I still routinely see people I know have operational brains launching new newsletters on substack in 2026 and I really have to rein in my impulse to yell at them

I feel ‘serving kings’ is a rather charitable description of the activities of the best-known Thane of Cawdor.

Bikes don't do this.

Abolish the Home Office

Another warm congraulations to every person who has fought to delay, kill and weaken climate policies to gradually reduce fossil fuel reliance, over the past few decades. Now you get to experience sudden, unplanned, unfair and painful fossil fuel restrictions instead. www.iea.org/data-and-sta...

The only way to durably protect hauliers - and the economy - against fossil fuel shocks is to support them to electrify trucks. Sales of electric trucks in China outsold diesel trucks last December. So far this year, only one electric HVG was newly registered in Ireland. #fuelprotests #speirgorm

Afrori books needs to sell 1000 books in April or they’ll have to close. afroribooks.co.uk

#BMJInvestigation finds UK councils face industry legal threats for campaigns warning against wood burning stoves. As the government considers health warnings for new stoves, investigation reveals industry pressure to shut down clean air campaigns https://bit.ly/4cZKtfE

Maddening

My latest column: Ireland’s data centre policy will drive significantly greater fossil fuel use, contradicting multiple statutory and policy targets which require rapid reductions instead. www.irishtimes.com/environment/...

It was my aunt's dog's birthday yesterday. He'd been out in the wet and was wearing his towel wrap in the photo she sent of him. So my sister did this to it. Maybe the hobbits are a bit serious in their expressions for a birthday?

Things are moving fast in the energy world thanks to the latest war. I cover a lot of the highlights of the past week in this piece.

🚨NEW BLOGPOST 🚨 The Hormuz crisis has a real chance of causing energy shortages in the UK. The government is insisting it's business as usual, and opposition parties are arguing for fiscal measures that will stoke shortages. Neither is serious. open.substack.com/pub/joxleywr...

Fuel duty is *already* 34p per litre lower, in real terms, than in 2010 Its been frozen or cut for 15 years Its cost the Treasury over £200bn in tax - and hugely incentivised people to keep using ICE cars and driving. It's favoured the richest If anything we should be restoring it to 2010 levels

NEW ANALYSIS: Record wind and solar generation saved UK from gas imports worth £1bn in March 2026 📈Wind+solar were up 22% year-on-year in March to a record high for the month ⛴️This avoided the need for gas imports worth £1bn at current high prices www.carbonbrief.org/...

*taps the sign*

Something tells me that Third Runway at Heathrow will never happen (part 94) bsky.app/profile/dunc...

Once again we come back to 'George Osbourne was the worst chancellor in modern history and so many of our major issues stem from him'

Good read on the root cause of UK social divisions. Liked this: "The real test, which my colleagues and I call the “Wet Wednesday Night Test”, is whether your investment in social infrastructure gets 14 people to turn up for football (or cub scouts, or a book group) on a wet Wednesday in February."

This is a good article. I expect Reform to blame everything on others, when they were also clearly responsible. What is more disappointing is that various industry bodies are softpedalling or, even worse, trying to treat with them. Before they're anywhere near power and are falling in the polls.

🚨 BREAKING: The European Commission has urged people to work from home, drive and fly less, and for EU countries to urgently roll out renewables, as it warned of a prolonged energy crisis as a result of the conflict in the Gulf. Full story: www.politico.eu/article/euro...

The 2025 numbers are really striking. www.kielinstitut.de/fileadmin/Da...

Two extracts from an outstanding piece by @sarahoconnorft.ft.com

Cis women assemble, sign and share please. And if you don’t like that term or that request, scroll on by (nearly 100k are down with it though)

“Duffy’s approach to architecture – inquisitive, evolutionary and mediating between the changing needs of client and user – remains relevant as ever” (RIP Frank Duffy. His ‘shearing layers’ is probably single biggest conceptual influence on my thinking as a designer) www.ribaj.com/intelligence...

