Bill McKibben

Beliefs Korrents

• Korrents What they believe 21 beliefs — each backed by an exact quote.

  Each is a korrent — compiled by korrents.com, not by them: the one-line wordings are korrents', the quotes are theirs.

  Recent

  • AI data centers function mainly as a new way to sustain natural gas demand for an oil-and-gas industry facing declining gasoline demand.

    one way to understand a data center is that it's a device for burning natural gas, the latest excuse (after Ukraine and Iran) for the fuel that Big Oil is counting on to keep its business model afloat even as the world turns away from internal combustion cars and crude demand begins to drop.

    The Two Horsemen, Riding in Formation Said 15 Sept 2026

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    data centers

  • Politicians routinely underestimate how much the public cares about climate and environmental issues.

    politicians routinely underestimate the potency of this whole complex of issues.

    The Two Horsemen, Riding in Formation Said 15 Sept 2026

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  • Opposition to AI data centers is driven partly by resistance to concentrated corporate power, not only by local environmental concerns.

    it was a chance to stand up to the oligarchs and this technology they've staked their future on.

    The Two Horsemen, Riding in Formation Said 15 Sept 2026

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    data centers

  Show 18 more

  • Carbon capture technology is worth continuing to research, even though it is not yet a solution to climate change.

    It is entirely prudent to keep researching and testing carbon capture technology-someday it may be part of the solution to the greatest problem humanity has ever faced.

    Facts on the ground Said 7 Sept 2026

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  • Rapidly building out cheap solar, wind and battery capacity is currently the one climate action the world knows how to execute at scale.

    there is actually one thing we do know how to do, and that is build out lots of cheap solar, wind, and batteries.

    Facts on the ground Said 7 Sept 2026

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    solar

  • Scaling up clean energy is more effective when it is paired with retiring fossil fuel infrastructure.

    Building clean energy is much more likely, and much more effective, if we're also shutting down dirty energy.

    Facts on the ground Said 7 Sept 2026

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    energy

  • Elon Musk's political backing of anti-EV, anti-clean-energy politics has undone far more good than his earlier advocacy for electric vehicles did.

    Whatever good he did with his early advocacy for electric vehicles has now been undone a hundred times over with his advocacy for the people who hate EVs and all the other things we need.

    Two Men Said 1 Sept 2026

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    energy

  • Switching to sustainable energy is the one effective, scalable tool available to prevent catastrophic climate change.

    "Just switching to sustainable energy" is in fact the one good, scalable weapon we have to fight that

    Two Men Said 1 Sept 2026

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    energy

  • Elon Musk's dismantling of US humanitarian aid will cause millions of indirect deaths, making him one of the deadliest people in history.

    Musk's victims already number in the millions-a Lancet study predicts 14 million by 2030 as the indirect results of shutting down America's humanitarian work, which puts him up there in the Stalin/Mao category, and almost certainly the most deadly human of this millennium.

    Two Men Said 1 Sept 2026

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    America

  • The United States has become the world's biggest force pushing to keep burning fossil fuels even as the world shifts away from oil.

    in a world beginning to turn away from oil, the United States has become the biggest force trying to insure we keep pouring carbon into the atmosphere.

    The growing rumble Said 30 Aug 2026

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    energyAmerica

  • The upcoming U.S. elections are the last real chance to shift fast enough from oil and gas to solar and wind to limit global warming.

    But physics is giving us very little time now, and so the next set of elections in this country will be, I think, our last real chance to make the sea change-replacing oil and gas with sun and wind-that is our best hope for limiting warming.

    The growing rumble Said 30 Aug 2026

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    solarenergyAmerica

  • Expanding North Sea oil drilling would not reduce UK energy prices, because oil prices are set on a global market.

    This would accomplish nothing to reduce energy prices, since oil prices are set on a global market and there's not enough crude left off UK shores to influence that number.

    The growing rumble Said 30 Aug 2026

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    energy

  • Physical systems change abruptly past a threshold rather than declining gradually

    But that's not how physical systems work. You push them and then past a certain point things change.

    Reality intrudes Said 25 Aug 2026

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  • Global warming has already reached a level at which serious harm is occurring

    We have made it hot enough on this planet that things are going very wrong.

    Reality intrudes Said 25 Aug 2026

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  • Rapidly deploying renewable energy now would slow further warming rather than reverse it

    At this point it won't lower the temperature rapidly, but it could keep it from climbing rapidly.

    Reality intrudes Said 25 Aug 2026

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    energy

  • The buildout of AI data centers is part of a broader extension of oligarchic control over people's lives.

    It's clear by now that this is all part of the extension of oligarchic control over our lives.

    A year in, the data center/AI battle starts to clarify Said 21 Aug 2026

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    data centers

  • AI and the data-center buildout underlying it pose real and significant dangers to society.

    Its's clear by now that AI, and the data center development underlying it, pose real and significant dangers.

    A year in, the data center/AI battle starts to clarify Said 21 Aug 2026

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    data centers

  • The limitations of being human are what make being human worth experiencing.

    But it seems increasingly clear to me that those limitations are precisely what makes being a human so interesting.

    A year in, the data center/AI battle starts to clarify Said 21 Aug 2026

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  • Battery storage is becoming the defining transformative energy technology of the second half of the 2020s, as solar and wind were of the first half.

    Batteries are the transformative technology for the second half of this decade, as sun and wind were for the first half

    Fun with numbers Said 13 Aug 2026

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    solarenergy

  • The 'intermittent power' criticism long aimed at solar and wind now applies more truly to other energy sources, including nuclear and natural gas.

    that charge long leveled at sun and wind-that they provide "intermittent power"-is probably truer now of other energy sources

    Fun with numbers Said 13 Aug 2026

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    solarenergy

  • Windfall profits oil companies earn from wartime price spikes should be taxed.

    It would of course make great sense to tax these windfall profits, earned entirely on the back of dead Iranians and Americans, and everyone who's paying $4.50 a gallon at the pump.

    Fun with numbers Said 13 Aug 2026

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    America

  All 21 beliefs →