Why Maines Governor Just Killed a Pioneering Data Center Moratorium

Astuce de pro quand on parle avec des gens de changement climatique :
1) ne jamais partir du principe qu'ils savent ce qu'est une analyse de cycle de vie pour comparer les choses.
2) tre au courant que les personnes aux opinions les plus tranches sur "ce qui est colo" ou pas ont des postures plus proches du dogme religieux sans lien avec le monde rel que de la recherche scientifique prouve sur le sujet.
3) quasi personne ne connat les ordres de grandeur en matire d'impact climatique.

"There will be a significant boost to renewables and nuclear power and a further shift towards a more electrified future. And this will cut into the main markets for oil."

Thank you, Mr. President!

via

25 Apr 'Share your current biggest creative frustration.'

More about CelesteEmbrace on the website

25 Apr 'Share your current biggest creative frustration.'

Not so much a frustration, but something I dwell on for too long.

Many of my characters have quirky names including AngryBard, BarmyWaffle and CelesteEmbrace

see them all here

I now need amusing names for an elderly couple, the young lady in the post office, and the biscuit salesman for a play! (mise en abyme)

Cigarette Breaks on the Isle of Tumbledown

Ft Myers Beach, FLA

26.4520 N, 81.9481 W

The instinct to summon a cigarette is a learned behavior. I dont smoke, but the impulse is there. To draw forth from a crumpled packet. Flick at a lighter. Shield the fickle flame against the tradewinds. But Ive no cigarettes. No lighter. It is a learned behavior from watching my father in times like these. Times when there are no words and no action seems suitable. When there is fuck-all to be done. Have a smoke. 

Resilient palm trees lean drunkenly all in the same direction pointing at the church. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I see it: this place of worship where I spent a childhood of sundays. The temple resembles the carcass of a fish washed ashore on a red tide. Few patches of rotten flesh flap in the sea breeze, clinging to the skeletal structure. A single glossy fisheye remains aghast at the horror. Its a wonder it remains. The fisheye. A magnificent stained-glass window intact. Nothing else salvageable. Just the window. 

Have you seen the house, one Banjax Brother or the other asks. 

Were gathered at a bar called the Whale, or where the bar once was. At present, the Whale is a party tent posing as a bar in a dirt lot where oysters & Heineken are served out of a cooler. Theres an unobstructed view of the Gulf of Mexico. The gulf is unchanged, unbothered. Amnesiac. Business as usual. Months ago, though, this unobstructed view would have been blocked by the houses which stood between the boulevard and the beach. I watch a dumb pelican face-plant into the gentle waves. 

No, I tell one Banjax Brother and the other. I havent seen the house. Not yet. The eldest brother, the Commodore, tells me the house my father built withstood the storm. It wasnt a knockout, the hurricane won by unanimous decision but the house never fell. 

The Commodores Miami firm pays him enough of a kings ransom to live like a Venetian doge along Sanibels canals. Sanibel, the more affluent island to the north, was not spared of the hurricane. The entire causeway from the mainland was wiped-out. Residents who had evacuated could not return. Residents who stayed behind had to fight-off pirates. Fucking pirates, the Commodore says. The weariness of his eyes does not match his showmans grin. He puts his sunglasses back on and says again, fuck-king pirates. Every degenerate bastard from the Florida interior who could commandeer a boat set a course for Sanibel. Pillagers. Wreckers. Scavengers. Opportunists. Jean-shorted motherfuckers running amuck. A Florida Man shop-a-thon. 

Ft Myers Beach took the brunt of Hurricane Ian, but the bridges connecting the island to the mainland held firm. The community was slowly allowed to return. Not all evacuated. The Commodores youngest brother, Lothario, remained behind. On his phone is a video he took of the seas rising to threaten his position. A position well-above the preferred sea level. It is terrifying to watch. The POV is as if he was on a cruise ship instead of the second floor of a concrete building. In the images, tall palms struggle to tread water in the waves. It is as if the entire sea has vacated the deep to swallow the island. 

