iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Dutch energy research policy in March 1974. The key question isn't scarcity, experts noted, it's the environment: "We simply cannot burn everything."

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Jan Rosenow @janrosenow.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Electricity is 23% of global final energy but delivers 37% of useful energy and powers 46% of the global economy. We don't need to replace every fossil joule. We need to replace the services. A much smaller task. Great to see the @iea.org’s new Electrification report finally measure this.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

The proposed construction of three new nuclear stations was at the heart of the parliamentary debate. Meanwhile the development of North Sea oil fields was in full swing.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Finding odd coincidences while scanning old newspapers: As Dutch parliament prepares to debate key new energy policies in October '74, a newly-built offshore ship rams into a key railway bridge near Amsterdam, hastening the bridge's replacement by a tunnel in '79.

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Kees van der Leun @sustainable2050.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Two years after its completion (after 17 years of construction, 2007-2024), France's new nuclear power plant Flamanville 3 will shut down for a year starting this coming Saturday. This to replace its faulty reactor lid and for a major first inspection. www.france24.com/fr/info-en-c...

france24.com

Nucléaire : l'EPR de Flamanville à l'arrêt samedi pour sa première inspection approfondie

L'EPR de Flamanville (Manche) va être mis à l'arrêt pour près d'un an à partir de samedi pour sa première visite complète, qui se traduira pour EDF par des milliers d'opérations dont certaines d'enver...

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

'm fascinated by this kind of no-context 1970s Dutch tv: jazz dancers in front of what looks like a refinery, part of a '77 retrospect on the oil crisis of '73.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Heading into a rapidly warming future with substantially less research to tell us how the planet is changing. This takes denial to a whole new level.

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Centre for Anthropocene History @anthropocenekth.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Join our new intensive Winter School in Planetary Histories, November 23-26 at KTH Stockholm! Application open now shorturl.at/x0KgY

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Dr Dave Hitchcock @davehitchcock.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

I'm writing a thing about history education and "AI". Myself and another came up with some 'considerations' and I was wondering what people make of them in their current form. All critique appreciated, I'm trying to get to durable and defensible positions.

"Considerations for Large Language Models and the Teaching of History
1. Education is a process, not an event. And a history education is an active process through which we seek to understand our pasts and presents. We encounter history experientially through our senses and by using our memories, and we learn to do history iteratively, through the process of producing it ourselves in various formats.
2. Generative AI models cannot ‘replace’ historical thinking so much as generate a simulacrum of thought. Their use seems to offer shortcuts to a particular outcome. These shortcuts risk the acquisition of historical skills, because they subvert or replace the core processes of ‘doing history’.
3. LLMs potentially save users time by undertaking tasks like tabulating large datasets, surfacing patterns, and computing information, so long as results are carefully checked. But such tasks are to historical research like calculations are to accounting: they might support the practice but cannot inspire critical insight or reflective thought, which are the primary aims of historical scholarship.
4. Therefore, classrooms should first train history students to locate, identify, and describe sources of information and only then to learn the skills to reflect on the selection, organisation, and mining of datasets used by LLMs. "

"5. History teaching should privilege the value of quoting accurately, citing work correctly, paraphrasing sources honestly, and marshalling arguments carefully and specifically. LLM prompt responses do not yet reliably do these things, and may never do so.
6. Unless history students can assess the selection, organisation, and algorithms that power a given LLM, they should treat its outputs as sources of uncertain provenance.
7. Use of LLMs in a history classroom should always be subject to ethical and critical scrutiny, just as with any other source of information.
8. Most widely available large-language models are commercial systems, and administrator control of their parameters, tone, capabilities, acceptable answers, and programming resides with commercial firms. Their use entails significant energy expenditure and environmental degradation. These facts place significant limits on their use and on our ability to undertake the required ethical scrutiny."

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

The Hautes Fagnes is one of the larger reserves in the Low Countries. I remember hiking around the area seven years ago, when, during a cold spell, the bogs were covered in snow and mist.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Among the terrible fires raging across Europe at the moment: the raised bogs of the Hautes Fagnes (or Hoge Venen) have been ravaged by one of the largest fires in Belgian history.

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HydrologyNL @hydrology.nl · 05/08/2026

The Rhine is at an exceptional low – a 1-in-63-year event. Worryingly, this is a pattern: 2018, 2022 and today all rank in the top-10 lowest discharges measured at Lobith since 1901. Only November 1947 saw less water. However, modern water demand is vastly higher than it was in the winter of 1947.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Once upon a time the widespread demise of forests catalyzed an environmental movement and helped push an energy transition.

