š CAT Newsletter 288 - 2025-10-05
Hey CATs,
Welcome to issue 288 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.
We're excited to announce the kickoff of our Responsible AI event series on October 29th! Sign up for the first workshop, Designing Responsibly in the Age of AI, on lu.ma. More details below.
There is also an opportunity to participate in setting software carbon intensity specifications with the Green Software Foundation. Links are in the Get Involved section.
Remember you can unsubscribe from this newsletter at any time - the link is at the bottom.
Stay curious ššš±
CAT Community News
š Get involved
Do you have expertise in web sustainability? If so, you could be a CAT representative in the Green Software Foundation's Software Carbon Intensity (SCI) for Web member assembly, and help set SCI specifications! Deadline to submit an application is Wednesday, October 8th. For more information, visit #gsf-membership.
ApplyĀ for aĀ CAT mini grantĀ to get a community-benefitting project kicked off
ApplyĀ for getting involved in defining theĀ GSFĀ Software Carbon Intensity specification for measuring carbon emissions of the web (joinĀ #gsf-membershipĀ for more behind-the-scenes discussion)
ā¤ļø Help a CAT
#cat-systems-series:Ā CĀ continued sharing insights from Green IO London and how C andĀ BĀ showed a systems modelling platform. Has anyone used a good platform for this sort of modelling analysis?Ā Share your thoughts\n#local-san-francisco-bay-area:Ā KĀ will be in San Francisco on October 15-16 and isĀ asking about recommendations\n#local-scotland:Ā I recently moved here and isĀ asking for in-person connections
š Workshop: Designing Responsibly in the Age of AI
Wed, Oct 29th -Ā Workshop: Designing Responsibly in the Age of AIĀ [online]
CATs also shared events inĀ #local-austriaĀ (Permacomputing meetup on Oct 14th),Ā #local-germanyĀ (GSF meetup in HamburgĀ andĀ ecoCompute 2025)
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 17th. More info.
Media, events, and news
šŗ CAT recommendations
š± A cutting from Branch
#Branch issue 9: Reimagining the Browser for a Green Web
The web holds the promise of connecting people across distance and difference. A browser is a tool designed to make these connections possible by accessing and rendering websites. Yet, reimagining what browsers could or should be is difficult because we are so used to the familiar patterns of tabbed interfaces and ad-driven design that defines most browsers today.
This article asks afresh: What if the browser were more attuned to the natural world? What if it responded to the ebb and flow of natural systems and operated more thoughtfully with the limited planetary resources available? What could browsing the green web look like, and how could we even get there?
ā¶ļø CAT videos
10-15 minute videos providing accessible explainers to climate related issues.
Business Insider: Exposing The Dark Side of America's AI Data Center Explosion
The explosion of AI across every industry has seen hundreds of water- and power-hungry server farms sprout up across the US. Already, one-third of the world's internet traffic flows through data centers in just one US state: Virginia.
However, until now, there has been no official record of the number of data centers in America, who owns them, or how much electricity they consume. In an exclusive deep dive into the industry, Business Insider reporters cracked the code and, for the first time, revealed the true cost of the data warehouses feeding our growing appetite for cloud computing and AI.
Business Insider travelled to Virginia to meet people living in the shadow of 80-foot-high boxes that emit a constant drone, and to the drought-ridden state of Arizona, where some data centers are using as much as a million gallons of water a day to help cool their computer servers. Business Insider also discovered that the power needs of data centers have forced some states to withdraw from their carbon emissions targets. Power companies are even looking to extend the life of coal and gas plants to help meet the unprecedented demand.
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
Catalyst: The new wave of DERs
Demand response was the original distributed energy resource. In its early days, it was surprisingly manual: a grid operator would call up a large load, like a factory, and request a few hours of reduced demand during peak times.
Fast forward to today and DERs (Distributed Energy Resources) look dramatically different. They're automated, deployed frequently across the country, and include everything from EVs and thermostats to sophisticated management systems at paper mills and data centers.
So how did DERs evolve from phone calls to fully fledged virtual power plants? And what role do they play now as electricity demand surges?
Environment Variables: Building Energy Awareness into Operating Systems
Host Chris Adams speaks with Didi Hoffmann, CTO of Green Coding Solutions, about building energy awareness into operating systems and making sustainability a first-class concern in software development. They discuss Didi's journey from Linux kernel programming to climate-focused tech and many more!