Jesus, Loth, the Commodore scorns his kid brother, you and this damn video. Youre worse than Vic Neverman talking about his heart attack. 

Huh, I ask. Oh. 

Fuckin with you, Vic, the Commodore says with his jury-seducing grin. Your heart-attack gets better every time I hear it, he says. Hows it ticking

Ill make a full recovery, I say. Despite the genetic minefield left behind by my ancestors. 

Ive got to know, the little brother Lothario says. Whats it like masturbating after a heart attack

I never missed a beat.

Laughter. 

I should retire now. There will never be a better heart-attack masturbation joke. 

And the beat goes on, Lothario sings before switching to turn the beat around want to hear percussion turn it upside down. Hes clearly tended bar at too many karaoke nights. 

Lothario is the Commodores little brother yet his size dwarfs us all. Hes built like a fucking grizzly. One night I made the mistake of introducing a woman to him. She came away dazed. Concussed almost. She admitted she wanted to climb him like a tree. As the Commodore orders more oysters from the Whales bar staff, Lothario tells me he was supposed to go on a date tonight with his acupuncturists receptionist, but hes not feeling well. Shes offered to make him soup. Lothario winks and says, hopefully dick soup.

I mention to the Commodore with a nod to our surroundings how it is admirable the Whale keeps going even if they have to work out of a tent. Theyve little choice, the Commodore informs me. Bars blown down in the hurricane must continue selling alcohol or risk losing their liquor license. No rest for the weary. Eventually, the bars will rebuild. There is always a demand for vice. I dont know about the churches. With the islands population increasingly temporary, will there be a demand for worship When the sunburnt visitors can stream their hometown podcast church No, the churches will likely rebrand as Hard Rock Hotel & Casinos. And why shouldnt they God forsook us a long time ago. 

The Commodore turns his prosecutors glare on his brother and asks, dick soup, really

I know, Lothario says and shakes his head with regret. Its stupid. Forget I said that. Who wants a soup of dicks Not me. Thats gross. 

The Commodore tells me about Fantasies, how for a few weeks the gentlemans club stayed open under a large circus tent. The stripper poles were load bearing. Old Johnnie White was there tapping the beer kegs. Dancers made good money. Survivors who needed distraction spent insurance paydays on feeling good with fleeting erections. Its all so fucking post-apocalyptic, I say, or post-war Berlin. 

You did warn us, Vic, the Commodore says. Chachee is convinced you knew all of this was coming. It is all written down in your Mosquito Key stories. 

Nostradumbass, Lothario says with a laugh before immediately ensuring me hes only kidding. 

The Commodore presents the evidence of my foreknowledge, summarizing what I wrote many years ago. He says, you predicted Mosquito Key would sell its soul and change its name. Well, the north end of the island is now Margaritaville Resorts. You said the karmic price for this betrayal would be a hurricane which rises out of the Gulf and sinks the island. Sounds about right. You predicted the first American pope would be elected by reality television. We have our first American pope, but it was a president we got from reality TV. You said Mosquito Key would be infested with chupacabras. All of South Florida has become infested with pythons and iguanas. Close enough. And your protagonist always referred to a dead wife, but unbeknownst to the reader at least unbeknownst until the end of the book the wife is very much alive, but the unreliable narrator chooses a fantasy over revisiting the pain of his divorce.

How is your wife, Lothario asks me. I hear shes easy on the eyes, he says. 

Shes long gone, I say. Rest in peace. Freak toaster accident. Tried to make PopTarts in the hot-tub. 

Oh, Lothario says. Shit. Sorry bro. 

The Commodore snorts a laugh. Are you going to see the house while it still stands, he asks. Yknow people still talk about your dad around here. 

Yeah. It is time. I leave the Banjax Brothers and continue my tour of the tumbled-down island. 

Im parked near Shamrocks Irish Pub where my parents gathered after baseball games and always for St Patricks Day. After the storm surge, it is no more than cinder blocks & rubble. 

