š CAT Newsletter 273 - 2025-06-22
CAT 273 - 2025-06-22
Hey CATs,
Cripes! This email, issue 273, was supposed to go out last Sunday! We apologise deeply for the mixup. We're sending issue 274 today separately, and will resume our regular Sunday schedule next week for issue 275 on July 6th.
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Welcome to issue 273 of the ClimateAction.tech (CAT) Newsletter - your weekly summary of what's happening inside the CAT community, and in the wider world of climate and tech. New to CAT or looking to re-discover the community? Try outĀ our onboarding checklist.
Remember you can unsubscribe from this newsletter at any time - the link is at the bottom.
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CAT Community News
#ļøā£ Slack channel highlights
#open-source: our newest channel! Join for chats around open source and sustainable software
#culture-society:Ā BĀ raised some interesting questions on how even in this community we still celebrate the new rather than turning things off and how the word 'sustainable' gets used as a synonym for 'powered by renewable energy'. What end-state are we hoping to achieve with our efforts?Ā Share your thoughts on this nuanced topic
#carbon-footprint:Ā M asked what folks think ofĀ The Climate Label Certification Standard?Ā Share your thoughts
š¤ Conversations about AI
LĀ asked for links or calculators for figuring out the environmental impact of enterprise AI, such as Claude Enterprise andĀ CĀ shared someĀ tools in the thread
MĀ started a conversation on how we think about AI + the environment; suggesting to reframe it to "howĀ are tech companies getting the energy & water they need?" + "how can we influence themĀ (to act sustainably & fairly instead of forcing us to use AI in every product, using up the drinking water, re-activating fossil fuel plants, etc.)?Ā Have a read through the conversation and/or share your thoughts
OĀ sharedĀ an articleĀ stating that "the declining value of search results has naturally pushed users toward AI-driven alternatives".Ā O is wondering: Gen AI may offer an improved search experience. But for how long...Ā Join the conversation
Check outĀ #greener-data-aiĀ for more
š CAT Book club
We're readingĀ Insolvent: How to Reorient Computing for Just SustainabilityĀ by Christoph Becker.Ā
RSVP | Add notes / questions on Outline | Post thoughts inĀ #cat-bookclub
š CAT Events
Tue, Jun 24th -Ā Code Green London June meetupĀ [in-person]
Mon, Jul 7th -Ā CAT book club: InsolventĀ [online]
š Other local events
You can also coordiante with CATs in our local channels to join meet at other local events likeā¦
Jun 21-29 -Ā Climate Action WeekĀ inĀ #local-london
Jun 26 -Ā IT Sustainability Meetup ZurichĀ inĀ #local-switzerland
Jul 2-3 -Ā Green IOĀ inĀ #local-munich
š© Community networking
Every 2 weeks, we match 2-3 CATs so you can connect over a quick 30-minute call. Join #cat-roulette, pick your region and wait for a message from Donut. The next round of matches will go out on Fri, June 27th. More info.
Media, events, and news
šŗ CAT recommendations
ā¶ļø CAT videos
10-15 minute videos providing accessible explainers to climate related issues.
PBS Terra: When Will Extreme Heat Become Unlivable?
The most deadly heat waves so far have been dry heat waves. But a new threat is rising: humid heat waves, aka wet-bulb events. Scientists have identified wet-bulb temperatures where sweat can't evaporate fast enough to cool the human body. And once this threshold is crossed, it doesn't matter how much shade or water you have: you won't survive without environmental cooling like air conditioning. This episode of Weathered breaks down: What wet-bulb temperature actually means, why it's so dangerous, what areas will be affected, and why air conditioning, while essential, isn't enough.
