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Andrew MacDougall

@ahmacdougall.bsky.social
4.5K followers 558 following 641 posts

Canadian Climate Scientist from Nova Scotia, specializing in Zero Emissions Commitment, carbon budgets, permafrost carbon, and biogeochemical feedbacks to climate change.

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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 22h
Electric heavy trucks used to haul coal. The China paradox incarnate. “The roads in this part of Shaanxi province are filled with big rigs ferrying coal from mines to railheads. More and more of them are, like Qu’s, battery-operated” www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...
bloomberg.com
China Has an 18-Wheel Answer to Soaring Global Diesel Prices
Around a third of trucks sold in China this year will run on electricity, furthering Beijing’s goal of bolstering energy security.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
This is sad news. I used to read Climate Progress during my MSc before I switched from Glaciology to Earth System modeling. Maybe our time is the darkness before the dawn. But it makes me sad that the generation that rang the alarm will not live to see the turning of the tide.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
www.youtube.com/watch?v=isLW...
youtube.com
Your Boss Who Has AI Psychosis
YouTube video by Ryan George
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Chinese state oil company announces 2025 was probably peak Chinese oil demand. A glimmer of hope after a hard summer. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
bloomberg.com
China’s Oil Demand ‘Very Likely’ Peaked Last Year, Sinopec Says
China’s oil demand probably peaked last year, earlier than previous estimates, according to the head of the nation’s top refiner.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
Only took a few generations but looks like Labrador energy has finally been figured out. A lot of bad blood to get past but we might finally be there.
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Chris Bataille @chrisbataille.bsky.social · 17/08/2026
This is a big, good deal, building the Labrador Trough to Sept-Isle resource and industrial electrification corridor. I don't see anything in it about FN participation, but I'm guessing this is baked into the deal. www.canada.ca/en/natural-r...
canada.ca
Prime Minister Carney announces the largest clean energy investment in North American history - Canada.ca
On August 17, 2026, the Prime Minister, Mark Carney, alongside the Premier of Québec, Christine Fréchette, the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador, Tony Wakeham, and the CEOs of Hydro-Québec and Newf...
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Justin Ling @justinling.ca · 17/08/2026
We're less than 48 hours before Trump's new 50% tariffs take effect — and Canadian negotiators are still trying to talk the White House out of it. But at a certain point, I argue, we just need to tell Trump to get bent. www.thestar.com/opinion/star...
thestar.com
Justin Ling: Carney’s best move in trade negotiations with Trump is so simple it fits on a bumper sticker
Canadians need to accept that we may not strike a genuine deal with the U.S. — but all is not lost.
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Margaret Killjoy @margaret.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
i have lived among mountains older than bones there is a beauty and fire to youth, but I will rest on stone older than trees on hills that watched the rings of saturn as they were born
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Zeke Hausfather @zekehausfather.com · 10/08/2026
With all August model runs now in (except for SINTEX-F), we now expect this year's El Niño event to peak sometime between October and December at a stunning 4C in the Niño3.4 region. To see all the latest numbers, check out the Climate Dashboard: dashboard.theclimate...
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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Time Traveler Causes of Death xkcd.com/2976/
A modified XKCD comic titled "TOP CAUSES OF DEATH FOR TIME TRAVELERS BY GEOLOGIC ERA:" features a tall, vertical rectangle representing Earth's timeline from its formation down to the present day. Along the left axis, tick marks indicate time intervals from "EARTH FORMS" at the top down through "4 BILLION YEARS AGO," "3 BILLION YEARS AGO," "2 BILLION YEARS AGO," "1 BILLION YEARS AGO," "500 MILLION YEARS AGO," and ending at "NOW" at the bottom. The vertical column is divided into stacked sections labeling the leading cause of death for each period: beginning at the top with "LAVA," followed by a section for "ASPHYXIATION," a thin band for "METEORS," a large section for "ASPHYXIATION," an even larger block spanning roughly 2.2 billion to 700 million years ago labeled "SLIGHTLY SLOWER ASPHYXIATION," and then smaller bands near the bottom labeled "FREEZING," "STARVING," "EATEN BY FISH," "TRAMPLED," and "EATEN BY MAMMALS." Next to the very bottom sliver representing the present day, an arrow points to the text "HIT BY SUV."
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 04/08/2026
And it's happening all over.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
As someone who grew up on a farm vertical farming has always been an idea that bugs me more than almost anything else. Sunlight is free, electricity expensive! Land in cities is expensive, so is building multi-story buildings filled with way or soil! There is no way this could ever make sense!
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
rdcu.be/fvHdS My News & Views Piece accompanying newly published Nature Climate Change paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
rdcu.be
Less than net zero needed to stabilize climate
Nature Climate Change - Global temperature change over long times after cessation of greenhouse gas emissions is not well constrained. Now, research shows a consistent global cooling, especially if...
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 17/07/2026
thebeaverton.com/2026/07/nova...
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
Well this is getting genuinely alarming.
