many Americans trust the information they encounter and are concerned about climate change, they believe others are far less concerned and less able to recognize accurate information.

I think some politicians are starting to recognize the possibilities here. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, venerable campaigner for climate action (with a particular focus on insurance) this winter tweeted out a memorable thread

There’s a thing out there called a “climate husher.” Anyone who cares about what fossil fuel pollution is doing to Earth’s natural systems needs to ignore these so-called “climate hushers” – people who think Dems should stop talking about climate.

In an electorate focused on costs, 65% say climate change is raising their costs. Climate-driven hikes in home insurance are the top economic issue in many places. By 74-10, voters want companies to pay for the harm their pollution causes.

{Poll-chasing analysts] ignore the ‘leadership lack loop.’ When leaders don’t talk about something, enthusiasm falls among voters. In politics, you can often make your own wind, or you can make your own doldrums.

Last, they ignore that this is a fight in which there are real and dangerous villains. Our climate peril didn’t “happen,” it was done — by fraud and corruption.

The fossil fuel climate denial fraud operation and the fossil fuel dark money corruption operation are villainous. It’s evil stuff. Villains need to be fought. Plus, it’s a better story with villains. And true.

I’m pretty sure he’s right. Look, at Third Act we too are focusing a lot of our messaging on the Republican attack on democracy. But we can talk about a couple of things at once. And you can only have a working democracy on a working planet.

Happy Earth Day, all!

In other energy and climate news:

+From the UK, good news: Ed Milliband, the energy secretary (and quite possibly the heir to embattled prime minister Keir Starmer) is using the Iran crisis to double down on renewables policy. As Heather Stewart reports,

The energy secretary is set to announce a package of new policies in a speech on Tuesday in response to an expected energy crisis prompted by Donald Trump’s war with Iran.

These will include speeding up the warm homes plan to encourage the rapid take-up of solar panels and electric vehicles; expanding the use of solar on public land; and delinking gas and electricity prices, to cut consumers’ bills.

“As we face the second global energy shock in less than five years, the lesson for our country is clear; the era of fossil fuel security is over, and the era of clean energy security must come of age,” he is expected to say.

Meanwhile, some low-income British households will apparently get free plug-in solar units to take the edge off their power bills

And here in the U.S., the surge towards approving plug-in or balcony solar continues apace. This has been a big focus for Third Act, which has helped make sure 28 states are considering it this spring. And though state legislatures are usually slow to act, more and more are stepping up to the plate. The New York State Senate passed it unanimously yesterday—on to the Assembly! I’ll report more on this later, but it’s very good news.

+My old friends at 350.org have put out a nifty report on the cost of fossil fuel reliance. They use a reasonable figure for the damage that carbon is doing, add in the obvious health costs of breathing in pollution, and conclude that every human being is paying the equivalent of $1,400 a year to keep this smoky machine rattling along. As they point out, that’s a reminder that we have the resources to help the poorest people in the world make the energy transition. We should, they write:

Redirect public finance from fossil fuel expansion to a fast and fair energy transition. National and international public finance (through export credit agencies, development finance institutions, public pension fund investments and multilateral development banks) continues to underwrite new oil, gas, and coal infrastructure. Redirecting these flows toward just transition, climate resilience and inclusive green industrialization is among the highest-leverage policy interventions available.

Fast-track investment in renewables for broad-based prosperity and energy security. Simplify permitting, de-risk with guarantees, and prioritize the needs of communities, local businesses and families living in energy poverty

+As I’ve been writing, we’ve moved very rapidly into the era of the big battery. They’re powering California after sundown, but they’re coming everywhere, as evidenced by the news that New England has a new champion contender, as Julian Spector reports:

Canary Media recently covered the inauguration of the 175-megawatt Cross Town battery in Gorham, Maine, which was the largest in New England when it began operating in late November. But that trophy has already passed to a 250-megawatt facility in Medway, Massachusetts, southwest of Boston and about 10 miles from the Patriots’ Gillette Stadium.

The Medway battery came online fully Feb. 25, according to developer VC Renewables, a subsidiary of global energy trader Vitol.

“To be fair, I don’t expect Medway to hold that title for very long, either,” said Tom Bitting, managing director at Advantage Capital, which supported the project with a $158 million tax equity deal. ​“There are other batteries being developed in New England that are bigger, but I think it is all just a sign that we need all of it, and there’s huge demand for it.”

For instance, Jupiter Power, a heavyweight in Texas’ booming grid storage market, is developing the 700-megawatt/2.8-gigawatt-hour Trimount battery plant at a former oil-storage site in Everett, Massachusetts, just north of Boston. Jupiter aims to finish the project in 2028 or 2029. Trimount is slated to be among the largest stand-alone batteries in the whole country

By the way, if you want to help shepherd Massachusetts into the clean energy future, here’s where to register your comment against the proposed Constitution pipeline, an effort to extend the writ of fracked gas for another couple of unnecessary decades.

+Heatwaves around the world are already breaching human survival limits, especially for older humans, new research has found. As Graham Readfearn explains,

Scientists re-examined six extreme heatwaves between 2003 and 2024 and found that when temperature, humidity and the body’s ability to stay cool were accounted for, all were potentially deadly for older people.

The absolute limit for humans to survive had been assumed to be a six-hour exposure to a wet bulb temperature of 35C – a measure that accounts for temperature and humidity but has rarely been observed on the planet at that level.