The Cottage is gone. Just up & disappeared. An American flag perseveres alone. I recall a 4th of July at this bar: out on the beach, a fight broke out between two coed spring breakers. It was horse-play between the two girls, but they wound-up tossing each other into the waves. I approached the prettiest of the ladies and offered her my dry shirt. Chivalry is not dead, but she turned down my offer. Instead, she countered by saying she would take my pants. Yeah. Shit. Honor-bound, I spent the rest of the night in my boxers, getting catcalled and/or ass-slapped by the patrons of the Cottage.

Lani Kai, the great green monstrosity of a landmark hotel, remains. It is deafeningly quiet. The damage isnt as noticeable as the absence of life. Temporarily abandoned, this formerly frenetic building is silent. Walking the beach side at night, one notices the great void where Lani Kai stands a darkness blotting out stars, moon, the lights of the boulevard. The downstairs beach bar is cold. There was a summer night long ago, in these sands, my college buddy Tusk showed the locals how a North Florida riverbilly dances. He tore off his shirt and flung it around like a lasso. His sidekick, Palatka Joe, fought off those who would fight Tusk. By the end of the night, Tusk would be in the waves, vomiting sick through his laughter. Fucking maniac. I pulled him out of the sea before he was carried off.

I finally venture far enough south to find the house where I grew-up. Where it would be. I drive by it at first, not realizing what this pile of sand represents. My fathers house has been bulldozed. If the neighboring house is any indication, there wasnt much to take down. The neighboring house is a corpse propped on stilts with a crows nest in its empty ribcage. Too late for deathbed goodbyes, I gaze absently at the grave dirt.

My unstable heart flops at this revelation. As if the mechanics shut the hood without tightening the screws, something tumbles inside me. This is a gruesome exercise. Confronting mortality like this.  

Each 7/11 and CVS is boarded-up. Shutdown for renovation. The corporations will return to this beach. It will not be so easy for the families. The Commodore mentioned insurance payouts are for the value of the old houses which were, but the dollar figure often falls short of the expense to rebuild a house adhering to new building codes. Many families will be forced to leave. Foreign investors will swoop in. Jimmy Buffets empire will annex more margarita territory. 

This particular shuttered CVS is where my pizza restaurant had been located. PizzaEtcetera. Pizza plus other shit. I was a legend here the greatest pizza boy to ever work this coast. I was a legend, but still the most junior driver. When I wasnt on the road, I was on dish duty. I mopped at the end of each night. I had to defend the dumpster against the siege machines of jihadist raccoons. I folded pizza boxes while the other drivers & cooks took their smoke breaks, contemplated sudoku, argued over crossword puzzles. It was the greatest job I ever had.

During the summer, when Ft Myers Beach is too hot for all but the most foolhardy residents, pizza business was slow. No one ordered food unless the weather was monsoonal. Summer storms were when I made my money. On clear sunny days, this was a ghost town. On one such afternoon, I saw Noelle jog past the pizzeria. I chased after. Waved my arms. She stopped, took out her ear-buds, eager to continue jogging onward. Hey. Hi. Okay. Bye. Watching from the pizza shop, the old drivers drunks, gamblers, washed-up has-beens or never-beens they cheered me on. I was celebrated by the cooks in the kitchen. They appreciated my enthusiasm. They appreciated my innocence. My unbroken heart. As the summer continued, Id be in the back folding boxes as the old guys crossed words, sodukud and kept watch over the boulevard. If Noelle, or anyone who might be Noelle, jogged by, theyd holler, Vic!, time for your cigarette break! I was the only driver who didnt smoke. Cigarette break was code. When alerted, I would desert my pizza boxes and hurry out the front of the shop. Scanning for joggers, Id give chase. Sometimes I would gain her attention and shed slow down, jogging in place. Hi. Howdy. How goes Other times she wouldnt see me. Or ignore me. Either way, the old guys kept cheering me on. 

