Our Power News – New year, new energy

Your source for good climate news! Discover our reasons to stay strong & optimistic in 2025.

This newsletter is also available in French?and?Spanish.

A month into 2025, and it’s not good climate news we have been seeing on our screens:

• Wild climate impacts around the world, like the raging wildfires in Los Angeles.
• Trump taking office as the US President amidst the rise of other authoritarian governments aligned with fossil fuel interests & the billionaire class.
• Big tech companies like Meta ending fact-checking, fueling the spread of misinformation.

It’s a lot, we get it.

But what the news might not have shown you is this: the incredible rise of ordinary people stepping up for lasting change.

So yes, we can give in to despair, or we can join those who are seizing this time as an opportunity to push for a better future. Hope, optimism and action are powerful forces that transcend despair and inaction. And that’s the energy we are bringing into 2025. Read on for more good climate news!

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Movement Updates

Discover our latest actions demanding climate solutions & energy justice?

Meet Anne Jellema, our new Executive Director

Based in Cape Town, South Africa—a city she calls “one of the most beautiful places on Earth”—Anne brings over 20 years of experience leading global justice and equality work. She has worked with social movements, women’s organizations, and hacktivists worldwide. Like us, Anne firmly believes in people power and will drive our shared vision for a clean energy future that uses collective action to build a peaceful, safer and equitable world. Hear from Anne herself on what we’ll be up to in 2025!

Finding hope in challenging times

Another leader, who we are not so excited about, (psst, its Trump) started his mandate by pulling the US out of the Paris and other important climate agreements again! Remember that while folks like Trump undermine climate action, most humans highly support renewables, for example. We must not feel powerless, because no matter what politicians, we still have the opportunity to reject business as usual. If you want a community, tips for organizing, good climate news, and signs of hope in the resistance amidst these challenging times, sign-up for our monthly blog series!

We drew a Bold Red Line to Billionaires

Earlier this month, the world’s wealthiest and most powerful elites gathered in Davos, Switzerland for the annual World Economic Forum to push their interests in fossil fuels, war, and exploiting workers. It’s the same old script, and we are sick of it! So we joined forces with thousands of people worldwide, creating massive red lines outside the WEF and online to send billionaires a powerful message: we are drawing a red line to their actions! Discover our new movement to help create a fairer & greener world by taxing the super rich.

Pushing for action?in Türkiye with our new Climate Network?

Speaking of resisting the powerful, last year, we held influential Turkish banks and companies accountable for their climate actions (or lack thereof) by exposing them?here and here. Now, we’ve launched the “Climate Network” in Türkiye, along with 14 other incredible organizations like Greenpeace and WWF to tackle the climate crisis head-on. Stay tuned as we call for bold climate policies, ambitious targets, and a just energy transition that includes everyone and ensures all communities affected by the climate crisis have a voice through the Network!

Climate Jargon — Unpack the terms & concepts being used by climate activists & experts

Apocalyptic Optimism

While many are fearful of the climate breakdown, Apocalyptic Optimism reframes this breaking point as a call to action, a conviction that we can solve this crisis together.

This term is being talked about a lot in climate circles, and there is a good reason for it. Coined by social scientist Dana R. Fisher, apocalyptic optimism is the belief in global mass mobilizations (what we at 350 call “people power”) to overcome the climate crisis. Dana’s research tells us as we are getting tired of the status quo, more & more people are taking actions to pressure governments & businesses into moving away from fossil fuels for good!

So no, this is not the end nor the apocalypse, this is actually a time of fight and opportunity for a world we truly want! Check out this ted talk?if you too want to be an apocalyptic optimist.

Community Spotlight — Be inspired by stories & interviews of real people who are fighting for a just energy transition?

Energy choices sparking a global revolution.

Good climate news comes in many forms. Our partner and global energy community REN21 has a brand new inspiring space for climate optimists like us. REboot the World With Renewablesspotlights real stories and leaders proving how renewable energy transforms lives, protects nature, and boosts economies. You can now see how governments, businesses, and communities worldwide are driving the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. Better yet, you can even share your own renewable energy success story and help inspire decision-makers to accelerate the shift to a cleaner, sustainable future. Your story could be the spark that inspires change!

Submit your story here and join?REN21’s online community.

Renewable Rundown Get informed on big numbers, key facts and important news ? ?

1.5C = still alive!

We can still keep annual global temperatures below 1.5oC above pre-industrial levels – a critical goal to protect people and nature against the worst impacts of the climate crisis.?

Yes, alarm bells are ringing. Recent reports show that 2024 was the hottest year ever recorded, and this past year, for the first time ever, global temperatures exceeded 1.5oC of heating. As temperatures go up, so will it’s impacts, like the wildfires in Los Angeles, which became deadly due to hot conditions fueled by the climate crisis.

This is serious, but it doesn’t mean we’ve failed. The 1.5oC limit is about long-term warming over many years, not short-term spikes like these. Scientists even say2025 might be cooler as the El Ni?o weather pattern fades.

The lesson? Every fraction of a degree we prevent from heating matters and every effort to protect our planet counts. So let’s take this as good climate news, and take action!

Your Power Support us in demanding real climate action

Whether it’s wildfires in Los Angeles or floods in France, the climate crisis has no borders. Neither should the climate movement. Join us in standing united for people, communities and nature.?

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Energize?Build your skills to tackle the climate crisis and widen our movement

Is reading more books on your new year’s resolutions list? Then check out these hopeful climate justice reads, hand-picked by our staff at 350:

• The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh (Fiction) – A novel set in the Sundarbans, India, exploring environmental change, displacement, and community resilience.
• The Future Earth: A Radical Vision for What’s Possible in the Age of Warmingby Eric Holthaus – A hopeful guide on reversing global heating over the next three decades.
• Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution by Peter Kalmus – Practical advice for sustainable living and inspiring collective climate action.
• Who Owns the Wind?: Climate Crisis and the Hope of Renewable Energy by David McDermott Hughes – A look at how renewable energy can create a fairer, sustainable world.
• All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis – Essays from women leaders in the climate movement offering practical solutions.
• The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson (Fiction) – A gripping novel exploring global responses to the climate crisis and the challenges of creating a sustainable future.