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Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 06/07/2026
Types of Tornado Alert xkcd.com/3267/
8-panel Comic. (1) Tornado Warning [tornado in the distance of a house] A tornado has been detected; take shelter (2) Tornado Watch [Person with bun talking to another person pointing at diagrams on screen] Conditions are favorable for tornadoes to form (3) Tornado precaution [person] Tornadoes happen sometimes, so be ready (4) Tornado Inkling [Person with hand on face] No tornadoes yet, but we have a feeling (5) Tornado Suspicion [Person looking up at clouds] Weird clouds have been observed (6) Tornado Premonition [Person looking at birds flying in tornado shape and two birds sitting on scythe-like structure with skull beneath] Tornado portents and omens have been observed (7) Tornado Recollection [Person with thought bubble containing tornado] Tornadoes have occurred in the past (8) Tornado Contemplation [Person sitting and saying, “Wow.”] Tornadoes are very big and powerful
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 06/07/2026
Well that looks bleak.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 28/06/2026
www.wired.com/story/china-...
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Technology Connections @techconnectify.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
OK, so just as I have to yell at my fellow Americans "air conditioners *are* heat pumps!" to combat basic ignorance of what the tech actually is, Europeans need to hear "heat pumps *are* air conditioners" because y'all are making arguments which don't make sense if you see why heat pumps are good.
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Abbey @abbeyarletto.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
When reality surpasses fiction! Top: fictional forecast for August 2050, broadcast by French TV in 2014 to warn about the consequences of global warming. Bottom: Real French forecast for yesterday, June 22, 2026.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 15/06/2026
Lunacy. I wonder how much of history was negotiations like this. Some old warrior king who took too many hits to the head. With everything later rationalized by historians.
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Norman J. Steinert @njsteinert.bsky.social · 12/06/2026
Many climate models omit the permafrost carbon–climate feedback. In this new paper we show that inlcuding it can increase Earth system tipping risks, especially in overshoot scenarios with peak temperatures below 3°C or peak cumulative emissions of below 2000 PgC. iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...
iopscience.iop.org
Permafrost carbon–climate feedback amplifies Earth system tipping risks
Permafrost carbon–climate feedback amplifies Earth system tipping risks, Steinert, Norman J, Munday, Gregory, Sandstad, Marit, Sanderson, Benjamin M, Wunderling, Nico
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
“Looking at all industries, the researchers found Canada’s TFP grew.08 per cent annually between 2000 and 2018. With the oil industry excluded from the data, the TFP growth ballooned eightfold to .65 per cent.” news.mcmaster.ca/over-a-barre...
news.mcmaster.ca
Over a barrel: Canada's oil industry is a drain on productivity, research shows
Canada's economy is growing at a healthy rate, but heavy investments in the Canadian oil industry in the past two decades have skewed productivity figures typically used as indicators of growth. [...]...
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Randall Munroe @xkcd.com · 10/06/2026
Nostalgia Content xkcd.com/3256/
Comic. [Person in front of images of pogs, a Tamagotchi, and huge fungal tower over mossy ground.] PERSON: Who else remembers pogs? Tamagotchis? Vast forests of prototaxites towering over the mossy landscape as armored fish stir in the deep? [caption] Due to a database error, millennial nostalgia now includes a portion of the Early Devonian.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
Where else was one supposed to shelter from the wind when they threw you outside for recess at -20C? We used to be able to fit 3 kids in one of those tires.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 30/05/2026
“Everybody who met him, even if they met him briefly, seemed to remember him forever," About sums it up. RIP Andy, you were one of a kind.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 24/05/2026
These nuts are going to be a problem for a long while unfortunately. They have already started scaring away any non O&G capital from Alberta (Vancouver is to Calgary as Toronto was to Montreal), so they have destroyed any chance of a smoothish post oil future.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 17/05/2026
A lot of competition for most insane headline of the Trump era, but we may have a winner.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 03/05/2026
Made it to Vienna for #EGU26! It’s been 3 years since I attended in person. Kind of forgot about all the smoking.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 29/04/2026
“These small EVs aren't available for sale in American showrooms - and may never be - but for about the price of ​an average new car in the U.S., a consumer in China could buy all five of these EVs.”
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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 29/04/2026
Send this to anyone who complains about high gas prices.
reuters.com
For the average price of a car in the US, you could buy 5 new Chinese EVs
The Beijing Auto Show that opened to the public this week is a showcase for how hypercompetition in China has driven new car prices in the world's largest car market to ​a fraction of the level of the...
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 25/04/2026
We are likely to be hearing a lot more about the “freedom of the seas”. As a legal principle, today, it frames decisions not just about the global economy, but also about war and peace, migration and political asylum, and climate-driven expansion of the world’s oceans. Those who invoke this principle might remember not just how it entered international law, in the service of Europe’s conquests in the Indian Ocean, but also that those same waters contain other histories of freedom, grounded in principles of hospitality, rather than the capacity to bully and bomb one’s enemies into submission.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
Sometimes ‘overcapacity’ is just prescience.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 22/04/2026
sustainabilitydigitalage.org/featured/nat...
sustainabilitydigitalage.org
Nature-based Climate Solutions – 7 must-knows for effective implementation
Nature-basedClimate Solutions must-knowsfor effectiveimplementation Purpose Nature-based climate solutions, or NbCS, are actions to preserve and enhance carbon storage in natural or managed ecosystems...