š¤Ā Podcasts
The latest climate-related podcast episodes. Don't forget, if you're looking around, there's a list of podcasts maintained by CATs
CXO Bytes: Green AI Strategy with Adrian Cockcroft
In this episode of CXO Bytes, host Sanjay Podder speaks with Adrian Cockcroft, former VP at Amazon and a key figure in cloud computing and green software, about strategies for reducing the environmental impact of AI and cloud infrastructure. Adrian shares insights from his time at AWS, including how internal coordination and visibility helped drive sustainability initiatives. He also discusses the Real-Time Cloud Carbon Standard, the environmental impact of GPUs, the challenges of data transparency, and the promise of digital twins like meGPT in scaling sustainable tech practices.
Zero, The Climate Race: A skilled worker shortage is becoming an 'existential' problem for the energy transition
Western economies need to electrify and fast, but where are all the skilled workers going to come from to install the heat pumps, solar panels and batteries needed? This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi talks with Olivia Rudgard about the shortage of labor in electrification industries, and why some experts are calling it an 'existential' crisis. This is the second episode in Bottlenecks, a new series exploring the lesser known obstacles standing in the way of our electrified future.
Outrage and Optimism: Could This Change Your Life? The Climate Tech Revolution
While climate diplomacy grapples with global uncertainty, there's a quiet revolution happening that may be just as important - thousands of breakthrough technologies and creative applications that are emerging to tackle the climate crisis in new and unexpected ways.
From bio-based foams to paper-based electronic sensors, and from temperature-sensitive food labels to AI water management devices, this episode dives into the materials, data, and design transforming the climate solutions landscape.
Environment Variables: Open Source Carbon Footprints
Chris Adams is joined by Thibaud Colas; product lead at Torchbox, president of the Django Software Foundation, and lead on Wagtail CMS. They explore the role of open source projects in tackling digital carbon emissions and discuss Wagtail's pioneering carbon footprint reporting, sustainable default settings, and grid-aware website features, all enabled through initiatives like Google Summer of Code. Thibaud shares how transparency, contributor motivation, and clear governance can drive impactful sustainability efforts in web development, and why measuring and reducing emissions in the Python ecosystem matters now more than ever.
Catalyst: The story of steam
Addison Stark thinks waste heat is a waste of time. The real opportunity, he argues, is decarbonizing industrial steam, which accounts for roughly 30% of industrial heat in the U.S. But doing that means deploying alternatives to the fossil fuel boilers industry currently relies on.
So how do you clean up steam? And why does Addison think waste heat is overhyped?
House of Life: 007 - Values and dogma in the sustainability community
In episode 7 of House of Life, just gone live, Asim starts us off by sharing his somewhat brutal method of controlling aphids in his garden, illustrating his idea that if suffering is an inevitable part of life then "the suffering has got to be worth it". This moral dilemma somehow leads to a question mark over the authenticity of the modern sustainability community. What does it really stand for?
š Submitted events
Want an event listed here? Use this event listing form to submit the details so we can add it in the newsletter.
Saturday Jun 28, 2025 - Digital Collage
Join a 3h workshop using collective intelligence to learn about the environmental impacts of Digital Technologies and get inspired to take action.
Thursday Jul 03, 2025 - Green IO Munich 2025
Apidays Munich and the Green IO podcast have partnered to bring you the first Green IO conference for the DACH region, packed with the latest insights from thought leaders in Tech Sustainability and hands-on feedback from practitioners scaling Green IT.
Sunday Jul 06, 2025 - Pacific Northwest Climate Week
Pacific Northwest Climate Week is a community-powered event series that unites individuals & organizations. Accelerates the fight against climate change. The week-long gathering brings together climate innovators, thought leaders, & enthusiasts from Seattle, Vancouver, & Portland
Tuesday Jul 15, 2025 - Green Data Center for Green Software ā Green Software for Green Data Center
Green Software Development and Data Centres are dependent on each other if we want to build and operate green software. This event will bring together the players in digitalisation - Developers, Scaleway, Heat & Cloud and windCORES. Let's start a dialog
Wednesday Sep 24, 2025 - Green IO London 2025
Green IO and apidays London have partnered to gather 350+ responsible technologists to answer a simple question requiring complex answers:
"Good for the Planet, Good for Business?"
