The article doesn’t even mention the most effective coping mechanisms… Phone banking and door knocking. Turn your anxiety into action!

Phone banking and door knocking are evidence-based to improve turnout and at this point the race really is just about getting people to actually vote.

While important info, it’s a long read that doesn’t really provide much new information about “future scenarios” to be aware of.

Amen!

My gas stove was leaky and could have blown up my house. So we replaced that with an induction stove, and it’s all around a better experience. Same with the water heater and the EV. All of these things plus insulating the attic have been improvements to our lives with the added benefit of reducing natural gas consumption more than 20% over the past year and saving about $100/month on utilities and gasoline. It’s nice that we aren’t pumping air pollution directly into our house when we cook anymore.

Every bit of change we make helps, because the climate crisis is not binary. but more importantly the people who can make these changes receive the greatest upfront benefits.

I view this graph differently, the Biden line is pretty close to the target line through 2030 before it diverges. Estimates decrease in accuracy further into the future, particularly if we’re assuming the political calculus stays the same over the next 6 years. The Inflation Reduction Act was the most powerful climate crisis bill we were going to get with the current political situation and it has made a big impact. Particularly with building green economy jobs in swing states. As the swing states see more and more benefits in coming years, that will change the political dynamics of what is possible

Obligatory Technology Connections video.

It’s weird that they’re pushing for less innovation. Even if there’s a slightly increased up front cost, better energy efficiency saves consumers a ton of money on the back end. Particularly if it’s landlords buying the major appliances and tenants pay for utilities

Nah, this was a concession both Democrats and Senate Republicans were asking for. They hope to have a full budget deal finished before a new administration so there’s a clean slate for either incoming president

When there’s more people who want to buy homes than there are homes for sale, the power dynamic is still in favor of the sellers. Sounds like this could potentially favor more experienced buyers/hedge funds over first-time home buyers. If sellers don’t want to cover fees for buyer’s agent, then that’s more a first time buyer would have to pay upfront.

Kroger and Albertsons own a ton of “other grocery chains.” Classic example of just simply buying up the competition

Am I missing something? There is nothing new in the article. It’s just contrasting Harris’ Senate record and 2020 primary stances with the pragmatic political compromises that the Biden-Harris administration has made over the past 3.5 years because they had to deal with getting things through Congress. Of course the compromises made with Congress are going to be more to the right than what Harris has previously advocated for as her ideal stances, that’s what politics is…

Already has been. The “slow down” in EV sales is almost entirely from Tesla and I’d guess a lot of that is from how disliked he is by the main demographic of people buying EVs

Drone on drone warfare! Makes you wonder what sort of cold war is playing out.

#BirdsArentReal

The article details issues with pharmaceutical benefit managers, which 2 of the big 3 are owned by insurance companies and the third is owned by CVS

Plastic production is also one of the dirtiest industries in terms of air and water pollution… I doubt China has strong enough environmental standards

That only affects Kia models before 2015

Oh wow, thanks for pointing that out, an oversight on my part. I replaced the link, but damn it’s hard to find good sources about this. EPA website is very technical and not much I could find breaking it down well that was not industry-funded.

And yeah there’s other ways to look at spending money to offset emissions that are hard to reduce, like air travel. I figure this gets people thinking in different ways and these charities could use the funds.

EPA recently updated the “Social Cost of Carbon” which is an estimate of the dollar amount of damage each metric ton of CO2 emitted costs society from pollution, natural disasters, humanitarian issues, etc. In 2023 the cost was ~$204/metric ton. A flight across the Continental US emits about 1 metric ton per economy passenger.

So carbon offsets should be priced in the neighborhood of $200/metric ton. But many of the carbon offset services are pretty scammy or fraudulent. As an alternative, I’d suggest considering a simple donation to an environmental charity in the same dollar range. Check out Coalition for Rainforest Nations as an option!

Ours was 50 amp, which seems to be pretty common for 30-36in wide cooktops

Yeah we went with the GE Profile 36in induction cooktop.

It’s more responsive than either gas or electric coils. The catch is you need pans that a fridge magnet will stick to. A trip to the thrift store with a magnet worked out for us.

The heat goes down immediately with most pans. Cast iron retains more heat though.

We went to the thrift store with a fridge magnet to buy our new pans, stainless steel lasts a long time

Love my new induction stove! Our old gas stove was leaking and could have blown up the house. We’ve noticed a lot less waste heat too, metal pan handles can be grabbed without a hot pad, the kitchen doesn’t heat up as much from cooking. And it heats up blazingly fast.