As the years passed and my generation left the island in pursuit of glory elsewhere, I would only see Noelle, or the Banjax Brothers, at funerals or weddings. The last time I saw Noelle was at her own wedding. I didnt attend, but crashed the post-party. Crashed it with the Commodores kid brother, oddly enough. I had run into Lothario at a 7/11 buying cigarette rolling papers. He rolled a joint, we got stoned & somehow teleported ourselves to the backyard of Noelles post-party. I saw the bride, but never approached. For whatever reason. The old pizza guys wouldve been disappointed. They wouldve accepted nothing less than the bride & I jumping into my Chevy Cavalier to speed-off into the night.  

In the intervening years, I did hear Noelle divorced. 

I heard you married, Noelle says as she picks at the seafood paella on the table between us. Married, I say as a knee-jerk reaction, well no!, I mean, I am not married, not any more. Freak toaster accident

Have you seen the house, she asks and sips her lemon water. Examining Noelle over my beer, I cannot help but think this is unmistakably her. In a place where nearly all familiarity has been lost, she is as she always was. But more. New gestures I do not recognize. Eyes still youthful but with a wisdom gained from years of talking to cats. An excitable southern twang she picked-up detouring through Tallahassee. When she looks at me, she doesnt recognize me for me. She sees my father. Which is what prompted her question about the house. I think about your dad a lot, Noelle says, we all do. 

She asked about my cardiac event. Recalling the Commodores critique I keep my story brief. Ill make a full recovery, I tell her. Ill be fine as long as there isnt a zombie apocalypse. In that scenario, Id lose access to meds and a cannibalistic diet cant be healthy. Americans are high in cholesterol, youd think. Noelle gives a silent laugh. You crack me up, she says. 

Fingers itching for a cigarette, I ask if she remembers me chasing her down the boulevard. Her eyes rise as she consults her memory. I remember, she says, I remember the first time I realized you liked me. Oh, I ask. It was at one of those weddings along the way. Or one of the funerals. Noelle says, you confronted me. I did, I ask. I do not recall the event. You had been drinking, she suggests. That sounds more familiar, I say, but I would never I cant imagine, why would I confront you 

You told me my boyfriend was bullshit.

Oh. Ha.

You said I deserved more, Noelle says. Yeah, I ask her, did I say you deserved someone like me Noelle smiles and says, I think it was implied.

Noelle moved back to Ft Myers Beach two weeks before the hurricane struck. She was on the 3rd floor of her fathers bay front home as the seas rose around her. Holding glass window panes back, she watched in horror as the Gulf of Mexico swallowed the first floor of the building. A forty-foot fishing boat had loosened from its moorings and collided with the house as she held back the storm. She has a video. Jesus, I say as I watch from her phone. 

How do you move past something like that, I ask. 

The PTSD, Noelle asks. She says, I quit drinking for one. Ketamine therapy. Long walks on the beach.

Inside our tapas restaurant, the Spanish guitarist begins singing Guantanamera. There is not a large crowd tonight, but many here are Cuban and they adore their famous love song. As did my father. When we would drive through Miami, my dad would set the radio to the latin station. Inevitably, Guantanamera would play and my dad would sing along, bastardizing the lyrics to one ton tomato

Noelle begins to tear at my story. Do you think hes here, she asks of my fathers ghost. I believe in that, that they check-in from time-to-time. He may be making his presence known to you through this song. 

The spirit of Rodrigo, I ask with a throat-clearing cough. I dunno, I say to Noelle. Are there any ghosts left on this island I mean, wouldnt the hurricane clean-out the cobwebs Wouldnt that storm surge wash-away the spirits

Maybe so, she says. But maybe they can return. You returned, Noelle says. What made you come back

Uh, well I returned to see you, I say with an unsure smile on my dumb pelican face. 

Noelle holds my gaze for an extended moment, a smirk on her lips, and she gives a slight tilt of the head. Theres your answer. Why he would return. Hed return to see you. 

