I work on climate software at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory[1]. My team works with big data and visualization. We support ACME[2] (the Department of Energy's climate modeling program), PCMDI[3] (a team that's been evaluating climate models since 1989), and a number of other projects and groups.<p>If you are interested in what <i>you</i> can do for the climate, we need all the help we can get. Our code may not be the epitome of hygiene (think decades-old python with docstrings that haven't been touched in that long), but in the time I've been here we've gotten loads better. All of our code lives on github ([4] and [5]), we have way more funding than we know what to do with, and we have more work to do than people to do it.<p>If you're interested, shoot me an email (in my profile). I'm still hunting for the job application link.<p>EDIT: Job link found! <a href="http://careers-ext.llnl.gov/jobs/4494026-software-developers--2" rel="nofollow">http://careers-ext.llnl.gov/jobs/4494026-software-developers...</a> Don't worry about all of the skills listed, it's a generic one. Feel free to shoot me an email if you have any questions.<p>[1]: <a href="https://www.llnl.gov" rel="nofollow">https://www.llnl.gov</a>
[2]: <a href="http://climatemodeling.science.energy.gov/projects/accelerated-climate-modeling-energy" rel="nofollow">http://climatemodeling.science.energy.gov/projects/accelerat...</a>
[3]: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_for_Climate_Model_Diagnosis_and_Intercomparison" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Program_for_Climate_Model_Diag...</a>
[4]: <a href="https://github.com/ESGF" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/ESGF</a>
[5]: <a href="https://github.com/UV-CDAT" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/UV-CDAT</a>
I did considerable research into jobs where I would have the opportunity to help with climate change while I was a freelancer. I came up with a short list of companies, evaluated on a somewhat subjective basis of "effectiveness". (I read an essay by Bill Gates where he explained his investment strategies to "making the world a better place" were based on applying financial input where it had the most leverage.)<p>Most of the companies were here in the Netherlands, one was in the USA. I applied to them all, and got 3 interviews. I ended up choosing a utility startup called Vandebron based in Amsterdam.<p>Vandebron (<a href="https://vandebron.nl/" rel="nofollow">https://vandebron.nl/</a>) means "from the source" in Dutch. They're an AirBNB-style marketplace for renewable energy. Customers choose the supplier ("generator") they want to buy their energy from. They're growing quickly!<p>I've been there a little less than 3 weeks, and I feel like it's the best career decision I've ever made. I've never felt so motivated before. I encourage anyone wanting to join the effort against climate change to dig deep. Find the company you think will make the most impact. Get yourself in the door. Most companies are happy to find talented IT people.
Bret Victor has provided a first principles approach to solving climate change. I work at SolarCity we take a similar systems thinking approach and tackle the problems at their fundamental level. We have been vertically integrating the business from manufacturing highest efficiency solar panels, mounting systems that enable fast installation, electrical systems that can work with the grid, financing for homeowners that don't require any downpayment.<p>Our Software engineering team specifically works on improving efficiency of our sales workflow, geo spatial systems that support our installation crew, grid systems that monitor and work with the grid, and providing the best experience for our customers.<p>I'm happy to talk to anyone who is interested in joining us. Shoot me an email at mkumaraswamy@solarcity.com<p>Our career's page: <a href="http://solar.solarcity.com/careers/software-engineering/" rel="nofollow">http://solar.solarcity.com/careers/software-engineering/</a>
Great piece. I was thinking: "what programmers can do?" And came up with the "use compiled languages" answer.<p>I compare Ruby and Haskell, as that's what I have experience with; but I expect it to hold true for any Ruby/Python/Java/etc vs C/C++/Haskell/Go/Rust/etc shootout.<p>Just some typical numbers:<p>Disk space to house one app deployment: 800MB Ruby/Rails vs 80MB Haskell/Yesod.
Memory consumption of one instance: 350MB Ruby/Rails vs <1MB Haskell/Yesod.
Time (CPU bound) needed for a request: 80ms Ruby/Rails vs 8ms Haskell/Yesod.
