August News You Can Use
As summer heat waves, fires and storms roll across the northern hemisphere, the current administration undermines and corrupts our government, scientific research, academic freedom, election integrity, law, due process, the arts, medicine, mainstream media, and more. They are also desecrating our national heritage of freedom, justice and welcoming people from all over the world. I am feeling increasing despair, fear and rage. I have witnessed life in an authoritarian country. It is drab, gray and constricting.
What am I willing to risk to resist the unfolding fascist takeover of our society? How can I contribute to a vision of a better world to work towards? What are you willing to risk, or what have you risked? What is your vision of a resilient future and a path to get there? Let us know your experience and thoughts. Together we can forge a world that supports well-being for all. Let’s use Minerva’s View to share stories, explore ideas and build momentum for life-affirming change.
Events
Climate Leaders Monthly Meeting
Thursday, August 21, 4:00 - 5:00 PM PT
Join the Climate Leaders Meeting to exchange resources and inspiration with others who are working to create a vibrant and healthy future.
All leaders are welcome.
This is a monthly on-line event hosted by Minerva Ventures.
NorCal WateReuse: Direct Potable Reuse
Silicon Valley Water, Legislative Update, Panel Discussion and More
Friday, August 15 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM PT
Meeting via MS Teams ID: 287 423 645 229 0, Passcode: gX6Ai9Wi
Advanced Geothermal in California: Clean, Reliable Energy for All
A Climate Center Webinar: August 28, 2025 10:00 am PST - 11:30 am PST
In Person Event, Wednesday, September 10, 9:30 AM - 5:00 PM, San Francisco, CA
The Inner Development Goals (IDGs) were created to bridge this gap. They were developed as a framework to support the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by equipping individuals and organizations with the skills necessary to drive meaningful, systemic change. Join a diverse and forward-thinking community of leaders, changemakers, and visionaries for an immersive experience designed to strengthen your leadership, expand your network, and deepen your impact.
The Climate Reality Tour
Virtual Archive, Including a Presentation by Al Gore
Opportunities for Action
Join ECAN, the Employee Climate Action Network
As members of ECAN, employees and organizations around the globe work collectively to unleash the power of employees to protect our communities and our environment and transform companies for good; to address the current system and status quo while empowering an emerging system that supports change-making from within organizations.
Prepare to Support Pilot Decarbonization Communities in California
A law pass in California in 2024, SB 1221, authorized the establishment of pilot project zones in which utilities would be relieved of their obligation to provide natural gas and instead support residents to transition to zero-emission alternatives. The utilities submitted their proposed pilot zones in July. Locations will be chosen by Jan. 1, 2026, with pilots to be set up by mid-2026. Customers in the chosen zones will get a chance to vote on their participation, with a requirement of at least 67% in favor in order for a neighborhood to be included. Supporting awareness in the chosen pilot areas could hold a key to real progress.
Join In Sun Day: Day of Action
On September 21, 2025 communities around the country and the globe will join together to celebrate the power of renewable energy: from cutting the ribbon on new solar parks, to marching for laws to make it easier to benefit from renewables, to ebike parades and more. Find out how to get involved here.
Domains for Climate Action
Food and Agriculture
Energy
Tidal Energy Reaches a Milestone
In waters off of Scotland, an undersea turbine has been operating without requiring maintenance for more than 6 years, proving the possibility of harnessing the vast power inherent in tidal waters for energy generation. According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, power generated from tides, currents, waves or temperature changes is the world's largest untapped renewable energy resource. And this milestone proves tidal energy to be investment-worthy and ready for increased deployment. Read more.
Finance
New AI Model Finds Opportunities for Resilience and Adaptability in the Face of Extreme Weather
A new AI model, FICE (Foundational Intelligence for Climate & Economy) from ClimateAI empowers companies the public sector to forecast how extreme weather events impact consumer behavior, revenue trends, and other economic patterns. "What's powerful about FICE is that it's not limited to any one industry," said Will Kletter, ClimateAI's COO. "Whether you're a supplier planning demand, a grocer preparing for storms, or an insurer pricing regional risk, FICE looks back at how businesses have responded to past weather events and turns that insight into forward-looking intelligence—helping leaders across industries make smarter, faster decisions." The tool will also empower federal and state agencies to plan for potential losses in tax revenue and maximize the impact of available funds, including disaster aid. Read more.
