Patrick Mazza

I can’t say I find these days easy to take. Some days I wake with a sense of dread, not sure what the day will bring. These four touchstones help me navigate, and find shards of sunlight in the dark skies. I hope they help you, my readers, as we ready ourselves for the days ahead.

China has its own fate in its hands, as well as the rest of the world. We can hope it will take the needed actions that will give us a fighting chance to hold at 1.5°C, or near it.

This is not the time to sink into despair, but to acknowledge how much we have accomplished on climate. And how many avenues we have to continue making progress in our cities and states, communities and bioregions. Let’s be thankful for what we have done, and get ready to roll up our sleeves to do more.

We need to act where we can most effectively act now, in our communities and bioregions, cities and states. We’re only going to make it working together, building the future in place.

Scientists have issued yet another clarion call regarding our seemingly unstoppable momentum toward climate catastrophe. In a recent article, The 2024 state of the climate report: Perilous times on planet Earth, some of the world’s leading climate scientists lay it out.

The problems afflicting our world sometimes seem intractable. We have the greatest leverage to make change in the places where we live. Let’s use it.