These are the climate readings that have been most influential as we've started Watershed. Please send us recommendations or feedback as you look through.

Table of contents

The problem statement

• Background on climate fundamentals
  • IPCC 1.5 report — Inspirational message that the current trajectory is disastrous but it's not too late to redirect to a good outcome. https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/
  • Latest emissions gap report https://www.unenvironment.org/resources/emissions-gap-report-2019
  • One of many general audience explainers https://www.amazon.com/Climate-Change-Everyone-Needs-Know®-ebook/dp/B07BH377MM
  • Berkeley Earth. Rigorous verification of core climate science http://berkeleyearth.org/
  • Video series from University of Bremen https://www.va-bne.de/index.php/de/veranstaltungen/124-world-in-transition/climate-change-and-climate-impact/347-basic-facts-about-global-warming
• Visualizations
  • Our World in Data on where emissions come from
    • By country: https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions
    • By sector: https://ourworldindata.org/ghg-emissions-by-sector
  • A best-of compilation from the wonderful work of Robert Rohde https://twitter.com/RARohde/status/1110118702131961861?s=20
  • Earth's carbon cycle https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwVsD9CiokY
  • A year of atmospheric CO2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1SgmFa0r04
  • Tracker of country-level targets https://climateactiontracker.org/global/temperatures/
• Human cost
  • WHO on climate change: https://www.who.int/en/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/climate-change-and-health
  • World bank on climate change: https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/press-release/2018/03/19/climate-change-could-force-over-140-million-to-migrate-within-countries-by-2050-world-bank-report
  • https://www.amazon.com/Uninhabitable-Earth-Life-After-Warming-ebook/dp/B07GVPFH5V
• On feedbacks and tipping points
  • https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-nine-tipping-points-that-could-be-triggered-by-climate-change
  • Tipping elements in the Earth’s climate system https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/105/6/1786.full.pdf?wptouch_preview_theme=enabled

Ideas on solutions

• The big good news: Clean energy generation is now the least expensive in many geographies. Only one piece of the puzzle but a very, very important piece.
  • Core data: https://www.lazard.com/perspective/levelized-cost-of-energy-and-levelized-cost-of-storage-2019
  • Commentary on how this happened and how to replicate the success: https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/15/how-to-decarbonize-america-and-the-world/
  • Case study of how this happened in the UK: https://interactive.carbonbrief.org/how-uk-transformed-electricity-supply-decade
  • Video lecture on state of US transition: https://www.woodmac.com/our-expertise/focus/Power--Renewables/watch-the-webinar---transformation-power-markets/
• In addition to electricity, where do emissions come from?
  • Best visual [WRI Sankey] https://www.wri.org/resources/data-visualizations/world-greenhouse-gas-emissions-2016
  • https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data
  • http://cait.wri.org/
  • https://www.wri.org/resources/charts-graphs/us-greenhouse-gas-emissions-flow-chart
  • https://www.b-t.energy/landscape/
• Scenario modelings: Books and tools for thinking about the many levers available
  • https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Climate-Solutions-Policy-Low-Carbon/dp/1610919564
  • https://www.amazon.com/Drawdown-Comprehensive-Proposed-Reverse-Warming-ebook/dp/B01KGZVNT0/
  • https://us.energypolicy.solutions/scenarios/home
  • https://en-roads.climateinteractive.org/scenario.html
  • https://drawdown.org/solutions/table-of-solutions
• Unsolved frontier problems
  • Demand-matched clean power: How to move to 100% clean electricity given the diurnal and seasonal variation of solar and wind https://www.blog.google/outreach-initiatives/sustainability/internet-24x7-carbon-free-energy-should-be-too/
  • Atmospheric carbon removal https://stripe.com/blog/negative-emissions-commitment
• Interesting opinion pieces
  • Saul Griffith https://medium.com/otherlab-news/how-do-we-decarbonize-7fc2fa84e887
  • Brett Victor http://worrydream.com/ClimateChange/
  • John Doerr and Hal Harvey on climate solutions https://vimeo.com/sprinklelab/review/470420478/4a7b18eecf
• Inspiration and caution for entrepreneurs
  • https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2020-green-billionaires/
  • Reflections on cleantech 1.0 https://energy.mit.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/MITEI-WP-2016-06.pdf
• Business spending can drive the problem or drive solutions
  • 2011 Nature opinion
  • https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/money-is-the-oxygen-on-which-the-fire-of-global-warming-burns
  • https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/investor-relations/larry-fink-ceo-letter
  • Microsoft's program https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2020/01/16/microsoft-will-be-carbon-negative-by-2030/
    • Vox's coverage https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2020/7/30/21336777/microsoft-climate-change-goals-negative-emissions-technologies
  • Apple's program, see their 2020 progress report https://www.apple.com/environment/
  • https://sustainability.google/projects/ppa/
  • Economist on businesses and climate change
  • A quick explainer about net zero from Grist

Great things to subscribe to for ongoing perspective

• Twitter accounts:
  • https://twitter.com/hausfath
  • https://twitter.com/Peters_Glen
  • https://twitter.com/RARohde
• Podcast series: https://www.myclimatejourney.co/
• Best climate-specific news site: https://www.carbonbrief.org/