Hosted by Apidays, this takes place on September 23 to 24, 2025 in etc.venues, 155 Bishopsgate.
Sunday Aug 29, 2027 - Biodiversity Basics for Product Professionals
The products we build rely on and affect nature. This workshop will address: 1. What is biodiversity and why is it relevant for product professionals 2. What can you do & practical examples 3. Your takeaway: first biodiversity analysis along your product's value chain
š° News Highlights
Geographical: New online tool can identify climate misinformation
'Hot Air' tool collates data from more than 300 individuals & organisations online to track the spread of climate misinformation. It can track origins of common climate change denial theories, such as wildfires being caused by arsonists and not rising planetary temperature, and users of the tool are able to flit through authors, following the trajectory of their claims across several years and even view original posts.
BBC Earth: How electric scooters are driving China's salt battery push
The country is racing ahead of the rest of the world in bringing sodium-ion batteries to the mass market. This time, through scooters. Some industry insiders believe that sodium-ion batteries are safer. They are less prone to overheating and burning compared to lithium-ion ones because sodium's chemical traits are more stable, according to some studies. But others warn that it is still too early to be certain about their safety due to a lack of relevant research.
Science: Nanoparticle gel could help save degraded coral reefs
Now, amid a rush to help degraded reefs around the world bounce back and survive, scientists report in the journal Trends in Biotechnology a new way to boost coral abundance by artificially attracting coral larvae to resettle, and revitalize, degraded reefs. This could infuse more genetic diversity into reefs and give them a better shot at coping with heat stress and other challenges.
Wired: How Much Energy Does AI Use? The People Who Know Aren't Saying
As AI takes over our lives, it's also promising to transform our energy systems, supercharging carbon emissions right as we're trying to fight climate change. Now, a new and growing body of research is attempting to put hard numbers on just how much carbon we're actually emitting with all of our AI use.
Non-Profit Quarterly: In California's Largest Landback Deal, the Yurok Tribe Reclaims Sacred Land Around Klamath River
More than 17,000 acres around the Klamath River in Northern California, including the lower Blue Creek watershed, have returned to the Yurok Tribe, completing the largest landback deal in California history.
DownToEarth: Global energy systems under strain amid climate crisis, geopolitical turmoil and tech disruption
Global energy systems are under mounting pressure from the converging forces of climate change, geopolitical instability and rapid technological transformation. Record energy demand in 2024 ā driven by factors like artificial intelligence (AI), electrification and extreme heat ā exposed deep vulnerabilities in global energy supply chains and cast doubt on the world's ability to meet its climate targets.
š Papers We Love š
University of Buffalo & IBM: Evaluating the Energy-Efficiency of the Code Generated by LLMs
As the quality of code generated by Large Language Models (LLMs) improves, their adoption in the software industry for automated code generation continues to grow. This paper investigates the energy efficiency of the code generated by 20 popular LLMs for 878 programming problems of varying difficulty levels and diverse algorithmic categories selected from the LeetCode platform by comparing them against canonical human-written solutions. Although LLMs can produce functionally correct results in most cases, the findings show that the performance and energy efficiency of LLM-produced solutions are often far below those of human-written solutions.
Jobs
Remember only jobs listing salary ranges are listed here - to get your job listed, you need to list a salary range. Folks can still look in the #jobs channel. Remember: if you're looking for advice finding a role, check our #climate-careers channel.
Working Families Party - Data Systems Engineer - $100,000-$137,000 - Permanent - Totally remote
I'm hiring for a Data Systems Engineer at Working Families Party to help build out the data infrastructure of the electoral left! To win change on climate we need an electoral strategy to win governing power, and powerful electoral organizing requires a powerful data team! This is a senior level role working on data engineering, cloud infrastructure, web applications, and workflow automations. This role is remote and the salary band goes up to $137,500.
No need to meet ALL the qualifications sought on this job post. Feel free to reach out with any questions!
If you know someone who might be good - please make sure they see this! Thank you!
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