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‘More Than Ambition’: 6 Experts Weigh in on Accelerating Global Energy Transition (Maria)
The author writes, “Progress toward a secure, equitable and sustainable energy system is advancing, but momentum is at risk of stalling amid financing constraints and rising geopolitical uncertainty, according to the World Economic Forum’s Fostering Effective Energy Transition 2025 report. The report, developed in collaboration with Accenture, presents a data-driven framework to assess how 118 countries are positioned to navigate a complex energy landscape. It evaluates both system performance — measured across sustainability, security and equity — and transition readiness.”
How Much Energy Does AI Use? The People Who Know Aren’t Saying (Reader Jim)
The author writes, “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. This effort is complicated by the fact that major players like OpenAI disclose little environmental information.”
The Trump Administration Is Shutting Down the National Suicide Hotline’s Program for LGBTQ Youth (Dana)
From Mother Jones: “Since the hotline’s launch in 2022, hotline callers could press 3 to speak with counselors trained to work specifically with LGBTQ youth, who are four times more likely to attempt suicide than their peers. The service received half a million calls and texts last year; in February, the program received an average of 2,100 contacts per day. On Tuesday, the Trevor Project, a LGBTQ suicide prevention nonprofit that contracts with Health and Human Services to respond to the calls, received a stop-work order, effective July 17. A statement from HHS on Tuesday said the hotline will ‘focus on serving all help seekers’ and ‘no longer silo LGB+ youth services.’ Notably, the statement omitted the markers referring to transgender and queer individuals.”
Proposed Bill Would Ban ICE Agents, Law Enforcement From Wearing Masks in California (Reader Steve)
The author writes, “In response to immigration raids by masked federal officers in Los Angeles and across the nation, two California lawmakers on Monday proposed a new state law to ban members of law enforcement from concealing their faces while on the job. The bill would make it a misdemeanor for local, state and federal law enforcement officers to cover their faces with some exceptions, and also encourage them to wear a form of identification on their uniform. ‘We’re really at risk of having, effectively, secret police in this country,’ said state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), co-author of the bill.”
Why a Professor of Fascism Left the US: ‘The Lesson of 1933 is — You Get Out’ (Sean)
From The Guardian: “‘It’s all almost too stereotypical,’ Shore reflects. ‘A 1930s-style military parade as a performative assertion of the Führerprinzip,’ she says, referring to the doctrine established by Adolf Hitler, locating all power in the dictator. ‘As for Los Angeles, my historian’s intuition is that sending in the national guard is a provocation that will be used to foment violence and justify martial law. The Russian word of the day here could be provokatsiia.’ That response captures the double lens through which Shore sees the Trump phenomenon, informed by both the Third Reich and the ‘neo-totalitarianism’ exhibited most clearly in the Russia of Vladimir Putin. We speak as Shore is trying to do her day job, having touched down in Warsaw en route to Kyiv, with Poland and Ukraine long a focus of her studies. Via Zoom from a hotel lobby, she peppers our conversation with terms drawn from a Russian political lexicon that suddenly fits a US president.
Scientists Discover Natural Cancer-Fighting Sugar in Sea Cucumbers (Mili)
The author writes, “Sea cucumbers are the ocean’s janitors, cleaning the seabed and recycling nutrients back into the water. But this humble marine invertebrate could also hold the key to stopping the spread of cancer.A sugar compound found in sea cucumbers can effectively block Sulf-2, an enzyme that plays a major role in cancer growth, according to a University of Mississippi-led study published in Glycobiology.”
