Zion Lights

“It’s all in the game.” - The Wire A few years ago I wrote about how senior officials alleged that Russia sought to influence Western energy debates, including opposition to nuclear energy and fracking, while positioning its own gas exports as an alternative. But Germany’s story goes deeper than I had space to explore then. Who exactly shaped German energy policy, and how did one of the world’s most sophisticated economies end up so catastrophically dependent on a petrostate?

Once upon a time, I spent many hours talking and writing about climate change. Like much of the traditional environmental movement, my focus was on emphasising the scale of the problem and on arguing, implicitly or explicitly, for energy scarcity as the price of taking it seriously. So much was this my life, that my first book - published in 2015 - was about how to live with a low carbon footprint.

A recent article brief from a pro-progress media outlet (who shall not be named) asked contributors to consider whether it was “sensible” for India to build nuclear reactors in the 1970s. My first reaction was: that question is already doing a lot of work. It smuggles in a number of assumptions about what “responsible” development is supposed to look like, and who gets to define it. And that merits closer examination. Are developing countries allowed to dream?

I expected this to be bigger news. Earlier this month, Berlin endured one of its most severe power outages since the Second World War. What initially seemed like a simple infrastructure failure was soon revealed as something far more disturbing: a deliberate arson attack on a cable bridge feeding the Lichterfelde power station, destroying high-voltage cables and knocking out electricity and heating for tens of thousands of households and businesses in freezing winter conditions.

Here we go again. Anti-nuclear activists are lobbying against nuclear energy again, this time attacking small modular reactors (SMRs). Yes, they are doing this even though a substantial body of evidence shows that resistance to nuclear energy has historically led to higher carbon emissions and a greater reliance on fossil fuels.

I fell for it again. For some time now, I have felt a mounting dread about microplastics, faced with a barrage of stories warning of infertility, disease, and oceans choked with plastic - to give just a few examples - and making the problem seem ubiquitous and inescapable. Microplastics are tiny plastic particles that have either been created intentionally (like microbeads) or formed from the breakdown of larger plastics.

After many years of exploring energy and climate change, from dropping banners and giving viral interviews, to recreating memes, to publicly pivoting from one side to the other and everything in between, I am thrilled to announce that my new book, Energy is Life, is now available for pre-order. This project is the culmination of my curiosity, research, and passion for storytelling, and I’m excited to finally share it with you.

Italy’s long and complex relationship with nuclear energy is finally entering a new chapter. Once a pioneer in atomic power, the country turned its back on the technology in the wake of the 1986 Chornobyl disaster. A national referendum held the following year saw an overwhelming majority vote to abandon nuclear energy altogether, leading to the shutdown of Italy’s four operational reactors by 1990.

The UK government recently announced that the UK Space Agency (UKSA), which was set up in 2010 to centralise civil space activity, will cease to operate as an independent body by April 2026. Instead, it will be folded into the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), where it will function as a unit while keeping its name and brand.

There’s a lot going on in Canada. If you look at the headlines, Canada appears to be crushing the clean energy transition. The country already gets over 80% of its electricity from non-emitting sources, mostly hydropower. That’s a higher share than Germany, the UK, or the US. But take a closer look, and the cracks begin to show. Due to drought and extreme weather, Canada’s hydroelectric output fell significantly in 2023, contributing to a 3.9% drop in total electricity generation.