We have been promised many tipping points of late, most notably Peak Carbon. One of the biggies has been the shift from reporting only on climate disasters to regular, widespread reporting on more and more beneficial tipping points, such as I have gathered here today. We have seen this shift particularly from Bill McKibben, in Here Comes the Sun, and we will continue to see much more of it..
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IEA's (@iea.org) Renewables 2025 report is out. This year, solar PV is expected to account for almost 80% of all new renewable power capacity worldwide — maintaining its dominant lead. Another record year ahead: 750–840 GW total renewables, driven by the sun. ☀️💡
Report: www.iea.org/reports/rene...
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— Diren Kocakuşak, Ph.D. (@direnkocakusak.bsky.social) October 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
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As coal fades, Australia looks to realize dream of 100% renewable energy
https://www.europesays.com/2472588/
As coal fades, Australia looks to realize dream of 100% renewable energy https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/clean-energy/australia-aims-all-renewables-no-coal by thinkB4WeSpeak
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— Climate Change (@euclimate.bsky.social) October 7, 2025 at 2:00 AM
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The world generated almost a third more solar power in the 1st half of the year compared with the same period in 2024 meeting 83% of the global increase in electricity demand. Wind power grew by just over 7% allowing renewables to displace fossil fuels.
www.theguardian.com/environment/...
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— Earl Russell LD (@earlrussell.bsky.social) October 7, 2025 at 1:38 AM
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In Q2 2025, renewables powered 54% of EU electricity — up from 52.7% YoY — while solar jumped 14% to 122 TWh, becoming the #1 source. In June, solar hit 22% of all power, eclipsing nuclear, wind & gas. The solar era is taking over energy generation as renewables boom.⚡ #Solar #EnergyTransition #BESS
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— EV Curve Futurist (@evcurvefuturist.com) October 4, 2025 at 1:52 AM
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UNSW researchers unlock singlet fission for silicon solar cells. 30%+ efficiency, cooler panels, and better EV rooftop potential.
This could lead to most of the worlds energy coming from #Solar. all we need now is storage. #auspol
cleantechnica.com/2025/10/02/u...
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— Sydney EV (@sydneyev.bsky.social) October 6, 2025 at 8:34 PM
From recent Gud Gnuz Roundups:
Germany launches $7 billion industrial decarbonisation program
German Economy Minister Katherina Reiche on Monday unveiled a 6 billion euro ($7 billion) funding initiative aimed at industrial decarbonisation, incorporating carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology into the country's climate protection contracts for the first time.
The program targets energy-intensive sectors such as chemicals, steel, cement and glass, as Germany navigates stringent climate targets
Under 15-year contracts, the government will subsidize costs
with projects requiring the lowest subsidy per tonne of CO2 saved taking precedence. In return, the subsidised companies will be required to meet binding emission reduction milestones.
🎩 Jessiestaf
In the Middle East's least electrified country, solar energy is now bringing a ray of hope.
The Aden Solar Power Plant is supplying hundreds of thousands of homes in a country that has been grappling with an electricity crisis for three decades.
Yemen's lack of fuel has caused long-term shortages.
Clean energy is starting to bend the curve on China’s fossil-fuel use.
Overall, carbon-free sources met more than 80% of China’s new electricity demand last year — a marked difference from recent years. Between 2011 and 2020, they met less than half of new demand, according to a new report from think tank Ember.
The U.S. is a nation of air-conditioned houses, and this ubiquitous cooling machinery drives an outsize chunk of the country’s electrical demand, especially during heat waves. Now, as utilities scramble to meet even more power demand for AI computing, legacy air-conditioning giant Carrier has launched a new business venture to make regular old HVAC equipment part of the solution.
The concept is simple enough: Put a battery on central ACs that can charge up when energy is plentiful and take over the job of running the appliances when the grid is stressed. But actually doing that requires grappling with the forces that shape America’s energy system — monopoly utilities, regulators, decentralized energy, intermittent renewable power, and the looming colossus of data centers’ energy consumption.