Startup time of app: 30sec Ruby/Rails vs <1sec Haskell/Yesod.<p>Especially for large scale apps this makes a difference. Just through metal at it, is not a sustainable answer. The Googles and FBs know this; and they compile a lot.<p>I think going compiled is going green with your software in many cases; especially on scale.
I'm disappointed that the one item most accessible to the software/consumer-electronics world: telecommuting, doesn't appear much in the article.<p>Giving people the tools to properly manage a remote team (including non-experts that are unaccustomed to remoting) is something we can do and that will take commuters off the roads.
This is really awesome, both layout wise and for it's data visualizations. I'm a huge fan of Brett's work and this seems like it fits right in with his other exposes.<p>That said, anything that doesn't discuss the global shipping industry (or more abstractly, emissions due to globalized trade), nuclear power, <i>and</i> solutions for developing countries* is missing more than half of the discussion (I'd personally argue it's almost missing the entire forest for a couple of trees). I'd be very careful to follow any conclusions or suggestions that don't factor any of that in.<p>* This is the biggest annoyance for me when climate change is discussed in general. Moving the US and other developed countries to clean/renewable energy is mostly a matter of time and money. But developing countries like, say, India, have neither the money, infrastructure, or time to do so (not even broaching the fact that some don't even have the human rights framework to maintain an environmentally sustainable economy). Furthermore there's a moral issue, in that US/China led development essentially set the stage for global climate change. Is it morally acceptable to punish developing countries for following the same route? Fossil fuels are essentially the only way these companies can begin to compete... and after all it's the developed countries that took us, at a dead sprint, to the edge of the cliff.
I look at the human-caused part of climate change as a billion or so smaller and easier-to-solve (but still hard) problems. Each one of these billions of problems is a person like you and me who acts without truly knowing what they are doing. Not in the sense of faking our way through life, but that we have only a superficial awareness of the consequences of our habitual or culturally-driven actions. This makes climate change an information problem, and technologists do information splendidly.<p>It's an information problem because we base much of our behavior on feedback loops. When we get a big electricity bill, we take a closer look and perhaps rely less on our heaters or air-conditioner. When we see the odometer on our car hitting big numbers too soon (and repair bills looming), perhaps we look into a job closer to home. There's thousands of examples, many of which have an impact our our environment.<p>So if we focused on developing a tool whose sole purpose was to give us quantified feedback on the consequences of our actions - much like how we use utility bills - we might be able to make a real dent in the big problem of climate change and others like it. We already have the pieces for a tool like this (Internet, computers everywhere, software libraries) along with the skills of technologists, so what's needed is the vision and the demand.<p>I recently wrote these ideas in long form: (<a href="https://medium.com/@SteveHazel/we-re-drowning-in-low-quality-information-cf9566d407a9#.v3nzyp18m" rel="nofollow">https://medium.com/@SteveHazel/we-re-drowning-in-low-quality...</a>)
While I don't really agree with the premise, my initial impression is that this should get ten upvotes for being so well reasoned and executed. Amazing work, I'm confident a lot of good will come of it.<p>One recommendation, at your earliest convenience do something about this:<p>> I didn’t mention nuclear because I don’t know much about it.
The best you can do is lobby for denser development and ending the rules that force a suburban character. Suburbs are more wasteful than cities. Riding a bike to work generates less pollution than a car. Buildings themselves are more efficiently insulated when it's 100 units on a block vs. 100 single family homes on 50 acres. Deliveries can use more efficient and less polluting forms of transport, such as rail, more often or for more of the trip. Delivery trucks can stop on the block<p>While that's going on, lobbying for a carbon tax would be a great way to lower emissions from industrial or other sources.
