The technology exists but who pays for it? I’ve done a number of stories about communities in Texas w/o clean water and it always comes down to how to get more funding to public water systems.
Saul Elbein
@saulelbein.bsky.social
Rooted cosmopolitan. Uncovering stories to build broad coalitions around clean water and soil for all Texans. Co-publisher of Heat Death with @asherelbein.bsky.social.
It seems that specific, influential group of rich people have definitely considered this a lot
But have we considered that while doing nothing is expensive to everyone, doing *something* would be expensive to a specific, influential set of rich people
WATERSHED Investigations@watershed-i.bsky.social · last wk.The unbearable cost of doing nothing www.theguardian.com/business/202...
Troubling long-term dynamic here: as the rains increasingly fail, Texas cities will rely on fossil groundwater. But the groundwater — given that much of Texas spent its prehistoric seas, and sumps for rivers eroding ancient, geologically active mountains — has a *lot* of bad stuff in it.
Martha Pskowski@psskow.bsky.social · last wk.Did you hear about Amazon's latest data center in Pecos County, Texas? Well just a few miles away in the town of Imperial, residents don't have safe drinking water. I reported on Imperial's radium problem for @insideclimatenews.org insideclimatenews.org/news/1108202...
No shade (hah) whatsoever to Michael or Oliver, who understand this in their bones, but I am begging @theguardian.com to for the love of god stop, stop, stop, posting heat wave pictures of people having fund at a splash pad. I get it, they're trying to cool off, it's too hot.
Michael E. Mann@michaelemann.bsky.social · last wk.“July was hottest month ever recorded in US as heatwaves scorched country” by @olliemilman.bsky.social for @theguardian.com: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
The attack on data represents media savvy by the pro-fossil camp: it doesn't just stop climate science, it also closes off a data pipeline that translates directly into artifacts that journalists can quote, and numbers that can become memes. It leaves the question of: how do you cover an absence?
Zack Colman@zcolman.bsky.social · last wk.SCOOP: Trump is ending federal support for NOAA's Arctic Report Card, a major annual update shedding light on the effect climate change has on the Arctic. subscriber.politicopro.com/article/2026...
@rahmstorf.bsky.social did The Week just steal one of your photos for a piece framing the fires as an issue of “adaptation“?
Not only are the Feds bulldozing the best parts of Big Bend for the wall, there’s an almost 1:1 transfer of park funds **to the damn Reflecting Pool**
Head of Texas environmental regulator just told Senate hearing that public challenges to air and water discharge permits is way up — but refused to say why. Cites the "high level of public interest in the permits and work we do." (It is, of course, data centers, which need both permits.)
wait did these oil yahoos just invade Greenland AND hire Dr Phil to film it www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...
Greenland issues ‘strong warning’ as Trump-linked oil firm prepares to drill
Island’s government says no approval given after Greenland Energy brings kit ashore for exploratory drilling
theguardian.com
Huge divide between what the industry wants and what Texans want here.
Future Heist@futureheist.bsky.social · 2w ago"Still, he acknowledged it’s getting harder to find a home for produced water," which is to say, the toxic wastewater that comes out of the oilfield at 4x the volume of oil — minimum. "Reuse [putting it on crops and in rivers] has to be introduced at some point." www.mrt.com/business/oil...
"Still, he acknowledged it’s getting harder to find a home for produced water," which is to say, the toxic wastewater that comes out of the oilfield at 4x the volume of oil — minimum. "Reuse [putting it on crops and in rivers] has to be introduced at some point." www.mrt.com/business/oil...
Permian Basin oil companies prioritize water management strategies
Producers highlight the need to incorporate water management into their operations
mrt.com
Ugly little parable here in the tendency of weather disasters to compound. Kerrville is running low on water ... because the floods knocked out the water treatment plant. www.expressnews.com/hill-country...
Kerrville declares 'water supply emergency,' restricts water use
With the city's water treatment plant still offline, officials say the restrictions are needed to "aid in prolonging our groundwater supply.”
expressnews.com
Cool, but also: can anyone answer why beavers are on both sides of the Atlantic, seems wrong, they should pick a side
Alan Puttock@alanputtock.bsky.social · last mo.Great to get out to some local #beaver sites and see them holding water and looking green amidst the heatwave! @exeter.ac.uk
"I began to see this as a pattern in some of Fasulo’s arguments against industrial solar: Legitimate concerns were often inflated into sweeping conclusions with shaky evidence." heated.world/p/the-influe...
The influencer teaching millions to fear solar
Alexandra Fasulo says she’s protecting farms and wildlife. Her campaign is becoming a blueprint for the fossil fuel right.
heated.world
sea people classic thehill.com/policy/energ...