Governments See the Need To Account For Climate In Economic Planning
The European Central Bank (ECB) is intensifying its efforts to deal with climate-related economic risks. That includes accounting for the implications of climate change as well as of “nature degradation” when setting monetary policy. Read more.
Circular Economy/Materials
Aluminum Tariff’s May Set Off Recycling Boom
The aluminum in America’s trash just got a whole lot more valuable. Analysts estimate that fully utilizing scrap aluminum in the US could offset nearly half of the country’s 5.5 million ton annual import deficit of the metal. Additional benefits include the much lower cost and shorter timeline to get recycling facilities up and running vs. smelters, as well as the fact that recycling uses about 5% of the energy required for smelting.
Eight Amazing Possible Uses for Wood
Apparently wood fibers can be used to create textiles, computer screens, scaffolding to regrow broken bones, cosmetics, bicyles, bottles, cross-laminated timber that can replace steel in construction, and even be used in skyscrapers. Replacing materials made from fossil fuels and other materials extracted from the earth at great harm to the environment with materials that can be grown sustainability holds great promise. Read more.
Water/Natural Resources/Biodiversity
A Solar-Powered Solution to Clean Drinking Water Anywhere
This Arizona based startup, Source, has created a solar panel that pulls drinking water directly from the air, even in desert regions with humidity as low as 5%. The system is design to add in the essential minerals required for health, created a solution optimized for regions where water is scarce, or to provide clean, safe drinking water in the wake of disasters. Each panel costs $2,000 and produces four or five liters of water each day. Read more.
Can the Amazon Restore Itself?
In March of 2025 Brazil launched a small experiment in forest restoration, leasing a degraded parcel in the Amazon to a carbon credit company to safeguard and passively restore, primarily by leaving it alone. If successful, the experiment could provide hope for the Amazon, where annual rates of deforestation remain devastating, including nearly 6,300 square kilometers last year, bringing the area closer to a critical tipping point where it turns from rainforest to savannah. “The forest can come back,” said Andreia Pinto, an environmental researcher who has written several studies. “The scar of deforestation can be healed.” Read more.
Built Environment
Next Gen Refrigerant For AC Removes Harsh Chemicals, Lowers Cost
As the planet heats and demand for air conditioning rises, it is increasingly urgent that we develop sustainable, safe and cost effective new technologies to provide it. The units in use today typically rely on hydrochlorofluorocarbons which deplete the ozone layer and produce planet-warming pollution. The new material being developed by Barocal, a UK startup, is a barocaloric solid, and thus won’t leak, and is also more energy efficient. Read more.
Tech Giants Look to Low Carbon Cement To Reduce Data Center Impacts
Microsoft and Amazon have both signed purchase agreements with low carbon cement innovators Sublime and Brimstone for large acquisitions from the yet-to-be finished manufacturing facilities. The announcements send an important signal that private-sector demand for cleaner construction products hasn’t declined, despite the administrations abandonment of the sector. More here.
Transportation
Health
Climate Interventions:
Regeneration, Methane, Geoengineering, CCUS
Adaptation and Resilience
Policy
EPA To Revoke the Endangerment Finding: Speak Up Now
Please submit your comments to the EPA in support of keeping the Endangerment Finding. Comment period ends Sept. 15, 2025 at 11:59 pm EDT. Use this link: https://www.regulations.gov/commenton/EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0194-0093 More information here: https://www.regulations.gov/document/EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0194-0093
The “endangerment finding,” issued in 2009, is the EPA’s scientific and legal
conclusion that the Clean Air Act requires regulation of greenhouse gas
emissions to protect public health and welfare. According to the New York Times,
“That finding is the foundation of the federal government’s only tool to limit the climate pollution from vehicles, power plants and other industries that is dangerously heating the planet.” The proposal to revoke it relies on “misinterpretations of the law and recent cases, fringe science, and tortured cost analysis to justify a
conclusion that the EPA cannot and should not regulate GHGs,” according
to legal analysis by Earthjustice. And while the proposal would almost certainly face legal challenges, if successful it would be very difficult to reinstate, and could hamper regulation of GHGs well into the future. Your voice matters: https://www.regulations.gov/commenton/EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0194-0093
Premier Science Advisory Group To Review Endangerment Repeal
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine has announced it will self-fund a study, to be released in September, convening an independent, fast-track review of the latest climate science. “It is critical that federal policymaking is informed by the best available scientific evidence,” said Marcia McNutt, president of the National Academy of Sciences. “Decades of climate research and data have yielded expanded understanding of how greenhouse gases affect the climate. We are undertaking this fresh examination of the latest climate science in order to provide the most up-to-date assessment to policymakers and the public.” Read more.