I'll probably get downvoted but I'm honestly interested in some thoughts on my dumb thinking.<p>This is an amazing presentation and I've loved Bret Victor's other presentations but, and I'm making an assumption here, I kind of assume he's rich or at least financially independent given where he's worked and when he worked there. Assuming I'm right I find it a little hard to listen to the advice which sometimes sounds like "Consider saving the planet but with a high possibility of a financially challenged life. I've already made my money so I'm free to give you this advice in comfort and security".<p>Of course that doesn't mean you can't get rich following one of these solutions. It also doesn't mean that money = happiness or anything like that. It's only this nagging feeling that the reader is being asked to sacrifice something the author themselves has not and that the author has forgotten where they are in their lives relative to most of the people they are asking.<p>If I knew all my financial needs (health care, retirement, family) were already well met I'd have less trouble dedicating my time to worthy causes like say Bill Gates apparently is. But, I'm not there yet. I do have to worry how I will retire, how much I'll need to spent on healthcare as I age, etc... Sure I can still make the decision to chase financial independence or chase worthy causes but it's just, I guess maybe the word is frustrating, to be asked to make that choice but someone who I assume doesn't need to choose. They've already achieved financial Independence and therefore the choice is far easier. (maybe one more reason for basic income).<p>I'm also aware it sounds stupid to even bring this topic up. There's all kinds of ways to frame this and ignore the part of it I just mentioned. But, for whatever reason I can't ignore it. I guess because I've seen my father too old to get an engineering job he's qualified for and too poor to retire.
(1) This is great.<p>(2) Political economy is a much bigger issue right now than technology. Most of what we need to do is deploy, and the tech we have is good enough for that.<p>(3) Low-hanging fruit for self-identified "Technologists" is to reconsider some of the blind spots caused by their social identities. David Roberts explains:<p><a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9214015/tech-nerds-politics" rel="nofollow">http://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9214015/tech-nerds-politics</a>
This is a masterpiece. I'm excited and overwhelmed after briefly skimming through it.<p>I'm looking forward to the hours it will take me to work through this web page and its hyperlinks.
Buy iron, dump in ocean. (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_fertilization" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_fertilization</a>) Donate to geoengineering efforts and lobbying against insane moratoriums against geoengineering efforts.
>Here’s an opinion you might not hear much — I feel that one effective approach to addressing climate change is contributing to the development of Julia. Julia is a modern technical language, intended to replace Matlab, ...<p>Well that was awkward transition.
Interacting with that graph of world carbon emissions and gradually realizing what it is showing me. Stuff of nightmares (and fantastic interaction design).
On a fundamental level, one can learn the discipline of systems thinking. Permaculture is an example of systems thinking with the ethics of Earth Care, People Care, & Fair Share.<p>It may also help you become a more effective & well rounded technologist.
>Climate change is the problem of our time, it’s everyone’s problem, and most of our problem-solvers are assuming that someone else will solve it.<p>I would change that to say, "Climate change is a problem that will always be 50 years away".
I have a controversial opinion on this topic: I don't think it is morally ethical to use inefficient languages in high duty-cycle applications. By "high duty-cycle applications" I specifically refer to environments which consistently consume the bulk of available CPU resources: big web servers, caching intermeddiate servers, etc. The common rationale is to trade off engineering time for CPU time. But that trade also means trading engineering time for carbon emissions, too.
Honestly, reading even a little bit of this article leads to the conclusion that the only solution is to switch to nuclear energy as our primary source of energy.<p>I'm sorry, but wind kites or wind blimps aren't going to substantially affect carbon emissions.
I still think that in addition to storage work needs to be done with super conductors in order to one day circle the earth with various power lines that fed from where energy is being produced to being used where generation is currently lacking. Before writing it off, it would not have been that long ago that wrapping the world in cables for communication would have been seen as a pipe dream either.<p>I am not a fan of the idea of lithium or current tech batteries being stacked in mass. I just think that there would be bigger environmental concerns long term with these as servicing is a big issue.<p>Still as a technologist two things.
First never consider the science of the climate as settled. As soon as you do you close so many doors in your own mind that you will hamper yourself.
Second realize the one big area we are truly short on isn't the technology but the people who can service it. From electricians, hydraulic engineers, and mechanical. Get people interested in those careers too. For many who might not have the technical chops to create such systems many more are far more capable of maintaining them
This is well-done, but I wish such treatments spent more effort establishing that climate change projections are (a) reliable and (b) catastrophic. Those two points are the essence of the case, and yet they're usually just assumed. (Note that whether climate-change is anthropogenic or not is utterly beside the point. That so much attention is paid to this peripheral issue is a major red flag.)
