š CAT Newsletter 287 - 2025-09-28
Hey CATs,
Welcome to issue 287 of the ClimateAction.tech (CAT) Newsletter - your weekly summary of what's happening inside the CAT Slack community (join here and check out our onboarding checklist), and in the wider world of climate and tech.
Remember you can unsubscribe from this newsletter at any time - the link is at the bottom.
Stay curious ššš±
CAT Community News
š Take CAT action
š± Small action:Ā Help cover our operational costs & fundĀ new mini grantsĀ byĀ donating some money
šæ Medium action:Ā Make our Slack community more vibrant and volunteer as anĀ introductions volunteerĀ or aĀ channel host
š³ Big action: Come and help with ourĀ Responsible AI progammeĀ starting this October!
#ļøā£ Slack channel highlights
#2-greener-tech: A whole load of CATs got toĀ meet in personĀ as part of Green IO London. If the conference has sparked ideas, why not band together andĀ apply for a mini grantĀ to get make your idea a reality!
#greener-webdev:Ā JĀ shared someĀ learnings on dark mode by default
#3-questions-and-ideas:Ā CĀ is curious aboutĀ people's opinion on the IEA?
#greener-infra: GĀ found an article on aĀ hydrgoen-powered Nvidia GPU clusterĀ and is wonderingā¦ serious potential here or just an intriguing proof of concept?
Some chances to meet CATs in person:Ā #local-chicago,Ā #local-sweden,Ā #local-australia,Ā #local-bristol
ā¤ļø Help a CAT
C is wonderingĀ whether there is a spec/extension for signalling "carbon aware API"Ā in a published API?\nA is working on an article on embodied carbon of GPUs - mainly looking at the impact on various communities - and isĀ looking for people with knowledge on this topic for a chat
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, Oct 3rd. More info.
Media, events, and news
šŗ CAT recommendations
š± A cutting from Branch
Branch issue 9: Cosmology of Internet Infrastructure: Three Visions to Bridging the Digital Divide
The Cosmology of Internet Infrastructure investigates the stories we tell ourselves about the origins of the internet and how this is manifesting in our space-time reality. The measure of time-space shifted during the colonial era, enforced with the Atlantic telegraph commissioned soon after the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade. The telegraph gave birth, geopolitically and culturally, to undersea cables which have wrought the information age, through the internet.
ā¶ļø CAT videos
10-15 minute videos providing accessible explainers to climate related issues.
Planet A: How Europe wants to stop the flood of broken stuff
Europeans have more "things" than anybody else and the EU is working hard to reduce the massive amounts of e-waste produced in the region every year. Some places are being innovative. Like Berlin ā which is paying residents to repair their broken things. Can this really make a difference?
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
Zero - The Climate Race: Building monuments to the end of oil
Monira Al Qadiri says she is pre-empting the end of oil and building monuments to it. As one of the most important contemporary artists of the Middle East, her work ā spanning sculptures, films and performances ā throws new light on humanity's deep interdependent relationship with fossil fuels. This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi asks Al Qadiri how art can help make sense of the current moment.
Energ'ethic: From Risky to Resilient - How Citizens Can Fund the Transition
How do we move community energy from "too risky" for banks to a serious part of Europe's clean energy future? In this episode, Marine Cornelis speaks with Chris Vrettos (REScoop.eu & Electra Energy) about the ACCE project.
Finance is never neutral. As Chris reminds us, it can either lock communities out or bring them in. ACCE has shown that citizen-driven finance is not only possible, but scalable.
Thinking on Paper: Microsoft, AI and Big Oil
Microsoft says it's going green. But insiders reveal its AI is powering Big Oil, making fossil fuel extraction faster, cheaper, and bigger than ever.
While most debates focus on data centers and electricity use, the hidden story is bigger: AI and fossil fuels are now deeply linked, with consequences for emissions, the climate crisis, and the energy transition.
In this episode of Thinking on Paper, former Microsoft sustainability leaders Holly and Will Alpine ā now founders of Enabled Emissions ā explain how AI has become essential to oil and gas companies, extending the life of reserves that should be shrinking.
Catalyst: Ag residue and carbon removal
Agricultural byproducts like corn stover, wood chips, and soybean husks typically get left to decompose and release carbon dioxide. Don't call them "waste" though; some farmers use these byproducts as field cover to improve soil health. And industry uses a fraction of this biomass as feedstock for valuable products like ethanol, electricity, and heat. Theoretically, it's a vastly underutilized resource.
The problem is that agricultural residue is really hard to collect. The economics of gathering, sorting, processing, and refining are tough. On top of that, it makes for a crappy fuel. It's low energy density and high carbon, compared to oil, for example.
So in what applications does agricultural residue make the most sense? And how do you economically collect the material at scale?
Zero, The Climate Race: The extraordinary rise of electric cars in developing countries
Something remarkable is unfolding in developing countries. From Nepal to Costa Rica, more people are buying electric cars than fossil-fuel vehicles, as battery prices plummet and cheap home-grown EVs come to market. And in China, more electric cars will be sold in the last quarter of this year than the total number of all cars sold in the US. Colin McKerracher, head of transport at BNEF, joins Akshat Rathi on Zero to unpack these trends, and what they mean for global oil demand.
Outrage + Optimism: The countdown to COP30 at New York Climate Week
How does COP deliver a pathway to dealing with the worsening climate crisis? That's the big question as attention across the world turns to COP30 in BelƩm, Brazil, later this year.
Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac, Paul Dickinson and new co-host Fiona McRaith take you on the road to BelƩm, starting on the ground at New York Climate Week where we hear from Simon Stiell, the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and Kara Hurst, Chief Sustainability Officer at Amazon. What needs to happen from here in this new era of climate action?