With the headline “Der Wald stirbt” [“The Forest is Dying”], this 1981 Spiegel cover page, depicting gray, sulphur-spewing chimneys above a plantation pine forest, made it clear to readers that industrial byproducts, mainly sulfur dioxide emissions, were responsible for forest dieback.

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Richard Fallon @richardfallon.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

Heroic nautilus of the centre of the title page of this edition of Johann Jakob Scheuchzer's Herbarium Diluvianum. One of the all-time great book titles, that. In fact there's nothing about this I don't like.

Engraving on title page: allegorical neoclassical figures in a drenched grotto filled with crustaceans and other beached invertebrates.

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Prof Lisa Schipper 🌍🍉💪 @lisaschipper.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

This is really grim. Imagine a different world. @tninstitute.bsky.social

A slide from a presentation that describes what NATO's 3.5% spending target would pay for. NATO’s new 3.5% GDP spending goal would lead to a total military expenditure of US$13.4 trillion by 2030, a US$2.6 trillion increase above current expenditure. This can cover nearly three years worth of climate finance needs of developing countries at $1 trillion a year or pay outright for the world’s global electricity grid to be made Net Zero compatible by 2030.

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Albert Pinto @70sbachchan.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

Same. HUGE gap between experts & everyone else. This was already expert consensus 2 years ago. Now? Trump's horrible & evil war have wrecked the perception of oil & gas as stable and cheap in the decade when solar, wind, batteries, EVs are SURGING worldwide www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/daw...

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Two possibly interesting PhD positions on "submerged" and "extractive dependencies" in the context of project titled "Power, Knowledge, and Servitude at Sea" in Bonn: www.idos-research.de/en/stellen-p... and www.idos-research.de/en/about-us/...

idos-research.de

Job advertisment: Doctoral Researcher (f/m/diverse) POESIS Submerged Dependencies

The BCDSS–IDOS research group, Power, Knowledge, and Servitude at Sea (POESIS), invites applications for a Doctoral Researcher (f/m/diverse)

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Dr. Aaron Thierry @thierryaaron.bsky.social · 04/05/2026

You can get to a high-warming world without high emissions . That's the part of this week's "RCP 8.5 is implausible" discussion that's getting missed. A short thread on why the relief is premature 🧵

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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 06/05/2026

Meanwhile the California grid now boasts the equivalent of 12 nuclear power plants worth of batteries -- the total cost of which was, I suspect, less than a single nuclear plant.

insideclimatenews.org

California’s Battery Array Is as Powerful as 12 Nuclear Power Plants. Here’s What’s on the Horizon. - Inside Climate News

An expert in the state’s energy grid explains how the state is faring amid federal cuts.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Fascinating. One day, I’ll be a historian of peat and peatlands.

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Alice Milner @alicemmilner.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

Peatlands store more carbon than the world's forests yet fundamental questions remain unanswered. Today we publish 50 priority research questions, identified by 467 participants from 54 countries #PeatQuest #Peatlands www.nature.com/articles/s43...

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Rage Against the Miocene @organiccarbon.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Global peatland experts share their top 50 research needs. Many of these are obvious (better mapping) and many should be obvious (centre local and indigenous communities), but some might surprise you (there is a lot that we do not know about what the microbes in peat are up to).

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Dave Vetter @davidrvetter.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Genuine, history-making stuff. A watershed.

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Kate Mackenzie @katemac.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

This is a critical point: *today*, even in countries that don’t introduce policies & measures to support it, consumers can unilaterally enact electrification and demand destruction

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Alexander Etkind @sashaetkind.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Written about a year ago

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Gaia Vince @wanderinggaia.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

Currently 431-432 ppm

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Prof. Stefan Rahmstorf @rahmstorf.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

A reminder of where we stand. Source: ed-hawkins.github.io/climate-visu...

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

The floods also offered an analogy for the Amsterdam patrician, scholar, and insanely wealthy collector Nicolaes Witsen to conjecture about the geohistorical processes that shaped the landscape of Holland, depositing the sand, clay, and peat strata that made up the subsoil around his home town. 5/

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

In subsequent decades, these dike breaches motivated Amsterdam's government to expand its flood protections, funding vastly expensive dike construction and producing new ways of measuring and governing water, as I've learned from @davidemartino.bsky.social 4/

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Jan Asselijn, too, returned to depict the efforts at the reconstruction of the dike in Amsterdam's estuarine environment. 3/

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

Jan van Goyen and Roeland Roghman depicted the aftermath, showing the extent of the damage and the labor required to undo it. Especially Roghman's 4-part engraving is fascinating! 2/