Pilgrimage complete, I depart the island. Not without first taking a fistful of sand to weigh down my pocket. Grabbing a piece of something while it lasts. Before anything more washes away. 

Older and Wiser: How Elder Animals Help Species to Survive.

A growing body of research is pointing to the critical, but unappreciated, role that older animals play in ensuring the survival of wildlife populations. Conservationists say the new findings should lead to policies that protect these elders and the essential knowledge they impart.

Environment: Australias expanding urban fringes at high risk of catastrophic bushfires

I enjoyed the movie Project Hail Mary last night

An enjoyable SciFi romp

A nice fantasy where governments around the world co-operate with massive investment on a shared project to avert disastrous climate change (caused by a mysterious alian organism).

The effects of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) slowdown

- - -
Les effets du ralentissement de la circulation mridienne de retournement Atlantique (AMOC)

// Article en anglais //

"CIFFC is designed to support fighting fires that shift between busy and quiet seasons among different locations. But recently, more provinces are burning at the same time, which means there are fewer resources to share because each jurisdiction also needs to fight their own battles."

24th of April 2026
431.43 ppm CO2 in the air

Chart shows current value and values for the same day 20 years back

Environment ministers from G7 nations said progress was made at a two-day meeting in Paris despite climate change being left off the agenda to avoid friction with the United States.

These beds are now of 3 weeks after germinating.... I know with confidence it will all be like the recent season because I have used the same measurements.. :mastodon:

The world is embracing offshore wind even as the US retreats.

Over 9 GW of new offshore wind projects came online last year. The sector is set to grow even more as nations in Europe and Asia seek out clean power.

There is an entire generation of children running around today who will be alive in 2100. My Gen X yielded to Millennials who yielded to Gen Z. And here come Alpha, Beta, Zoomers. With the birth of each generation, more greenhouse gas emissions trap more heat and oceans rise, weather gets more extreme, and tipping points arrive. Welcome to your warming world, child

everything is fine

25.04.2026 - 14:00 Uhr
Chart des deutschen Strommix ber die letzten 6 Stunden.

"Overheated cows, flooded highways, and now a fuel crisis: why Australias food system is in big trouble"

Le mois d'aot est arriv vachement tt cette anne.

Universitat de les Illes Balears.

Palma, .

De blokkade van de A12 bij Utrecht wordt live gestreamd door XR TV.

Geef t door.

Reduced winter snow cover across Eurasia and the Himalayas has also played a role, as less snow means less sunlight is reflected away, increasing warming over the subcontinent

Forty four Celsius at Four
Four more days of this Venusian weather
Day feels longer than year

The Wars: How Superpowers Are Carving Up the Earth With Arthur Snell

What do melting , a war for farmland in Ukraine, and the panic of Gulf petro-states have in common Arthur Snell exposes the terrifying new geography of global conflict.

The Next El Nio Could Lock Earth Into a Hotter Climate

The Pacific heat pulse is temporary, but scientists warn that its climate impacts are not

Criminalisation of climate protesters in UK is counterproductive, research finds

Study of 1,300 campaigners finds arrests, fines and jail terms increase determination of activists to take direct action

More heat, less rain El Nino weather threat looms over India in 2026

Poisoning the Forest for the Trees

!

Hundreds of firefighters battle wildfires in northern Japan

.

Klimawandel kurzweilig und einfach erklrt. Das wrden sogar Leugner des Klimawandels verstehen, wenn sie der englischen Sprache mchtig wren.

I fear that the proliferation of expert panels on is a bit like Randall Munroe's famous cartoon about the proliferation of standards. We don't need more panels, we need to pay more attention to the ones we already have

There is no justification for the expansion of North Sea gas. Via guardian

: and the lobby are flooding with fake climate news to stop increaase in energy

25.04.2026 - 08:00 Uhr
Chart des deutschen Strommix ber die letzten 6 Stunden.

The Gulf Stream that keeps Europe warm may well turn off. But if that happens, the effects will be global.