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Welcome to the week.
It’s Earth Day! What are you doing to celebrate today, and hopefully every day (in a real way, not in a Big Oil “green initiative” way)?
We’re celebrating by offering a 50% discount on our Membership all week (that’s $25 for the whole year)!
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And now to the news.
This week:
⚡Accelerating the clean energy transition
🚬 Banning menthol cigarettes
🧑🌾 Agri-environmental policies
💻 Recycling e-waste
And more
Have a great week,
— Willow
This is science for people who give a shit.
Every week, we help 31,000+ humans understand and unfuck the rapidly changing world around us. It feels great, and we’d love for you to join us.
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Do you feel prepared or knowledgeable enough to recognize greenwashing?
Last week, we asked how often you eat a plant-based diet. Here are the results:
🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ All of the time (13%)
“My wife and I have been vegan for the past few years. The biggest challenge is producing consistently tasty and nutritious meals. We primarily rely on a host of internet-based recipe resources - thankfully, there are now many to choose from. ”
🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ Most of the time (19%)
“We are vegetarian at home but will occasionally eat meat at restaurants.”
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 A couple days a week (29%)
“I am trying to shift to a whole grain plant-based diet without putting my husband into withdrawal or divorce court. :-) We've built up to 2-3 days a week. ”
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Rarely (29%)
“I have pernicious anemia. The less meat I eat, the worse I feel. However, I do limit what KIND of meat I eat. ”
🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Never (10%)
“Love meat. It's what we need ”
New Shit Giver Karen wants to help solve “the inaccessible housing problem. There is not enough affordable and available housing stock. People are forced to pay rental prices that 10 years ago would have been more than a home mortgage. I believe inaccessible housing is contributing to the unhoused crisis.“
THIS. It has gotten beyond out of hand, and it’s a crisis of our own making. Which means we can fix it. Check out the Action Steps below!
⚡️ Climate change:
🌍 Dubai had major flooding, and everyone is pointing fingers at cloud seeding. Here’s why cloud seeding (while certainly controversial) probably wasn’t the reason for the flooding
The Biden administration has blocked the expansion of oil, gas, and mining operations in the Alaskan wilderness, can I get a woop woop
🌎 Brazil’s G20 plans include taxing billionaires to fight climate change and poverty, let’s go
There’s a backlog of 2.6 terawatts of energy projects waiting to connect to the grid in the US, just waiting to accelerate the clean energy transition if we could just clear up that interconnection queue
🦠 Health & Bio:
🌎 Promising new TB vaccines for adolescents and adults (the current one, while great, is about 100 years old, and only for babies) could save millions of lives
Black-led organizations are suing the government to get them to finally issue a federal ban on menthol cigarettes and flavored tobacco
Parents eligible for mental health and substance use treatment under Medicaid aren’t receiving it
🌏 The WHO has just expanded the definition of an airborne disease, which will have a big impact on public health guidelines (remember all the confusion at the beginning of the Covid pandemic, if you haven’t blocked it out)
💦 Food & Water:
🌏 Agriculture is responsible for a big chunk of emissions, as well as deforestation, biodiversity loss, land and water use, and pollution. We’ve gotta do something about all of that, while still feeding billions of people — here’s some data on how agri-environmental policies stack up globally
California has set a new standard for limiting levels of chromium-6 in drinking water (the same chemical Erin Brockovich was fighting against), although environmental justice advocates say it still doesn’t go far enough
🌎 The future of a more sustainable palm oil industry could be in Latin America
The EPA is getting strict on forever chemicals, which is great, but will take a lot of time and money to implement. Here are some things you can do reduce PFAS in your drinking water
👩💻 Beep Boop:
🌍 AI-generated content is being used to spread election misinformation in a year where over 2 billion people are heading to the polls. Rest of World is tracking that content throughout 2024 here.
🌍 If the US bans TikTok, what does that mean for an open internet globally?
Demand for electricity is growing (AI, clean energy, electrification, etc.) — but we have the solutions to meet it
🌏 The UN’s “Global E-waste Monitor” says to recycle your e-waste to help with clean energy transition
🌎 = Global news
Last week’s most popular Action Step was using Too Good To Go to reduce food waste.
Donate to the National Coalition For The Homeless to ensure everyone has access to safe, quality, affordable housing.
Volunteer with your local YIMBY group to solve housing issues in your community.
Get educated about how your community can expand affordable housing the data and consulting services of the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board.
Be heard about policy that will fix the housing shortage and affordability crisis and urge your representatives to support the YIMBY Act.
Invest in climate solutions that will help mitigate housing losses from climate disasters using ATMOS.
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What is maternal health?
Last week was Black Maternal Health Week (every year from April 11-17th), so now is a great time to learn about maternal health, maternal mortality rates in America, and how Black women are disproportionately effected.
Read our explainer 👇
This one’s for you, my fellow bird aficionado’s 👇
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