I still like Burt Rutan's take on the AGW question (<a href="http://rps3.com/Files/AGW/EngrCritique.AGW-Science.v4.3.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://rps3.com/Files/AGW/EngrCritique.AGW-Science.v4.3.pdf</a>).<p>He looks at it as an engineer, using generally-accepted data. His conclusion is that the alarmists are wrong.
If you're an engineer and you want to help enable sustainable deployment of solar power infrastructure, my company Genability is hiring for all kinds of roles right now. <a href="http://genability.com/careers/work_with_us.html" rel="nofollow">http://genability.com/careers/work_with_us.html</a>
I'd think there are better sources for reading about climate change than an author one who must admit "I didn’t mention nuclear because I don’t know much about it."
The model-driven section (ability to write models, publish models, and for them to become the standard for public decision making) is important to me and I am working on solving it through the Beaker Notebook, an environment for data modeling, visualization, communication, and publication.<p>Check out <a href="http://BeakerNotebook.com" rel="nofollow">http://BeakerNotebook.com</a> and especially <a href="https://pub.beakernotebook.com/#/publications" rel="nofollow">https://pub.beakernotebook.com/#/publications</a><p>The final step of making authoring and execution work in the cloud is still under development...
Fantastic article with so much information.. I feel humbled when I see how much work people put into these things and how great the result looks like !<p>Haven't read it all yet and forgive me if I'm repeating what's already mentioned there, but I would also add the following..<p>I think that climate change is the consequence of people <i>doing</i> too much X.
One way to curb it would be for people to do <i>less</i> X or do (more) Y instead.
No governments, no grants, you and me - the people, aka users.<p>But that involves changing the people's behaviour, which is very hard. Or is it ?
Well, advertising works quite well and we've become very good at manipulating and determining people to do (buy) all kinds of things.<p>What if we used all that ad tech and all that exposure that tech corporations have and implement a global 'climate change' propaganda ?<p>This can be done starting tomorrow.<p>Microsoft Windows popping up an alert "Do you really need all your lights on in your house ?"<p>Facebook wall containing ads encouraging people to be less wasteful, respect nature and think about the future (we can do incredibly cool ads nowadays!).<p>iPhones displaying "plant a tree !" on the home screen with the button to actually schedule it in the calendar.<p>Google search returning a 'sponsored' link to climate-healing projects ...<p>There's so much, we, the tech people working at the big corps can do <i>today</i> .. We don't need startups for that, we already have most of the eyeballs of the planet in our operating systems, social networks or search engines.<p>It's a matter of delivering the right information and people will follow. We all want to do this, regardless of country or race or religion.<p>So, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple , etc - why not allocate 1% of your UIs to fixing the climate ?<p>You can reach everyone on the planet and we are ready to do it, just give us some pointers, remind us to do the good stuff and we will, because that's how advertising works !<p>I'd happily discuss this more, so let me know if anyone's interested ;).
I like the increasing focus on climate change but what about any one of of the other really damaging things we are doing? Acid Mine drainage, for one, is heavily related to the tech world with the ever growing demand for more materials to build our hardware.<p>Let's figure out how to build electronics & devices in a manner that enables systemic recycling and has more reasonable power costs. As it is, we just bury our old tech under a pile of trash and go mine some more. That is not a sustainable or in my opinion, sane, practice.
The simple answer to the question is to create source of power and distribution that are cheaper, easier, and as reliable as gas, oil, and coal. Add to that a cheap solution to remove carbon from the air and oceans and you solve the problem. Anything that requires sacrifice of the first world or impedes the third world's progress is not going to be adopted.<p>Swing for the fences since we need the homerun.
Develop products and technologies that are better for the environment while at the same time more attractive than what it replaces. People don't want to sacrifice: they want better. So real change is about better alternatives.<p>You need a long planning horizon. Be prepared to spend decades for the problems that matter.
