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Hey everyone, welcome to this week’s FutureProof - my Tech and Sustainability Digest.
As always this newsletter is dedicated to surfacing and sharing good news stories across tech and sustainability. If good news sounds like something you need, read on. And please share this newsletter with anyone/everyone else you feel could do with a little cheering up!
Now, on with the stories:
Climate
No Oil & Gas: Thanks, We’re Full
The International Energy Agency has doubled down: if the world actually takes 1.5°C seriously, then not one more euro, dollar, or yuan needs to be spent on new oil and gas projects. The fossil industry is already “running fast to stand still,” dropping half a trillion a year just to keep the taps from sputtering.
Nearly 90% of upstream investment since 2019 has gone to patching decline, not meeting demand.
New exploration licences take ~20 years before yielding a drop of oil or a puff of gas.
In a 1.5°C pathway, much of the most expensive oil and gas would shut early, becoming stranded assets.
Why This Matters: The choice is stark, invest in decline and stranded assets, or accelerate the transition and leave oil and gas expansion where it belongs: in the history books.
Kismet: The North Sea “bonanza” politicians keep flogging? By the time any new wells there come online, we’ll be closer to 2045 than 2025 - talk about drilling a hole in the wrong century. 👉 Full story here
Kids vs Trump: The Climate Showdown in Court
A group of young activists, some barely out of primary school, are hauling Trump’s pro-fossil fuel executive orders into federal court, arguing that declaring a “national energy emergency” to pump coal and oil violates their constitutional rights. David vs Goliath, but with subpoenas.
Plaintiffs aged 7 to 25 are challenging three Trump executive orders to unleash fossil fuels.
They’re backed by Our Children’s Trust, the same legal team that won the landmark Held v Montana case in 2023.
Expert witnesses include heavy hitters like Mark Jacobson (Stanford) and John Podesta (ex-White House clean energy lead).
Why This Matters: If they succeed, it would set a legal precedent that even presidential power can’t trample young people’s rights to a safe climate.
Kismet: The first US Supreme Court case on youth climate rights dragged on for over a decade; this one could move faster, thanks to the Montana kids already proving in court that state-backed fossil expansion violates constitutional protections. 👉 Full story here
AI News
AI Becomes Doctor’s New Wingman
Harvard researchers have unveiled PDGrapher, an AI tool that can spot the gene and drug combos most likely to flip diseased cells back to healthy ones, think of it as a biomedical chef whipping up recipes for wellness instead of illness. Unlike old-school methods that poke at one protein at a time, this AI goes multi-target, multi-pathway, and does it lightning fast.
Tested on 19 datasets across 11 cancers, it predicted effective drug targets with up to 35% higher accuracy than rival models.
Identified both well-known treatments and fresh candidates, including promising targets for lung cancer and metastases.
Could pave the way for personalised treatment roadmaps, even tackling neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
Why This Matters: This is a potential revolution in drug discovery, cutting years off the process and unlocking therapies for diseases that medicine has struggled with for decades.
Kismet: The same graph neural networks behind TikTok’s uncanny ability to guess your guilty-pleasure videos are now helping doctors outsmart cancer cells, proof that not all algorithmic rabbit holes are bad. 👉 Full story here
ChatGPT for Cassava: AI Lifts Farmers in Malawi
After Cyclone Freddy turned his farm into rubble, Malawian farmer Alex Maere turned to a WhatsApp-based AI chatbot for help. The bot suggested planting potatoes alongside corn and cassava, and suddenly he was pulling in $800 in sales instead of 8 kilos of despair.
The AI tool, Ulangizi (“advisor” in Chichewa), works by text, voice, or even crop photos.
Backed by Malawi’s government, it helps smallholders adapt to droughts, cyclones, and shifting soils.
Africa’s small farms feed up to 80% of the continent, yet face barriers like patchy internet, low literacy, and fragile trust in tech.
Why This Matters: AI isn’t just writing essays, it’s literally helping farmers survive climate shocks and keep their kids in school.