Zero, the Climate Race: A return to coal? AI's demand for gas turbines risks a new crisis
Rising power demand from data centers for artificial intelligence has led to a shortage of the gas turbines needed to generate electricity. This shortage might not seem the most obvious climate story, but it's having impacts across the entire energy sector. This week on Zero, Bloomberg's Stephen Stapczynski joins Akshat Rathi to look at what's causing the bottleneck in gas turbines, if the shortage will make companies look to renewables or coal, and whether natural gas is really a "bridge" fuel.
Green IO: #65 Green IO London 2025 special episode in collaboration with Architect Tomorrow
Today, Green IO doesn't have 1 or 2 guests but 10! In partnership with the YouTube channel Architect Tomorrow, the team are glad to share with you snippets and interviews of the speakers who made the latest Green IO Conference in London a huge success last week.
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.
š CAT Workshop: Designing Responsibly in the Age of AI
Wednesday, October 29th | 16:00 - 17:30 GMT
Zoom š© RSVP https://luma.com/2cf0sfmc
Through stories, small-group reflection and hands-on exercises we'll examine and discuss how AI is showing up in our work, and what we can do to shape it with a bit more care, curiosity and conscience. You don't need to be an AI expert (in fact, that's the point). This session is open to the public, invite your colleagues! Led by CAT member Paolo Rizzi, Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability Principal at ustwo.
Tuesday Oct 07, 2025 - San Diego Climate Week: Sustainability Creatives Bonfire
Join The Sustainability Creatives for a bonfire on Fiesta Island! We're bringing together people who care about sustainability and creativity to roast marshmallows, enjoy a drink, and participate in guided networking activities.
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.
Tuesday Oct 14, 2025 - Carbon Aware Computing - tools, tools, tools
It is a key strategy in the energy transition - we use electricity when it is available (from renewable sources). This is a paradigm shift from demand-oriented use to supply-oriented use of electricity.
š° News Highlights
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research: Seven of nine planetary boundaries now breached ā ocean acidification joins the danger zone
A new report from the Planetary Boundaries Science Lab at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) reveals that 7 of the 9 critical Earth system boundaries have now been breached, one more than last year.
TechCrunch: DuckDuckGo now lets you hide AI-generated images in search results
Privacy-focused browser DuckDuckGo is rolling out a new setting that lets users filter out AI images in search results.
CarbonBrief: Five charts that put data-centre energy use ā and emissions ā into context
Artificial intelligence (AI) has undergone a rapid expansion in recent years. Tech leaders have hailed an "AI revolution" ā yet, the industry is also facing scrutiny on many fronts. One major critique concerns the environmental impact of AI, particularly the intensive energy use and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of the data centres that power it. Carbon Brief takes a look at some of the best available figures, to explore the energy and emissions impact of AI.
UN Trade and Development: Digital economy is a new frontier for trade, sustainability and inclusion
The digital economy is booming but highly concentrated in a handful of countries, leaving the rest of the world, including many least developed countries, often relegated to the role of mere data providers.Without deliberate action, the integration of trade and digital transformation risks deepening existing divides rather than closing them.
ESG Today: Microsoft Invests in Low-Carbon Cement Startup Fortera to Tackle Data Center Emissions
Microsoft has announced an investment in a green cement manufacturer, alongside an agreement securing rights to procure low-carbon cement from the company, forming part of the tech giant's efforts to advance technologies to address the carbon footprint of its datacenters, as well as to help advance the sustainable materials market. Cement production is a significant contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, and one of the more difficult sectors to decarbonize.
šĀ PapersĀ WeĀ LoveĀ š
Computing within Limits: A User-Centered Lens into Digital Excess - Exploring the Superfluity and Environmental Burden of the Digital World
This article seeks to take a new view on the environmental burden of information and communication technology through the concept of digital excess. Authors take a user-centric lens into this concept and discuss various aspects of our digital lives that could be perceived not to carry meaningful value but appear as wasteful and superfluous, while also harming individuals, society, or the planet. We provide examples from digital media services where digital excess may be regarded as, for example, accumulation of self-created content with redundant copies or inattentive consumption of high bandwidth streaming services.
For the design of digital services, focusing on digital excess offers a lens through which designers could simultaneously optimize multiple quality criteria that conventionally require trade-offs (e.g., environmental sustainability vs. lively user experience vs. economic viability).
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.
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).
Thalo Labs - Director of Software Engineering and Machine Learning - $190,000-$240,000K - Permanent - Onsite only
Thalo Labs is looking for a Director of Software Engineering and Machine Learning to join us in our mission to change the landscape of HVAC Infrastructure and transform the built environment into a carbon sink!
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