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

In March 1651, a dike breach wreaked havoc just outside the walls of Amsterdam, inundating a whole polder. The damage was so spectacular that artists flocked to the site, documenting the disaster and its aftermath in sketches, oil paintings, and engravings. These by J. Asselijn and W. Schellinks 1/

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Prof. Stefan Rahmstorf @rahmstorf.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

The #AMOC by 2100 will thus be so weak (~8 Sv) that it is very likely on the way to full shutdown, as our study last year showed: iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1... In my view, this now makes a full #AMOC shutdown more likely than not. Definitely not a low likelihood risk, as we used to think.

iopscience.iop.org

Shutdown of northern Atlantic overturning after 2100 following deep mixing collapse in CMIP6 projections

Shutdown of northern Atlantic overturning after 2100 following deep mixing collapse in CMIP6 projections, Drijfhout, Sybren, Angevaare, Joran R, Mecking, Jennifer, van Westen, René M, Rahmstorf, Stefan

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All Our Yesterdays @allouryesterdays.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Vol. 1, no. 6 of the CO2 Newsletter, Aug-Sep 1980, is now downloadable. Founded by American geologist William Barbat, each issue was 8 pages of excerpts from recent reports, editorials and deeply researched articles. Pls comment on/share this thread! 1/9

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Samuël Kruizinga @samuelkruizinga.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Vacancy for a three-year post-doc position at the Universiteit van Amsterdam! This postdoc position, part of the European Research Council (ERC)-sponsored 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐂𝐊𝐀𝐃𝐄 project, seeks to understand the long legacies of blockades on the post-war order.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 14/04/2026

Sounds like the stuff of an 18th-century luna-theological argument for the existence of a divine architect.

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Greenhouse Center for Environmental Humanities @greenhouseuis.net · 23/03/2026

We're hiring! 🌿 The Greenhouse Center for Environmental Humanities at the University of Stavanger invites applications for a 3-year postdoc in Environmental History. See thread for more details. #envhist #envhum

jobbnorge.no

Postdoctoral Fellow in Environmental History (297163) | University of Stavanger

Job title: Postdoctoral Fellow in Environmental History (297163), Employer: University of Stavanger, Deadline: Monday, April 20, 2026

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Finn Arne Jørgensen @finnarne.me · 14/04/2026

Six days left to apply for this very cool #envhist postdoc with us here @greenhouseuis.net - it's a great opportunity to join a vibrant and active research environment with much support for career development and a good community.

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David Roberts @volts.wtf · 13/04/2026

The Wayback Machine archive is, like Wikipedia, one of the last corners of the internet that hasn't been killed by greed & slop. That ... may not last long.

wired.com

The Internet's Most Powerful Archiving Tool Is in Peril

As major news outlets cut off the Wayback Machine, journalists and advocacy groups are rallying to protect the Internet Archive’s vast collection of web pages.

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Kees van der Leun @sustainable2050.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

The stupidest tool from the box. Keeps demand and prices artificially high, costs billions, and largely ends up with households that don't need support. 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♂️🤦

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

“The “methodological blind spot” that she and Minderhoud have uncovered went undetected for so long in part because geoid estimates are most accurate in Europe and the eastern seaboard of North America, where the majority of published researchers are based.” e360.yale.edu/features/sea...

e360.yale.edu

A More Troubling Picture of Sea Level Rise Is Coming into View

Scientists have uncovered a "blind spot" in the research on rising seas, revealing that tens of millions of people thought safe from coastal flooding are at risk of inundation. Across much of the worl...

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Chris Julien @chrisjulien.eurosky.social · 13/04/2026

Hoi Nederland. Jetten en de rechtse horde kunnen wel met vlaggetjes wapperen maar zonder radicaal klimaatbeleid is het enkel demagogie

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John Gallagher @earlymodernjohn.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

Probably going to have to flesh out the traditional dismissal of Great Man Theory in first-year historiography lectures now it turns out that two to three deranged geriatrics actually can slingshot the entire planet into the sun

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

... by the increase of the fields.” Humanist scholars can hardly be accused of deep geological or ecological literacy, but such remarks reflect explicitly on the effects of man-made change over many centuries.

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

... which the Rhine, spreading out over the fields and pastures, used to deposit, enrich, and raise in height; … bringing yearly a kind of dunging of slime to the lands. Indeed, they think that the inconvenience and loss of a few years would easily have been compensated ...

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Mathijs Boom @mathijsboom.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

Keep finding these remarkable discussions of Holland's geomorphology in antiquarian works like Hadrianus Junius' 'Batavia' of 1588: "many are persuaded of this: that our ancestors took too little care of their own affairs when they shut out—by opposing embankments and dikes—the mud ...

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