Visit a Heat Pump in your area. app.visitaheatpump.com

What is seriously depressing about Reform having control of a bunch of local authorities is that not only do they engage in performative bullshit around net zero, but they will be busily destroying capacities and resources at a local level that we really need - through incompetence as much malice.

The UK Government is making a move to try and restrict timber from being used in a significant proportion of new buildings, proposing to significantly extend the "external wall ban" which has been in place for residential buildings residential buildings of more than 7 storeys since 2022.

Fun fact about the IOC's one time only, all or nothing, SRY gene test 'to identify men'. It's entirely possible to test positive after being pregnant with a boy. Fetal DNA can cross the placental barrier and linger in the maternal bloodstream for decades.

I want to talk to you about cycling and hip arthritis It surprises a lot of people, and needs to be more widely understood I have a hip replacement next month, this thread is my experience, but I know others have found the same 🧵

A family member went straight from maternity leave from nursing into the ICU in a major city hospital in the middle of the second wave. Like many others, they left the NHS not long after. You can't treat people like that and expect them just to carry on.

*Everyone* thought Sheffield was losing the snooker - there was no chance Sheffield could match the Saudis' cash. So how did we save it? www.sheffieldtribune.co.uk/unsnookered-...

Past time to get off twitter, british parliamentarians

Glorious day in the Dark Peak.

When you have an unusual (in England) surname, it sure is weird to hear it repeated multiple times in a single short BBC4 advert. They even pronounce it properly (again, rare in England).

Belatedly reading this excellent piece from @georgemonbiot.bsky.social. A near perfect distillation of the climate theory of everything. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

If only more people understood this

VICTORY! Government to open up the Land Registry - bringing to an end a thousand years of secrecy shrouding who owns England. I’ve been campaigning for this for ten years: the new Land Use Framework, published later today, makes it government policy. 1/ www.theguardian.com/environment/...

🚨 DOUBLE YOUR DONATION for ONE WEEK ONLY!! 🚨 We’re taking part in Big Give hashtag#ArtsForImpact campaign and we’ve got £10,000 of match funding to unlock WITH YOUR HELP!! Donate today 👉 bit.ly/3P57NyZ

Exactly this! Plus various family members died young or lost limbs thanks to the fossil fuel industry. During my teenage years the local coking plant was replaced with some of the UK's first large scale wind turbines. It was better. Sod anyone who thinks solar or wind are an aesthetic problem.

Just seen my first bumblebee of the year! #Equinox

[stares at British 'populism']

The uk needs to: 1. Make shifting to solar and heat pumps for homes ans businesses a priority. 2. A programme of rail electrification. 3. Reduce speed limits. 4. Emergency cycle and bus lanes, and fill any gaps. 5. Revamp cycle2work scheme into govt backed interest free loans for cycle purchases

If you missed it, I’m part of a small collective trying to bring a radical bookshop shop to Newcastle. We haven’t had a good proper radical book shop since the 1980s. We think that should change! We launched our crowdfunder today, support if you can: www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/booksfromb... Pls share

As I - who coauthored two books and literally demonstrated *for* nuclear energy - have tried to explain several times, slashing regulations is NOT a good thing for nuclear power. Especially if done by an unpopular, laughably incompetent & blatantly corrupt administration! A reaction WILL follow.

The final report on last April's Spain/Portugal blackout is out. A few takeaways: - Lack of "inertia" due to too few fossil/nuclear generators - the thing anti-renewable pundits immediately blamed without evidence, then reporters breathlessly endlessly repeated - played essentially no role.

Don't always agree with George, but I am very much a free market anti-capitalist. You cannot have a free market without a robust state. One of the big failures of British politics has been the demise of the inspector class; people whose job it was to go around and check rules were being followed. /1

Went for a cuppa with my Dad in the new hotel on Whitehaven harbour at the weekend. Disappointed that no one tried to sell us any droids.

‘I used a comparison with Winston Churchill as a way to disparage someone while sitting next to a Fianna Fáil taoiseach.’