Bret Victor complained on Twitter that technologists were wasting their imaginations, energy and talent on things that wouldn’t matter after climate change reduced the world to a drowned cinder; his followers pushed back and asked what they, as technologists, could do about climate change.
In response, Victor’s produced an incredible, exhaustive, insightful andattainable list of projects that technologists can address in their work to mitigate climate change and build a better world. Even better, Victor’s list is full of potentially profitable ideas that nerds can raise money for (“there are basically only two scenarios for investors as a collective: (a) invest in clean energy immediately; clean energy takes over the $6 trillion global energy market; investors get a nice piece of that; or (b) don’t invest in clean energy immediately; fossil fuels burn past our carbon budget; investors inherit a cinder”).
Victor builds on the work of Macarthur Genius winner Saul Griffith, whowrote a still-essential series of posts on the subject for us in 2009. He breaks his suggestions into seven categories: Funding, Producing Energy, Moving Energy, Consuming Energy, Tools for Scientists and Engineers, Media for Understanding Situations and Other.
This is your essential read for the day. If this inspires you, read the late David MacKay’s open access, accessible engineering book Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air, the single best book about energy and climate I’ve ever read.