Kismet: Africa had just $10m of agri-tech investment in 2014; by 2022 that number hit $600m, proving the continent is quietly becoming the world’s agri-innovation lab. 👉 Full story here
Electromobility
EVs Surge Ahead, Oil Demand Hits the Brakes
BloombergNEF’s 2025 Electric Vehicle Outlook shows the EV juggernaut is unstoppable: one in four cars sold globally this year will be electric. China leads the charge, the US is wobbling thanks to policy rollbacks, and emerging markets like Vietnam and Brazil are suddenly leapfrogging into the future with record adoption.
25% of global car sales in 2025 will be electric, with buses and two/three-wheelers already at sky-high numbers.
Road transport oil demand peaks in 2029, permanently denting Big Oil’s business model.
Battery factories are pumping out double expected demand, driving prices down, even as solid-state batteries loom.
Why This Matters: EVs are no longer a sideshow, they’re dismantling oil’s monopoly on transport faster than the industry (and many governments) are willing to admit.
Kismet: Brazil, long the ethanol powerhouse, is now seeing EVs displace demand for its biofuel, the very country that once symbolised the “alternative” to oil is now betting on electrons instead. 👉 Full story here
Volvo’s 600km Electric Beast Is Here
Volvo has unveiled its FH Aero Electric truck: up to 600 km range, 40-minute charging with the new Megawatt Charging System, and a payload capacity that rivals diesel rigs. Long-haul trucking, one of the hardest nuts to crack in decarbonisation, just got cracked.
Charges 20–80% in 40 minutes, perfectly synced with EU driver rest rules.
Packs 780 kWh of batteries with an innovative e-axle design for extra space and efficiency.
Can haul 48 tonnes, nearly matching diesel’s payload.
Why This Matters: Heavy-duty trucks are a major slice of transport emissions, proving they can run electric over long distances is a tipping point for the freight industry.
Kismet: Volvo will start taking orders in 2026, meaning by the time these rigs roll out, Europe’s highways could be dotted with megawatt chargers, turning truck stops into the EV equivalent of pit lanes. 👉 Full story here
Clean Energy
Shipping Giants Back a Global Carbon Fee
For the first time, big shipping companies are calling for a global fee on greenhouse gases, a levy that could funnel billions into clean fuels and infrastructure. The industry, responsible for ~3% of global emissions, finally admits that without a price on pollution, the green transition won’t sail.
Would create a worldwide carbon levy to accelerate adoption of zero-emission fuels.
Backed by major shippers, even as Trump signals opposition to international climate measures.
Revenue could finance green corridors, clean ports, and technology for decarbonisation.
Why This Matters: Shipping has long been a climate laggard, this move cracks open the door to real accountability and funding for its clean transition.
Kismet: If shipping were a country, it would rank as the 6th largest emitter in the world, ahead of Germany, so pricing its pollution could have outsized climate impact. 👉 Full story here
AI’s Dirty Secret: Data Centres Slurp Power, But Context Matters
Yes, AI is guzzling electricity, but the IEA says context is key: data centres are just over 1% of global power demand and 0.5% of CO₂ emissions today. Still, by 2030, AI could drive a third to half of all data-centre use, and in places like Ireland, servers already swallow 21% of the grid.
Data centres could add 945 TWh of demand by 2030, about Japan’s entire electricity use.
In the US and Japan, they may drive half of all demand growth in the next five years.
Fossil fuels still provide ~60% of data-centre electricity, though renewables will likely overtake by 2035.
Why This Matters: AI’s energy appetite is a warning siren, either we scale renewables and grids fast, or “the cloud” risks grounding the energy transition.
Kismet: In Dublin, data centres already gulp 79% of the city’s electricity, meaning the servers are now more essential to the capital than the Guinness taps. 👉 Full story here
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Blog post
Electrify Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
I’ve just published a new piece digging into why the electrification of everything - from cars and heat pumps to smelters and shipping, is the hardest, messiest, and most non-negotiable part of the energy transition. We can’t afford to dawdle, because delay just piles costs on top of costs and leaves us more exposed to fossil chaos.
Global demand for electricity will at least double by 2050 as we electrify heating, transport, and industry.