Stone-age hunters crossed the Mediterranean, study finds
Long-distance seafarers crossed the Mediterranean Sea far earlier than scientists had believed, a new study has found. Excavations at a cave on the island of Malta have uncovered stone tools, cooki…
thehill.com
on the subject of people of the sea: evidence suggests Homo Erectus crossing mainland Asia to Indonesa *by sea* in large enough numbers to establish a population 800,000 years ago
🌌Forebodings of Éskʷətayit@joxter.bsky.social · 3w agowww.science.org/content/arti... www.abc.net.au/pacific/prog... www.ancient-origins.net/artifacts-an... (also, i'm mearrasápmelaš & coastal/maritime NDN/first nations. we've been at this much longer than the colonisers. 🫶)
tired: the Sea Peoples didn't exist wired: the true Sea Peoples were the English, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese
Seth L. Sanders@nabalkattu.bsky.social · 3w agoThere are two problems with waving off 'the sea peoples' as a nonexistent "debunked 19th century idea": the ancient sources and modern archaeology. Egyptian, Ugaritic, Hittite, Aramaic, and Canaanite sources all mention population groups that emerged in the Eastern Mediterranean around this time.
“And if Homer, perhaps, wrote at the dawning of a new civilization, Nolan maybe writes at the beginning of the end of one—or at least so he seems to fear.”
Nathan Goldwag @goldwagnathan.bsky.social · 3w agoNEW BLOG POST! Some thoughts on Christopher Nolan's adaptation of The Odyssey, the historical context of the Bronze Age Collapse, the Sea Peoples, and the legends of the Trojan War, and whether Nolan's movie is "historically accurate" or not, and what that even means.
“The beaver education started for me then,” Smith said. “I never really knew … all the different things that they contribute to an ecosystem.” news.mongabay.com/2026/07/beav...
Beavers brought a volcanic wasteland back to life. Now it's under threat
The Smith family referred to the back part of their property as “the wasteland.” It opens up to the North Fork Toutle River in the U.S. state of Washington, which was swamped with volcanic sediment an...
news.mongabay.com
David Ho@davidho.bsky.social · 3w agoI love these stories about turning old industrial sites into thriving ecosystems. Derbyshire’s Willington Wetlands, a former gravel quarry where beavers were released in 2021 after being absent for 800 years, has welcomed white storks, bringing them back to the Midlands after 600 years.
Campaigning for all serious Anglo-American publications to have a full-time reporter on the beaver beat. bsky.app/profile/futu...
Future Heist@futureheist.bsky.social · 3w ago“The beaver education started for me then,” Smith said. “I never really knew … all the different things that they contribute to an ecosystem.” news.mongabay.com/2026/07/beav...
... "a new Pfas that chemical giant Chemours is attempting to fast-track for approval for use in cooling datacenters, and [that] would almost certainly pollute regions around the facilities." www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...
US environmental groups urge EPA to reject new Pfas to cool datacenters
Coalition says Chemours downplayed health and climate risks in bid to fast-track the compound’s use
theguardian.com
Saul Elbein@saulelbein.bsky.social · 3w agoThere is a kind of honesty in their admitting that you can’t have the current data center boom without massive pollution from gas plants etc.
Whatever gets built now, in the headlong rush to build as fast as possible, we are likely to be stuck with for a long time. Which is why it's important to talk about *how it is powered and cooled* just as much as *what it is*.
Future Heist@futureheist.bsky.social · 3w agoSince it's trending right now, a quick thread on stories about data centers and pollution: First, we have Meta going all in on more methane gas plants, which are more expensive than solar in almost every case — except for when you never plan to turn it off electrek.co/2026/07/27/m...
“The sky outside is hazy orange, and my five-year-old son is screaming bloody murder. ‘Sorry, buddy, we have to stay inside,’ I say. ‘It’s not safe to breathe out there.’” hell of a lede
Aaron Regunberg@aaronregunberg.bsky.social · 3w agoMy first piece in @us.theguardian.com. Next time you hear a climate disaster described as a crime, remember that this isn’t just rhetoric. These really are crimes -- reckless endangerment, risking catastrophe, manslaughter. It’s time we treated them that way. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
There is a kind of honesty in their admitting that you can’t have the current data center boom without massive pollution from gas plants etc.
Reuters@reuters.com · 3w agoEPA says power for data centers can sidestep pollution laws reut.rs/3RzNU4A
I can’t read past “palaeo-media” without choking, is this like naewspaepers
Asher Elbein@asherelbein.bsky.social · 3w agoGenuinely quite disappointing that Tim Haines apparently got up onstage and directly shilled AI-generated prehistory animation, but somewhat heartening that he was essentially booed out of the room over it
Genuinely quite disappointing that Tim Haines apparently got up onstage and directly shilled AI-generated prehistory animation, but somewhat heartening that he was essentially booed out of the room over it
DinoCon@dinoconuk.bsky.social · 3w ago
and that friends is why we always double check the AI transcript
