Hello!
The big piece of New York climate news this week comes from gorgeous Ithaca, where the city voted to electrify all their buildings by 2030. The city aims to cut its emissions by 40%, and they’re partnering with NYC’s own BlocPower to make it happen. While that may be ambitious, anyone who’s listened to Saul Griffith wax poetic about electrification knows that renovating our buildings is an essential step for a net-zero future.
Meanwhile in DC, Congress finally passed the infrastructure bill, which may or may not count as action on climate, but definitely will bring money to patch up New York. It’s certainly not enough, but it’s a start.
In this Newsletter:
We’re a little light on events and jobs this week — if you want anything listed, just hit reply.
🗽 NY Events
💥Our November NY Climate Tech Meetup
When: Wednesday, Nov 10th from 6:30pm - 9pm
Where: Loreley at 7 Rivington St.
RSVP: https://lu.ma/ny-climate-tech-november
With the colder weather and growing group, it's time to move inside!
I've booked the downstairs room at Loreley for our meetup — we'll have it to ourselves and should be easier to chat.
If this is your first time — we normally have 25-30 people, about half of whom are regulars. A lot of attendees are just looking to get into climate tech and come from a variety of backgrounds, while others are already old hands.
Once a critical mass of people have arrived, we typically do a round of intros so everyone knows who's there and what people are working on. We encourage you to thow out any asks or requests when you're doing it and to go follow up with people working on things you're interested in.
We’ll have space this time for some lightning talks, if anyone wants to present to the group for <5 minutes — let me know and we’ll set it up.
🏛 How Climate Change Impacted the Ancient World
When: Wed, Nov 10, 2021, 6:30 PM
Where: The National Arts Club at 15 Gramercy Park S.
RSVP: Free on Eventbrite
Dr. Stephen Pekar of Queens College discusses evidence that the climate change currently threatening humanity’s future should not be viewed as something unique to our era. Climate change contributed to the collapse of civilizations such as the Maya between 800-900 CE as well as earlier Bronze Age cultures.
This presentation cites results from sedimentary cores taken 50 kilometers off the coast of Antarctica which document abrupt climatic changes traceable to low latitude climate events affecting past societies.
Pekar is a Professor at the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Queens College. He has participated in four scientific expeditions to Antarctica.
🌐 Online Events
☀️ Climate Con
When: Tuesday, Nov 9th through Thursday, Nov 11th
Where: Online
RSVP: Free on the ClimateCon website
Climate Con is an online gathering for us regular people to discuss what the heck we’re going to do about climate change.
This event is organized and produced by The Regenerates and My Climate Journey, along with a passionate team of volunteers and a whole host of rad speakers and content partners.
🎥 Women in Climate Tech: Climate Migration Docu-Series Watch Party
When: Fri, Nov 12, 2021 from 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM
Where: Online
RSVP: Free on Eventbrite
Through a discussion of the Climate Refugee Stories digital humanities project, this panel explores the intersections of struggles for climate and social justice, and how interdisciplinary collaboration can contribute to climate change education.
Climate Refugee Stories is a multimedia narrative, public education, and archiving project that documents stories of people around the world displaced by the impacts of climate change and a global hardening of borders, broadly defined. The project is supported by grants from the University of California's Critical Refugee Studies Collective, National Geographic, and North Carolina Humanities.