Metals like copper, lithium, and nickel are under huge pressure, but recycling and substitution can bridge the gap.
Electrification is already slashing fossil fuel demand in key sectors, and that curve is only getting steeper.
Why This Matters: Electrification is the only credible pathway to cut emissions at the speed physics and climate reality demand, everything else is just noise.
Kismet: Fun fact, when Norway hit over 90% EV sales for new cars, petrol stations started closing not because regulators shut them down, but because customers simply stopped turning up. 👉 Full story here
Latest Podcasts
Climate Confident:
Your Pension Is Financing the Climate Crisis (And How to Stop It)
In this week’s Climate Confident, I sat down with Scott Ryan, founder of Investature, to talk about something most people never think about: how your money impacts climate. Turns out, pensions and retirement funds are quietly the world’s most destructive asset pool, pouring trillions into fossil fuels. Scott’s mission? Flip that script and show how reallocating just 1% of global capital could close the climate finance gap and turbocharge solutions.
An organisation’s retirement plans are often 20–30x larger sources of emissions than a its direct footprint.
Reallocating just 1% of global wealth (~$8 trillion) would make climate solutions economically unstoppable.
Green banking and climate-positive funds can deliver solid returns and measurable impact.
Why This Matters: Money isn’t just numbers on a screen, it’s one of the fastest levers we have to accelerate the climate transition, yet it’s hiding in plain sight.
Kismet: Every $1,000 you move from a dirty bank to a green one is like avoiding a 4,000 km flight, proof that financial choices can be as climate-powerful as lifestyle ones. 🎧 Listen to the full episode
Sustainable Supply Chain:
AI Meets Scope 3: From Dirty Data to Real Action
This week in the Sustainable Supply Chain podcast, I spoke with Paul Byrnes, CEO of Mavarick AI, about why most manufacturers are drowning in bad data, and how AI can finally help them clean it up, engage suppliers, and actually decarbonise. Spoiler: the magic isn’t in dashboards, it’s in fixing the inputs and making sure suppliers see “what’s in it for them.”
Data accuracy is king - BOM errors and supplier misreports can swing emissions by 40%.
AI can flag dodgy data, train suppliers, and even uncover decarbonisation projects with ROI.
Efficiency wins (like Volkswagen’s smarter AGV charging) often slash emissions by 30%+ while saving money.
Why This Matters: Scope 3 is messy, but AI gives manufacturers a fighting chance to turn compliance pain into cost savings and climate impact.
Kismet: One Volkswagen factory slashed emissions from its robot fleets by 38%, just by rethinking charging patterns, proof that sometimes “AI-driven decarbonisation” starts with plugging things in smarter. 🎧 Listen to the full episode
Coming Soon to the podcasts
In the coming episodes I will be talking to Tara Milburn, Founder & CEO of Ethical Swag, and ODI Director Emily Wilkinson.
Don’t forget to follow the podcasts in your podcast app of choice to ensure you don’t miss any episodes.
Featured Chart
It is a beautiful virtuous circle. Prices drop → more people buy batteries → economies of scale and the learning curve kick in dropping the prices → more people buy them → etc.!
Renewables are cheap, and quick to deploy (the environmental impact assessments for renewables take far less time than for fossil fuel projects), so they are dominating new power plant construction.
China is really going all out for renewables - they know they are the future, and they are determined to own it.
And China is starting to own the EV market as well!
Misc stuff
Who doesn’t love a cute kitty pic?
LOL!
The man has a point!
Engage
If you made it this far, very well done! If you liked this newsletter, or learned something new, feel free to share this newsletter with family and friends. Encourage folks to sign up for it.
Finally, since being impacted by the tech layoffs, I'm currently in the market for a new role. If you know someone who could benefit from my tech savvy, sustainability, and strong social media expertise, I'd be really grateful for a referral.
If you have any comments or suggestions for how I can improve this newsletter, don’t hesitate to let me know. Thanks.
*** Be aware that any typos you find in this newsletter are tests to see who is paying attention! ***
And Finally
Hard to believe, I know, but apparently Robert Redford wasn’t often rejected by women!
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