Jeff Spencer
@revjss.bsky.social
Pastor and Teacher of Niles Discovery Church (a DOC/UCC congregation), punster, and climate activist. CO2 level at birth: 319.5ppm. he/him http://linktr.ee/revjss
A reminder to candidates: the #ClimateCrisis IS a kitchen table issue!
Leah Stokes@leahstokes.bsky.social · 4h agoEl-Sayed, Lawrence and McKinney all won progressive campaigns in Michigan last night by talking about climate and clean energy like it was a kitchen-table issue — because skyrocketing energy bills and endless wildfire smoke matter to people.
When we burn fossil fuels, we are digging up carbon that is safely sequestered under ground and converting it to CO2 (and some CO) and dumping that heat-trapping pollution into the atmosphere. How much carbon have we dumped into the atmosphere? 1/
I'll give AI this: It has somehow managed to make those of us who went to small liberal arts colleges even more smug about it than we already were.
Every fraction of a degree matters. “Each tenth of a degree that we raise the temperature moves 100 million of our brothers and sisters out of a safe climate zone and into a more perilous one.” It’s worth the 11 minutes to watch all of Bill McKibben’s TED talk. @billmckibben.bsky.social
Our last, best chance to cool the Earth
We're living through oil wars, wildfire smoke and extreme weather driven by a warming planet. But environmentalist Bill McKibben says one thing is finally going right: the price of clean energy has pl...
ted.com
“The disparity between the fantasy Trump and his cronies sold to their supporters and the reality of the situation when they were forced to prove their allegations in court matters. -> 1/5
August 1, 2026
In a classic Friday night news dump, the Department of Justice last night moved to dismiss the criminal charges against David Hearn, the U.S.
heathercoxrichardson.substack.com
The manuscript for today’s #sermon is on my blog. jeffsjottings.wordpress.com/2026/08/02/p... 1/2
Peter’s Denial & Re-entry
A sermon preached at Niles Discovery Church, Fremont, California,on Sunday, August 2, 2026, by the Rev. Jeffrey Spencer.Scriptures: John 18:12-18, 25b-27 and John 21:15-19Copyright © 2026 by Jeffr…
jeffsjottings.wordpress.com
I am so sick and tired of lying liars who lie, the Cheeto in Chief being the primary offender in the USA. Second place probably belongs to others in Washington, D.C. Or maybe it’s Exxon. 1/3
A religious studies professor from Macalester College (the undergraduate college I attended) has been arrested and charged with several crimes in an attempt to intimidate people doing clearly constitutional community organizing. 1/2
The professor facing prison in ‘antifa’ case: ‘They want to scare all who oppose ICE’
Erik Davis is accused by the government of a ‘conspiracy’ to obstruct ICE – experts say it’s part of a pattern to criminalize lawful organizing and ruin activists’ lives
theguardian.com
What is driving the huge increase in Canadian wildfires? Climate scientists have explained it for years: as long as humans continue to burn fossil fuels, global temperatures will increase, droughts will worsen, and there will be bigger, more frequent wildfires and smoke events. 1/5
A Warmer World Will Be a Smokier One
Higher temperatures and drought conditions are contributing to more intense wildfires and extending the summer fire season in North America.
nytimes.com
Couldn’t solve the 4x3, but smashed smush. hankgreen.com/smush · Jul 29 688 pts · PERFECT 💯 · 3-day streak 🥞🥞🥞 🥞⭐🥞 🥞🥞🥞 @hankgreen.bsky.social @johngreensbluesky.bsky.social
Smush
A daily word game. Each letter gets 5 uses. Except the gold one, which is always required.
hankgreen.com
What I had to say is too long for a typical social media post, so I posted it on my blog … all about how “natural” gas is dirty and expensive. jeffsjottings.wordpress.com/2026/07/28/c...
Call it what it is: heat-trapping gas
By 2030 or so, the amount of oil we use should be going down, thanks in no small part to the rise of EVs. That’s why the fossil fuel industry’s growth story has been largely about “natural” gas. It…
jeffsjottings.wordpress.com
It turns out that Roman Catholic nuns are much more environmentally engaged than are Roman Catholic priests, bishops, etc. I’m not surprised by this. It’s just that as a Protestant, I never thought to ask if that true and, if so, why. 1/4
Why are sisters more engaged in environmental activism than other church leaders?
In the face of decades of papal teachings about the reality and urgency of climate change, U.S. sisters have been leaders on environmental action. In contrast, U.S. bishops have largely not been creat...
globalsistersreport.org
What is fascism? Dr. Heather Cox Richardson @hcrichardson.bsky.social offers an excellent explainer in her July 22 “Letter from an American,” starting by quoting how the U.S. Army explained it during World War II. 1/5
The manuscript for today’s #sermon, “Esther & Mordecai,” is on my blog. jeffsjottings.wordpress.com/2026/07/26/e... 1/2
Esther & Mordecai
We need each other. We need each other to help us be brave. We need each other to help us grieve, especially when a whole community has experienced trauma. We are grounded in connection.