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“The homes we have and the fact that they all have air conditioning or a heat pump defines how the grid is sized, built, and operated today,” said Hakan Yilmaz, Carrier’s chief technology and sustainability officer and head of its energy-solutions arm, in an interview at this month’s RE+ conference. “The [U.S.’s] peak load is about 750 gigawatts — that’s what the grid can manage today. Around 300 gigawatts of that is reserved for HVAC.”
A new nationwide study confirms that plastic bag bans work. In areas that restrict plastic bags through bans or fees, there were 25% to 47% fewer plastic bags found on beaches and shorelines. That’s compared to areas without such policies. The research, published in the journal Science, offers strong evidence that these laws reduce plastic pollution in the environment.
The results come from a detailed analysis of over 45,000 beach and shoreline cleanups across the United States between 2016 and 2023. Researchers found that volunteers collected significantly fewer plastic bags in areas with restrictions, proving that plastic bag bans work in real-world conditions, not just on paper.
🎩 2thanks, from Sunday’s Good News Roundup GNR Sunday ☀️ 63 pips+ ☀️ 2 Polls: WWtW? + Boosting and/or attending a No Kings Day rally on 10/18?
No New Nukes
The Argentine SMR isn’t operating.
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"There are only three operating [small modular nuclear reactors] in the world... The cost overruns on the China SMR was 300%, on Russian SMRs 400% and on the Argentina SMR (so far) 700%.” All promised to be up and running in three to four years and all took 12 years or more to complete."
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— Kevin J. Kircher (@kevinjkircher.com) September 22, 2025 at 5:25 PM
Argentina...Oops.
Enthusiasm for nuclear energy might have gone too far??? You make me laugh.
Utter drivel. (I was a global high-tech market analyst for many years.) Nuclear costs far too much, and takes far too long to design, test, permit and build to be relevant before we get to 100% renewables. It is always vastly over budget, never anywhere near the supposed schedule, and then there is the nuclear waste. Solar, wind, and storage are vastly cheaper, so that nearly all electric power construction today is renewable. Even in Africa and outback Asia.
Nuclear power is having a moment in the US. After being largely stagnant for decades, the industry has been reignited by an insatiable demand for energy to power the data centers needed to support artificial intelligence. Bloomberg Intelligence estimates that demand for electricity will drive a $350 billion nuclear spending boom in the US, boosting output from reactors by 63% by mid-century.
Expectations of a nuclear renaissance have sent stocks soaring. Shares of nuclear energy startup Oklo Inc. have surged more than 500% this year, helped by a Sept. 22 announcement that the company broke ground on its first commercial reactor in Idaho. The MVIS Global Uranium & Nuclear Energy index is up over 70% in the period, compared with a 14% increase in the S&P 500 Index.
That exuberance looks overdone when considering likely delays in supply, according to Variankaval. “The demand of new power is materializing in real time, but the supply of new nuclear may take time,” he said.
Oklo Inc. is named after the natural fission reactor that formed in Africa 1.7 billion years ago.
Denial and Obstruction vs. Resistance and $$Real Money$$™
And sometimes, maximal stupidity, which is how we got the original Chernobyl/Zaporizhzhia disaster.
It turns out that we got past that looming disaster, but pay attention. The experts in disasters tell us that there are consistently about 30 near misses for every actual catastrophe of any kind. Nuclear meltdowns, airplane crashes and collisions, outbreaks of dread diseases, political nightmares...
Power supply fully restored in Zaporizhzhia after Russian attacks
Power was lost to home and business customers as well as the Chernobyl protection system.
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This is good news! Some people say that it's not worth doing net zero because other countries won't be. This data shows that moving to renewable energy is a global trend. 1/2
BBC News - Renewables overtake coal as world's biggest source of electricity
www.bbc.com/news/article...
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— Margot Hodson (@margothodson.bsky.social) October 7, 2025 at 1:40 AM
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A coalition of solar energy companies, labor unions, nonprofit groups and homeowners sued the EPA on Monday over its termination of $7 billion in grants intended to help low- and moderate-income families install solar panels on their homes.
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— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) October 6, 2025 at 9:00 PM