I actually believe 'climate change' is a type of cover for geopolitical issues related to the petrodollar. I believe that humans affect the climate, but the real scientific basis for that being the primary driver of climate change isn't there. But they are using 'da earf is melting' as a substitute for another truth that is just as scary.<p>That truth is that the United States and its closest allies use about twice as much fossil fuel as the rest of the countries, and being able to continue that is completely dependent upon a massive military campaign that stretches thinner as the years go by.<p><a href="https://www.mtholyoke.edu/~paul20i/classweb/AFP2008/middleastmap.jpg" rel="nofollow">https://www.mtholyoke.edu/~paul20i/classweb/AFP2008/middleas...</a><p>Technologists can work on education and preventing the spread of war propaganda, which is rampant in Western television and media. Notice how the terrorists always seem to be loudly explaining which currently most strategic middle east country they come from.<p>If you want to believe the main problem is just that 'da earf is melting' or climate change or whatever, the root of the problem is still fossil fuel dependency.<p>The massive amount of fuel used for moving 3,000 pound vehicles to and from offices everyday, for work that probably 75% or more can be done over the internet with Skype or whatever, is the most obvious low-hanging fruit.<p>Another thing is, as the dollar hegemony fades, what replaces it, and what sort of conflict arises during that transition? Something like bitcoin might be a good alternative to WWIII.<p>We can also look toward alternative technological frameworks for society that support decentralization. Named-data networking, IPFS, Ethereum, etc.<p>Suburbia is a prime target for reform. Here is my idea: <a href="https://runvnc.github.io/tinyvillage/" rel="nofollow">https://runvnc.github.io/tinyvillage/</a>
Do you find that navigation in the middle annoying, specially since user has to scroll to find it again. Content is great but design didn't quite do justice to the research.
Many workplaces are built in suburban wastelands. Perhaps if enough people refused to work in such a hostile-to-any-mode-other-than-car environment, that might help.
Build mining robots. Those robots can mine olivine, crush the rocks, and spread it all over the oceans. We can offset all human CO2 emissions with this method.
re: "Coordination (consuming when?)"<p>Z-Wave already has ADR (Automated Demand Response) capabilities. <a href="http://z-wavealliance.org/energy-management/" rel="nofollow">http://z-wavealliance.org/energy-management/</a><p>So the protocol (OpenADR2.0a) is defined, the messaging is available (from a DRAS), and the consumer client is listening (Z-Wave). We just need more appliances to build ADR integrations to Z-Wave.
I always wonder who might invest in and how much CO² could be saved by bringing the Americas to 230V.
Due to half the voltage, the current needs to be doubled for the same power at 110V leading to much higher losses due to resistance (U=I*R²).
I've asked this question a few times but haven't really gotten a satisfactory answer. There are a lot of what I might call "epic problems" out there. Malaria, homelessness, HIV, refugees, war, climate change, income inequality, gender inequality, hate crimes.<p>I don't know anything about creating vaccines or cures for malaria or HIV. I don't have a degree in social work or behavior science. I don't have any experience with economics outside of personal investment and filing my income tax paperwork each year. I don't have billions of dollars to fund a company to focus on these things.<p>I make a small salary relative to what's required for these things and have very limited knowledge.<p>I'm a programmer and a manager. So how do I contribute to these problems? How can I take the skills I have and get homeless people the help they need? How do I take my web development skills and reduce income inequality? How do I help stop the next Trayvon Martin incident?<p>I have no idea. This article goes into great detail about climate change, but I finished reading it and still have no idea. I don't even know where to start.
Technologist can do approximately the same thing about the climate change, that our Sun can do about the average temperature in the Milky Way. Keep calm and carry on! Humanity is not a geological force on this planet.<p>UPD: Lovely stockpile of relevant information though. But I have a better one <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfeytbHBPFM" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfeytbHBPFM</a>. Snows always melt. Look at glaciology data, dudes!
First determine the ideal temperature and climate conditions. Then, if the ideal is cooler than the current temp, wear the same clothes twice as long between washings; if the ideal is warmer than the current temp, wear them half as many times. But I cannot overstate the importance of Step 1 before taking a potentially irreversible action. Coup de Grace: Apply the same calculus to your every energy-consuming/heat-generating activity, and lather/rinse/repeat (metaphorically).