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 19/04/2026
ember-energy.org/latest-insig...
ember-energy.org
The New Twin Fossil Shock | Ember
How the energy crises of the 2020s speed up the electric age
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ClimateBook @climatebook.bsky.social · 15/04/2026
Some simple truths about methane vs. CO2. I've said this before, in various ways, in various peer reviewed papers, but I keep repeating it with variations hoping the message will get through somehow. (1) CO2 accumulates in the atmosphere. If you introduce a new CO2 emission source into the system
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Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · 07/04/2026
#Artemis II lunar flyby images are showing up! 😍 A crescent Earth setting behind the Moon.
Earthset captured through the Orion spacecraft window at 6:41 p.m. EDT, April 6, 2026, during the Artemis II crew’s flyby of the Moon. A muted blue Earth with bright white clouds sets behind the cratered lunar surface. The dark portion of Earth is experiencing nighttime. On Earth’s day side, swirling clouds are visible over the Australia and Oceania region.  In the foreground, Ohm crater has terraced edges and a flat floor interrupted by central peaks. Central peaks form in complex craters when the lunar surface, liquefied on impact, splashes upwards during the crater’s formation.
[alt text from NASA]
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 02/04/2026
Well that was cool. Didn’t know how much I’d be afraid the rocket would blow up. I think I’ve watched too many Challenger Documentaries. Good luck and god’s speed to Jeremy Hansen and the other astronauts!
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Chris Bataille @chrisbataille.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
IMO the clean energy transition will start moving fast now, but while it will be a gentle ride for some economies, it's going to cut like a buzz-saw through through those that chose to delay and lock-in structural fossil fuel dependency. This will be masked by a brief burst in revenues for sellers.
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
The timescale on this figure really bugs me. What is ‘historical’ supposed to mean? Clearly not supposed to be written history since that starts in the Bronze Age. Did they rename the Common Era “Historical” is some deranged compromise?
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
I’ve never wanted to read the ethics board approval for a study more than this: www.newscientist.com/article/2517... Also drives home the fact that neurons are not Universal Turing Machines.
newscientist.com
Human brain cells on a chip learned to play Doom in a week
Neuron-powered computer chips can now be easily programmed to play a first-person shooter game, bringing biological computers a step closer to useful applications
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
A reminder that the rapture is considered theological nonsense by almost all Christian denominations, and is a belief confined to some branches of American Protestantism.
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Jordan Carlson @jordantcarlson.bsky.social · 01/03/2026
Finally, an advertisement that doesn't suck. www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4Up...
youtube.com
A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator
YouTube video by Forbrukerrådet - Norwegian Consumer Council
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Laura Estill @lauraestill.bsky.social · 23/02/2026
Why does the Nova Scotia government want to cost universities hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of dollars? Why have they spent almost half a million dollars on an American consulting firm? Find out more tonight! Online town hall (zoom link on linked page below) cocogov.org/blog/townhall/
Image with purple text in a white box on yellow background
Text:
Townhall: Protecting Post Secondary Education in Nova Scotia
A Conversation about Provincially Mandated Program Reviews and Bill 12
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 30/01/2026
www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtQ9...
youtube.com
You are being misled about renewable energy technology.
YouTube video by Technology Connections
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 28/01/2026
The great gift of a classical Earth Science education. All data is best displayed as a ternary diagram 🙂
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
Even more evidence that Syphilis originated in the Americas. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
science.org
A 5500-year-old Treponema pallidum genome from Sabana de Bogotá, Colombia
Treponematosis, a bacterial infection caused by Treponema pallidum subspecies and T. carateum (yaws, bejel, syphilis, pinta), has afflicted humans for millennia. Despite paleopathological evidence and...
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
Well that was blunt. “ We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false. That the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient... And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.”
cbc.ca
Read Mark Carney's full speech on middle powers navigating a rapidly changing world | CBC News
Read the full text of Prime Minister Mark Carney's speech about a shakeup of the global order and role of middle powers at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
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Jordan Carlson @jordantcarlson.bsky.social · 18/01/2026
A BYD Plant in Oshawa will create a 1000 Year Laurentian Elite Victory
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Andrew MacDougall @ahmacdougall.bsky.social · 17/01/2026
www.thebeaverton.com/2026/01/cana...
thebeaverton.com
Canada chooses lawful evil over chaotic evil
“We looked around for a neutral evil country to trade with, but couldn’t find one.” Luke and the Panel (Ian MacIntyre, Clare Blackwood and Nile Seguin) talk about the horrific ICE shooting of Renee Go...
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