jeffsjottings.wordpress.com
Dr. Heather Cox Richardson @hcrichardson.bsky.social writes that, according to NBC News, “the internal Pentagon estimate of the cost [of the war in Iran] is about $100 billion … [and] that when economists at Moody’s added higher gas prices to the cost of the war, they estimated that -> 1/2
July 23, 2026
I have been thinking lately about taxes and war and citizens and what the government should do for its people.
heathercoxrichardson.substack.com
“Light” is a stop-motion animated short film that explores humanity’s evolving relationship with the earth and energy. Seven minutes; worth the time and then some. youtu.be/diXCVZbzdTA
Light
YouTube video by halcyon string quartet
youtu.be
What is AI costing us? Well, just from an energy usage lens, Google is using more juice than New Zealand or Nigeria or Morocco. Google increased its electricity consumption by over a third between 2024 and 2025 (from 31TWh to 43TWh). ketanjoshi.co/2026/07/01/g...
Google’s exponential path to climate-wrecking digital bloat
Google’s latest report reveals a completely unprecedented rise in energy consumption – more than any of us expected. Generative AI is a climate carbon bomb.
ketanjoshi.co
This is just nuts! “The federal government has approved plans by a start-up company to test a satellite that would use a 60-foot mirror to reflect sunlight back to Earth after dark, as part of a project the company says would power solar farms, provide light for rescue workers and -> 1/3
F.C.C. Approves Test of Space Mirror to Light Night Sky Despite Outcry
A start-up company has permission to try its plan to bounce solar rays onto the dark side of Earth, turning night to day for a three-mile-wide patch.
nytimes.com
Thankfully, there are people like Dr. @zekehausfather.com doing these deep dives … ‘cause it sure ain’t gonna be me!
Zeke Hausfather@zekehausfather.com · 2w agoA recent viral graph found fewer days in the contiguous US above 95F/100F/105F today than in the 1930s. But the graph is misleading – it fails to correct for changing measurement times and techniques, and overstates regional warmth. I take a deep dive at The Climate Brink: www.theclimatebrink....
If Trump was really an “America first” kind of guy, he’d be pushing American auto manufacturers to produce more EVs. Worldwide, “one of every four vehicles sold globally in 2025 was battery-powered. Analysts with Bloomberg have predicted -> 1/2 www.nytimes.com/2026/07/15/m...
The American E.V. Has Been Crushed. Will It Take the U.S. Auto Industry With It?
nytimes.com
Feeling the need to do something today, even if it’s just a little thing, to move toward holding ICE accountable? You can sign on to a petition calling the Maine’s Attorney General conduct a full and transparent investigation into the death of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero.
TAKE ACTION: Demand a Full Transparent Investigation into Biddeford ICE Shooting
Join in demanding a full investigation into the fatal shooting of 25-year-old father, Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, by ICE agents in Biddeford. ICE's immediate claim that he attempted to use his veh...
actionnetwork.org
Sending ICE Agents to intimidate voters at polling places, declaring martial law to try to delay or cancel the election, seizing ballots-As he gets more desperate, there's nothing he won't do to try to save his pathetic orange ass. ALL states should preemptively prepare to defend Democracy! 🇺🇸 ✊
While the Canadian (and northern Minnesota) wildfires are not about forest management, they are completely connected to climate change. Zeke Hausfather @zekehausfather.com brings the data (and analyzes it for us). www.theclimatebrink.com/p/canadas-bo...
Canada's boreal wildfires aren't just bad forest management
Higher fire season temperatures are strongly correlated with increased area burned
theclimatebrink.com
Once again, Dr. Heather Cox Richardson chronicles clearly and concisely what happened on July 16 to add to all that makes these times so perilous. heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/july-16-2026
Conventional wisdom says that solar power, wind power, and batteries are a luxury. It turns out that’s actually conventional stupidity—from an economic point of view (as well as from a “let’s reduce heat-trapping pollution” point of view). Read more at substack.com/profile/5802...
Jeff Spencer (@revjss)
Conventional wisdom says that solar power, wind power, and batteries are a luxury. It turns out that’s actually conventional stupidity—from an economic point of view (as well as from a “let’s reduce h...
substack.com
Fremont friends, If you need a place to gather in community, grieve together, and know that you are not alone in your desire for justice, please join us.
The American Rescue Plan, passed in March 2021, lifted 3.7 million children out of poverty before it expired on December 31, 2021. 1/3
Switzerland is highly reliant on hydroelectric power. As alpine glaciers melt, lots of that water runs through hydro power plants, generating much needed electricity. And in a warming world, those glaciers are melting really well—for now. It turns out that someone had the bright idea -> 1/2
Switzerland bolted 5,000 solar panels onto a dam wall 8,000 feet up in the freezing Alps where everyone said solar made no sense, and the plant now makes three times more winter power than any farm do...
High in the Swiss Alps, on a concrete dam wall more than 8,000 feet above the sea, someone bolted thousands of solar panels to a place almost no one thought
ecoportal.net
I’ve been thinking about the ICE killings of the past week, and felt the need to write something. So I did. You can read what I wrote at open.substack.com/pub/revjss/p...