Lawsuit Could Force The EPA to Reinstate $3bn In Climate Funding
A coalition of non-profits, tribes and local governments has sued for the reinstatement of climate justice grants intended to help communities prepare for climate disasters and environmental hazards. they are bringing a class action suit that would force the reinstatement of all of the grants, rather than requiring each to sue separately.
What Will Happen to the EPA’s $27 billion Climate Lending Program?
The GOP’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act rescinded any uncommitted — or “unobligated” — funds that might be left over from the $27 billion in the Inflation Reduction Act’s largest grant initiative promoting lending for green technologies. However, an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office, which found that only $19 million was unobligated. While the administration is still attempting to claw back the funds, the final decision will likely be up to the courts. Read more.
Solar For All Cancelled, And the Fight Begins
The EPA has terminated a $7 billion grant program intended to help pay for residential solar projects for more than 900,000 lower-income U.S. households. According to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, “EPA no longer has the statutory authority to administer the program or the appropriated funds to keep this boondoggle alive…. saving US taxpayers ANOTHER $7 BILLION!” The Southern Environmental Law Center has already declared “we will see them in court.” Read more.
Corporate Sustainability Is Here To Stay
While some sources have been broadcasting public retreat from corporate sustainability goals, Trellis Founder and Chairman Joel Makower and many corporate executives say the truth is more positive. Makower posits that rather than dying out, corporate sustainability efforts are “evolving — getting smarter and, in many respects, more effective — in response to a complex and pugnacious political and economic environment…. we’re witnessing … a recalibration — an evolution of terminology, tone and tactics.” Rather than public pronouncements, the work is being done by integrating sustainability into core strategy and focusing on risk management, supply-chain resilience and operational excellence.
Private Firms Fill Some Weather Data Voids
As NOAA cuts cause a reduction in weather data collection, potentially crippling National Weather Service forecasting, private companies are picking up the slack. One startup, WindBorne, is opening five new balloon launch sites in the U.S. this year. Sofar Ocean, Tomorrow.io, Black Swift Technologies and Saildrone are among other startups with innovative technologies and AI forecasting models that are supplying NOAA with critical atmospheric and oceanic data. And while this is incredibly helpful at this juncture, many believe it is critical that NOAA maintain ownership of its “backbone” data assets to ensure public safety and maintain the historical climate record.
Climate News
UN Court Rules Countries Must Limit GHGs
In a non-binding ruling, the United Nations’ International Court of Justice told wealthy countries to fulfill their commitments to curb pollution or risk having to pay compensation to nations hard hit by climate change. “"States must cooperate to achieve concrete emission reduction targets," Judge Yuji Iwasawa said, adding that failure by countries to comply with the "stringent obligations" placed on them by climate treaties was a breach of international law.” The ruling also affirmed that nations are responsible for the actions of companies under their jurisdiction. Read more.
Employee Climate Action Groups Continue Quietly Agitating
Unlike green teams, employee climate action groups are self-organized to address controversial issues: fossil fuels-free retirement plans, low-carbon procurement policies or firing clients involved in oil and gas exploration and production. A newly formed network, the Cross Company Alliance, has attracted employees from companies including Bath & Body Works, Pinterest, Amazon, Google and Microsoft to it’s meetings about best practices for campaigns, including a pilot at Google, supported by more than 1,200 employees, to create “climate-safe” 401(k) options. Read more.