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.
Tuesday Sep 30, 2025 - Call for Speakers closing on 30.09 - ecoCompute conference
ecoCompute is a green tech conference purely dedicated to digital sustainability. On 30.09.2025 the Call for Speakers will close - Make your voice heard and submit your contribution until the end of the month!
ecoCompute will happen in Berlin on 13&14 November
Tuesday Sep 30, 2025 - Showcase your Story: Live Portfolio Redesign
We will coach Ely, a mid-career job seeker who is looking for work in social media and climate communications. Ely wants to redesign their portfolio so ensure it presents their best work and potential clients can easily purchase their services.
Wednesday Oct 08, 2025 - Small Group Networking
Connect with fellow eco-conscious product professionals at this monthly meetup. Youāll join a few small breakout groups with climate-focused prompts to spark real conversations and make new connections.
š° News Highlights
UK Government Sustainable ICT Blog: AI's thirst for waterĀ
The rapid growth of artificial intelligence (AI) in recent years has transformed how we work, communicate and access information. While much attention focuses on the electricity consumption of data centres, a less visible but equally significant environmental concern is emerging AI's substantial water usage. A recent report from the Government Digital Sustainability Alliance (GDSA) examines in detail the water consumption associated with AI and data centres.
Washington Post: At the bus stop, a living ad for nature
Bus shelters tend to be practical, utility-oriented, no-frills structures. They offer protection from the elements. Seating for while you wait. Maybe an ad to grab your attention.
But a green bus stop movement is seeking to make them something more: Antidotes to the heat-island effect. Habitats for native pollinators. Living advertisements for incorporating nature into the built environment.
University of Warwick: 'Designing defects' in Graphene opens new possibilities for future tech
Recent research from University of Warwick has developed a new process for growing graphene with controlled imperfection that will improve performance across a range of applications - from sensors and batteries, to electronics
US Today: The hidden environmental cost of generative AI and its toll on climate
From job displacement and plagiarism to questions about accuracy and privacy risks, generative artificial intelligence ā or genAI ā is fraught the kinds of issues you'd expect from such disruptive technology. And you can add environmental threats among them.
Startups Magazine: AI adoption in climatetech is nearly double the UK startup average
New analysis from Sustainable Ventures has examined the potential for AI to accelerate growth in climate tech startups, who play a key role in the race to meet net zero targets.Ā The research has found that AI-related climate tech investment in startups is bucking the market downturn.Ā Whilst wider climate tech funding has flatlined, capital has instead flowed into AI-focused startups.
DataCentre Magazine: What Role Do NBSs Have In Sustainable Data Centre Strategy?
Nature-based solutions (NBSs) are emerging as a critical part of corporate sustainability, designed to protect, sustainably manage or restore nature ecosystems that address societal challenges such as climate change, human health, food and water security and disaster risk reduction effectively.
Alongside other decarbonisation strategies, NBSs are expected to play a key role in helping organisations reach net zero by 2050.
For data centre operators, where energy intensity and environmental impact are under constant scrutiny, these solutions offer both ecological and commercial value.
Reuters: Why is nature not material to your business?
Earlier this year, the first wave of corporate reports under the EU's Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) quietly revealed a troubling trend. Fewer than 40% of companies identified nature-related issues ā such as pollution, water scarcity and biodiversity loss ā as material to their business. This isn't just a bureaucratic oversight. It is a systemic risk hiding in plain sight.
šĀ PapersĀ WeĀ LoveĀ š
Vanderbilt Law: The Energy and Environmental Footprint of AI
Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to create major economic and social benefits but also to rapidly escalate electricity demand and its associated environmental impacts. Information has been a cornerstone of environmental law for half a century, and this Article argues that providing information to individual, corporate, and other users about the electricity demand and environmental impacts of AI can reduce those impacts without delaying development of the technology. Little is known about how AI large language models (LLMs) compare on these issues, though, and to address this shortcoming the Article provides the first comparison of the outputs of four AI environmental footprint calculators. The Article finds that running the same AI query through all four calculators produces substantial differences in outputs, with one calculator producing an estimate more than 50 times higher than another for the same type of query. These differences suggest that substantial improvements are needed in the disclosure of information, whether through international, national, state, or private standards, to provide reliable estimates of energy use and environmental impacts to users. In turn, more accurate, easily available information can create incentives for reducing the costs, energy demand, and environmental impacts of AI even in a deregulatory era.
š¼ 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.
Treeconomy - Mid-level Engineer (Full Stack) - Equivalent to Ā£50-60k annual - Contract - Flexible - remote ok
š³ My team at Treeconomy are building a digital twin of nature-based carbon projects. Our products create the integrity that big corporates need to finance nature restoration at scale.
š¬š§Ā Due to our funding requirements, we must hire someone based in the UK with an existing right to work. Youāll be close enough to London to pop into the office on a short train or flight.Ā Contract starts in October, lasting 6 months.
If this sounds like you, check out the role description and apply before 12 September.
Vizzuality - Data Engineer - Depending on experience, a salary ranging from ā¬24,000 to ā¬30,000 Eur a year - Permanent - Totally remote
Do you want to help build a fairer and sustainable future? Are you currently looking for a new career opportunity in data engineering?
We are hiring a Data Engineer with experience in Python and geospatial data processing.
At Vizzuality, we commit to a fair and sustainable planet by creating tools that radically empower people to make positive changes. Weāre always looking for passionate people who strive to use their creativity and skills to make a difference in peopleās lives and help make the world a better place. Finally, we know how life goes and are open to exploring full-time and part-time contract options (with a minimum of 80% time dedication).
Support our work
You can support us financially onĀ Open Collective.