Extra! Extra! 10/15 🪓

Hi, all, and happy Sunday.

After such a painful week—and in the midst of such a difficult time—I won’t greet you with my usual ebullience, but I am determined to still send out this list. It’s critical for us to remember that all isn’t lost right now. Many things are tough—ghastly, even—but many other things are trending in the right direction. Two things can be true at once.

Remember: despair is the enemy. Hope is our ally. So take a little hope from this newsletter today, and maybe pass it on to someone else, as well. We’re all struggling; you deserve this brief respite from the doom and sorrow, and so do your friends and family. So share widely!

I continue to send love to each and every one of you. We’ll be back to work tomorrow, making more victories. Until then have a restful Sunday.

Jess

P.S. Last week I was so thrown by the news that I forgot to put the 🪓 next to victories brought about—or made more likely—by activists like you. It’s back today.

Read This 📖

At 101, his secret to happiness? Making new friends.

Also this from NPR: It's not all bad news: Wonderful and wild stories about tackling climate change.

Also Read This 📕

This week I finished “Still Life” by Sarah Winman—I believe one of you may have recommended it to me. What a delight! It’s one of the most life-affirming and humanity-celebrating novels I’ve read in a long while; losing myself in it this week especially was extremely medicinal.

Order it up from an indie bookseller or your local library—you won’t regret it!

Celebrate This! 🎉

NPR just dedicated a week to highlighting climate solutions.

A Canadian judge ruled that the province of British Colombia has a constitutional mandate to consult with First Nations on mining rights. 🪓

In Ireland, wind power generation temporarily exceeded the total demand for electricity for the first time ever. 

Scientists in Brazil just rediscovered a tree that was thought to be extinct for nearly 200 years. The Pernambuco holly, a species of small holly tree, is one of conservation group Re:wild’s “top 25 most wanted lost species” and the ninth to be rediscovered since it started looking for them in 2017.

Democratic Senators continue to make progress on filling judicial vacancies — last week’s confirmations include U.S. Magistrate Judge Brendan Abell Hurson, to the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, and Susan K. DeClercq, who will join the bench in the Eastern District of Michigan. DeClercq, a civil rights lawyer, will be Michigan’s first federal judge of East Asian descent. These developments follow the long-awaited confirmation of Judge Rita Lin to the District Court for the Northern District of California. Judge Lin will be the second Asian American woman—and first Taiwanese American woman—to serve on the District Court for the Northern District of California. 🪓

After more than two decades of persistent efforts by Indigenous activists, including protests at company shareholder meetings, demonstrations on the river and complicated negotiations, four dams along the California-Oregon border have finally started to be dismantled. 🪓

Nissan will accelerate plans towards electrification by committing that all vehicles sold in Europe will be electric by 2030.

Hollywood writers voted to approve a new three-year contract with studios, formally ending a five-month labor dispute. 🪓

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed a landmark law aimed at banning red dye No. 3 and other potentially harmful food additives in consumer goods.

New Orleans experienced a welcome anomaly in early September: The Big Easy went nearly two weeks without anyone dying from a shooting.

For a few minutes on Saturday, September 23, all of South Australia's electricity demand was met by rooftop solar. This is the latest milestone for Australia's rapidly developing clean energy grid, and for the rollout of solar around the globe!

New York state is making a huge investment in clean transportation by making $100 million available to support schools to purchase emissions-free buses. New York's investment follows the EPA announcement of a $500 million clean school bus rebate competition, part of the $5 billion earmarked for clean school buses in the bipartisan infrastructure law. 🪓

A New York judge ruled that Greenridge Generation, a cryptocurrency mining company, is violating the state's landmark climate law, the CLCPA. This ruling sets a powerful precedent for the climate harms of cryptocurrency, which needlessly consumes enormous amounts of energy, much of which is generated by fossil fuels. 

Gavin Newsom signed SB 1167, a bill requiring bonding adequate to cover decommissioning of oil and gas wells. 🪓

The German women’s gymnastics team donned unitards at the world championships to continue promoting more comfortable uniform options and encouraging female athletes to remain in the sport longer. 🪓

Wisconsin Republicans have backed away from a threat to impeach Janet Protasiewicz!!! 🪓

George Santos got in a lot more trouble.

Incumbency-protection gerrymandering is now banned in California. 🪓

The Federal Trade Commission is proposing a rule that, if finalized, would ban businesses from using hidden fees, require honest pricing and ensure consumers know how much they are paying up front. The CFPB is proposing a similar rule. 🪓

Stockholm has announced a ban on diesel and petrol-powered vehicles in its city center, beginning in 2025.

The Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to a Harvard professor who studies the impact of women in the workforce. The third woman to ever win the prize, Claudia Goldin’s research uncovered the reasons for gender gaps in labor force participation and earnings.

A new Swedish report found that feeding cows seaweed can cut methane emissions by up to 45 percent. 

An airport in Dallas is using the powerful gusts from airplane takeoffs to power its facilities — it’s a first-of-its-kind move that could eventually change airports across the world. 

California is outlawing so-called junk fees. 🪓

In a significant ruling released Wednesday by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, the Florida drag ban will not be allowed to take effect.

Massachusetts just approved changes to its sex and health education curriculum for the first time in 24 years. The changes will be more inclusive of the LGBTQ+ community and teach about bodily autonomy, mental and emotional health, dating safety, sexually transmitted infections, consent, and more.

Suniva, the U.S. solar manufacturer that successfully fought for tariffs on cheap panels made overseas, will restart its Georgia cell factory next year thanks to incentives in President Joe Biden's landmark climate law. 🪓

In a win for voters, a Trump-appointed federal judge struck down the commissioner districts of Galveston County, Texas for violating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by diluting Black and Latino voting power. 

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D) joined a lawsuit brought by voters arguing that the state's legislative districts are extreme partisan gerrymanders that unfairly favor Republicans and violate the state constitution. 🪓

Allie Phillips, a young mom who was denied an abortion in Tennessee for a non-viable pregnancy, is now running for the statehouse there.

California passed a law banning the sale of gas-powered leaf blowers and lawn mowers by 2024! Whooooo! (Those things are a BIG climate-related pet peeve of mine. They’re just wildly polluting.) 🪓

Green Mountain Power, Vermont’s largest utility company, is asking state regulators to let it buy batteries it will install at customers’ homes. The company says that doing so will be cheaper than putting up more power lines.

The Biden administration’s DOE announced a goal of cutting the cost of home decarbonization in half and slashing household energy costs at least 20 percent by the end of the decade.  🪓

The Supreme Court rejected a challenge to the “social cost of carbon,” one of the most important calculations in US climate policy, on Tuesday. The court’s surprise decision sets the stage for the Biden administration to broaden the metric’s use across federal agencies when formulating climate-related regulations. 🪓

Californians will be able to make a single request asking that data brokers delete their personal information, under a bill Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law Tuesday.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed the Right to Repair Act into law, making it easier for owners to repair devices themselves or to take them to independent repair shops. The law, which joins similar efforts in New York, Colorado, and Minnesota, is tougher than some of its predecessors.

In Ohio the state Ballot Board, which has a Republican majority, unanimously voted that a ballot initiative that would create an independent redistricting commission complies with state law, clearing the way for supporters to soon begin gathering voter signatures to get it onto the November 2024 ballot.

A jury found Randy Roedema, 41, guilty of criminally negligent homicide and third-degree assault in the 2019 death of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old unarmed Black man.

Javan rhinos, one of the world’s most endangered species, have a new family member — a female calf believed to have been born in February, Indonesia’s environment ministry said.

The monarch butterfly is doing a bit better than we thought!