Uncounted Wildfire Emissions Top Those From Power Plants in California
The plumes of CO2 from the Los Angeles fires earlier this year released more carbon pollution than all of California’s passenger vehicles emit in a month. According to Michael Jerrett, professor at UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health, “Wildfire emissions in 2020 essentially negate 18 years of reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.” The USDA Forest Service and EPA have begun integrating wildfire emissions into national inventories. Platforms like Climate TRACE, which use satellites to monitor pollution in real-time, reveal that we underreport carbon sources, including wildfires. To fully measure and address the climate crisis we need policies that measure and include the carbon impact of wildfires. Read more.
The IEA Says Renewables To Be The #1 Global Power Source by 2026
New projections from the International Energy Agency (IEA) indicate that rapid growth in wind and solar energy output are driving renewables to overtake coal in 2026, with output projected at over 6,000TWh. Wind and solar power together will meet more than 90% of the increase in global electricity demand out to 2026, the IEA says, while modest growth for hydro power will add to renewables’ rise.
Reasons to Stay Hopeful
The Guardian recently published 8 reasons for continued hope, even in the face of all the dire news. They included the extreme price drops for and exponential growth of solar power and other renewables, increases to life spans and medical breakthroughs, among others. They conclude that “Optimism for the future is not only justified – it’s a weapon in the fight for a higher future, and a moral obligation to ourselves and to future generations.” Read more.
The West’s Megadrought May Continue for Decades
According to findings published in the journal Nature Geoscience, the megadrought appears to be the result of a pattern of Pacific Ocean temperatures that is “stuck” because of global warming, and could continue and even worsen for as long as humans continue to heat the planet. Read more.
Book Recommendation
It’s Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility, edited by Rebecca Solnit and Thelma Young-Lutunatabua
This is a book for anyone who is despondent, anxious, or unsure about climate change and seeking answers. As the contributors to this volume make clear, the future will be decided by whether we act in the present—and we must act to counter institutional inertia, fossil fuel interests, and political obduracy.
Minerva Ventures LLC believes:
MV and our team believe in the US Constitution and the importance of upholding the rule of law, including the rights of freedom of speech and assembly to ensure a vibrant democracy. We believe in the necessity for sound scientific research to guide policy and risk assessment. We believe that a diversity of backgrounds and perspectives makes our society more creative and resilient. Our culture, economy, and well-being depend on collaboration with people, nations, and institutions around the world. We will do all we can to defeat fascism and to build an inclusive society that works to restore healthy ecosystems, welcoming communities, and a safe and stable climate. Humanity faces challenges that we humans set into motion. It will take all of us working together to overcome those perils to build a better future.
About Minerva Ventures:
Are you concerned about climate change and seeking ways to take action? Business survival depends on addressing competitive challenges every day. Leaders attend to urgent business matters while counting on tomorrow’s weather and operating conditions to be similar to yesterday’s. What happens when underlying conditions change as climate consequences become more severe? It is hard to adjust to a disruptive future while you are focused on competing today.
Minerva advises clean tech companies on strategic and business development. We help you find customers, new markets, and new investors to build your momentum and success. Minerva helps established companies create strategies to identify and contend with climate risks to your business. Discover how you can protect your operations, assets, products, and services. Understand how climate risk will affect your suppliers, customers, and partners. Determine how you can strengthen your company to navigate change and seize opportunities as markets reconfigure in the face of the coming changes. Find innovative ways to change your operations, products, and services to help address climate change. Consider policy measures that your industry can pursue that will help address shared risks.
Minerva can help you find new solutions that will make your business more resilient and adaptable to change. Your company will be advancing climate solutions rather than just reacting to disruptions to your industry and markets.
Visit Minerva Ventures’ website at MinervaVentures.com!
Newsletter Editor: Dinyah Rein, Consultant, Minerva Ventures, LLC
Managing Partner: Marianna Grossman, Minerva Ventures, LLC
Copyright (C) 2024 Minerva Ventures. All rights reserved.
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