Heatwaves in Mecca (Saudi Arabia, 2024), Bangkok (Thailand, 2024), Phoenix (United States, 2023), Mount Isa (Australia, 2019), Larkana (Pakistan, 2015) and Seville (Spain, 2003) had seen thousands of deaths despite none approaching that wet bulb limit, the research found.

But when scientists applied a new model of human survivability that takes into account the body’s ability to function and stay cool depending on age, they found all six events had seen non-survivable periods for older people who could not find shade.

Prof. Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, the study’s lead author at the Australian National University, said the results were shocking.

“My first thought was ‘Oh shit’ – I really didn’t expect to see that, especially when you zoom in to individual cities,” she said.

+The indefatigable Emily Pontecorvo has gotten hold of some new documents to show that the Trump administration got nothing back for the $1 billion in taxpayer money it paid a French company to surrender its wind lease rights off the Atlantic seaboard. The administration claimed that the company would have to invest in oil and gas, but Pontecorvo says that’s not true (which is, in fact, a small win for the atmosphere, even if it’s another loss for truth in government, not to mention basic competence). As Kit Kennedy at NRDC says,

“The irony of handing a billion dollars to this developer at a time when Americans are struggling to pay their electricity bills and struggling to keep afloat,” she said. “To be clear, this billion dollars is coming from us taxpayers, and the net result of these agreements will be to increase electricity bills for Americans.”

Meanwhile, what is Big Oil doing with some of the $30 million an hour in extra profit they’re earning from the war in Iran? Investing it in new farflung oil plays, at least according to Collin Eaton at the Journal:

The surge in energy prices is providing the oil industry with a windfall of cash that is expected to help it venture into territories previously out of reach or abandoned years ago. The influx comes after many drillers cut spending on exploration to return more cash to shareholders.

“Never underestimate the romance of upstream people looking at opportunities. They say, ‘Boy, wouldn’t it be great if we could do this or that,’” said Edward Chow, a nonresident senior associate at the Center for Strategic & International Studies and a former Chevron executive. “Now, you’ve got the cash to do it.”

Romance is…one word for it

+Regular readers will know that one continuing minor drama is the development of the next generation of solar panels, so-called “perovskite” solar panels. A new step last week, as Kelly Pickerel reports that

Perovskite-silicon solar technology company Tandem PV has begun demonstration manufacturing in Fremont, California. In a 65,000-ft² facility, Tandem PV is producing tandem perovskite-silicon solar panels. The line can accommodate 40 MW of annual capacity.

“This factory marks the shift from impressive R&D results to repeatable manufacturing at a commercially meaningful scale,” said Tandem PV CEO Scott Wharton. “People have talked for years about the promise of perovskites. This is what it looks like to deliver. It is an important milestone in restoring American leadership in solar manufacturing through the kind of breakthrough engineering Silicon Valley is known for.”

Tandem PV’s proprietary technology combines a thin perovskite light-absorbing layer with a conventional silicon solar cell. By capturing more of the solar spectrum than silicon alone, tandem panels generate more electricity from the same footprint.

+Yet more data confirms something this newsletter has been insisting on from the start: of all the ways to make electricity, burning trees is the worst possible idea. As the hardworking Fiona Harvey explains

The findings cast doubt on plans by several governments, including the UK, to offer subsidies or other financial support for carbon capture attached to wood-burning power.

Bio-energy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) has been touted as a clean way of producing baseload power, substituting for gas and coal, which could even result in “negative emissions” as when replacement forests are grown they take up CO2 from the air.

But such systems could take 150 years to be “carbon negative”, researchers from the US, UK and China have found, in part because of the long time it takes to regrow forests, and because of the damage done when existing savannah, pasture or cropland is converted to grow biomass for burning.

+Pete Hegseth may have decreed that climate change is “crap,” but the military is continuing to prepare for it at least on one front, as chronicled in a new report from Amanda Kolson Hurley

The Defense Department is still engaged on one front of the climate fight: steeling its bases against the effects of a warming atmosphere, such as higher seas, fiercer storms and deadlier fires. A new flood wall is rising at the US Naval Academy in Maryland; a low-lying Air Force runway is being elevated in Virginia; and projects are underway to reduce wildfire risk around various military sites in Hawaii.

Work that was previously described as confronting the climate threat is now touted for ensuring “resilience” and “readiness.” The semantics are a nod to necessity: At stake are hundreds of billions of dollars of assets and the ability to launch missions quickly and smoothly.

“Ultimately, the military is a very pragmatic institution,” said John Conger, a past director of the nonprofit Center for Climate and Security and a senior Defense Department official during the Obama administration. “It wants to maintain mission capability. Whether we’re going to call it ‘climate,’ not ‘climate,’ whatever — if I can’t get to the base because the road is flooded, that’s a problem.”

+Thank heaven for Greenpeace, which erected a small replica windfarm on Donald Trump’s Scottish golf course. Anything to annoy the man!

Greenpeace said golfers arriving at Trump Turnberry in Ayrshire were greeted by the sight of prop wind turbines installed on the course’s 4th green, along with a sign reading “Choose wind, dump Trump”.

+And finally, from Molly Schen, a truly beautiful project that will give you something to relax with on Earth Day. Songbird Antiphons is a song cycle for unaccompanied voices, drawing on birdsong as a lens on climate change. The music by Benedict Sheehan, with texts by Talia Sheehan and Charles Anthony Silvestri, performed by Skylark, conducted by Matthew Guard. Here’s the Spotify link. I pretty much promise you’ll enjoy it!