Articles by openDemocracy

Nuclear September 29, 2022

Nuclear power is clean, safe and cheap. We need it to stop global heating

I’m a climate activist. The arguments made against nuclear power today are the same arguments I was making a decade ago, and I was wrong…

Climate Change August 25, 2022

Exclusive: Influential UK net-zero sceptics funded by US oil ‘dark money’

Net Zero Watch says it won’t take cash from fossil fuel investors – but we discovered a funder with millions in oil An influential Tory-linked…

Articles Policy & Strategy

Supreme Coup

The intention was to tell the story of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira, a British journalist and an Indigenous expert. Both were killed last June in the Amazonas. A beautiful corner of Brazil turned into an oasis for illegal gold…

Articles Wind

Direct Heating and Cooling using windmills

Everyone is familiar with huge wind turbines producing electricity for the electricity grid. Windmills much more modest in size can also contribute to direct heating or cooling of buildings, thereby replacing burnt fuels for heating and electricity consumed for air…

Articles Climate Change Policy & Strategy

Is philanthropy (really) good for climate and democracy?

The American multibillionaires Bill Gates and Michael Bloomberg have recently published books about how to fight climate change. It is always commendable when people seek to make the world a better place. There are both good qualities and bad aspects…

Articles Renewables

The not-so-distant future of energy storage

The war in Ukraine put some European countries in front of a strategic problem: how to cut ties with Russia and quickly find a reliable energy alternative? The obvious choice should be to invest immediately and massively in renewable, safe, clean,…

Articles Last Exit

Shoreham

The plant that never was. But no one envisaged that in 1965 when Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) President John J. Tuohy announced plans for the first commercial nuclear power plant on Long Island. Initially, that proposal faced no or…

Articles Fossil Fuels Innovation

Fossil Fuels Drive Increase in Atmospheric Helium

After decades of uncertainty, scientists have finally shown that fossil fuel extraction has flooded the atmosphere with 4He. The release of carbon dioxide (CO2) during the extraction and burning of fossil fuels has contributed to major changes in Earth’s atmosphere…

Articles Nature & Environment

Combining Old and New: Aquaponics Opens the Door to Indigenous Food Security

All across the United States, Indigenous peoples suffer higher rates of mortality than other ethnic groups, largely due to poorer diets and other colonial stressors that have completely altered their traditional lifeways. One nonprofit organization in Hawai‘i, Malama Waimānalo, is…

Advanced Tech Articles

Meet Zacua, Mexico’s first electric car brand

The nascent brand has sold its first 100 compact electric vehicles, and is helping to lay the groundwork for the EV industry in Mexico, says CEO Nazareth Black Zacua, Mexico’s first electric car brand, started in 2017, over twenty years…

Articles Nature & Environment

Protecting biodiversity – and making it accessible – has paid off for Costa Rica

After two years of pandemic lockdowns and border closures, global travel appears to be rebounding in much of the world in 2022. Wilderness is a big tourist attraction – but do countries that protect their natural environments earn a payoff…

Articles Climate Change

I Helped Pen the UN Climate Report. Here’s Why It Gives Me Hope.

On April 4, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released the final installment of its Sixth Assessment Report, an epic synthesis of science exploring the causes and consequences of climate change. This latest document focused on the causes…

The Lost Bayou: Grand Bayou

Grand Bayou, LA. At one time, it was a lively community of close-knit families, until they were forced to leave. ©2020. Garde Voir Ci magazine. Nicholls State University Department of Mass Communication.

World Rainforest Day

Rainforests cover only 2 percent of the planet’s surface area but are responsible for more than 25% of all Western medicine and house more than 50% of the world’s plant and animal species.