Rebecca Leber Profile
Rebecca Leber

@rebleber

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Climate & investigative journalist. Board member @sejorg . RebeccaLeber.climate at gmail dot com

Washington, DC
Joined February 2010
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 months
I wrote a short essay for @pbs interpreting a 1969 White House memo on climate change. A fascinating window into the moral clarity of the issue decades before the disinformation wars and politicization.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
why is everyone talking about gas stoves? is it really dangerous? am i going to have to give up gas cooking? isn't electric horrible? what about gas boilers and furnaces? doesn't electricity also run on fossil fuels? got some answers for you >>>>
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
some news! after four years at Mother Jones, I'm joining the fantastic team at @Voxdotcom as a senior reporter covering climate change.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
6 months
Found out today (by way of generic email) I'm getting laid off from Vox. I would love to talk opportunities for an experienced climate journalist, editor, and investigative reporter.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
Choice words from a gas exec in emails foiaed by by @ccspatz confirmed the hunch: the gas industry was worried about the public turning against the gas stove
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
there has already been more coverage of what looks to be an underwhelming Trump rally than there has ever been for any protest demanding action on climate change
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
I was interested in gas stoves in 2020, when I was startled that the gas industry was paying instagram influencers to promote #cookingwithgas . I didn't understand why the industry cared about stoves enough to market them
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
The gas industry wants to build more pipelines to buildings, new and old. Yes, the power sector still runs on coal and gas but it's fast shrinking its GHG footprint. Laying more pipes in the ground locks us into fossil fuels for decades longer than we have
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
I've been working on this new feature for months. It started with reporting on gas stove influencers. I got my hands on revealing industry emails & unpacked the layers of fossil fuel astroturf using America's favorite appliance to fight climate action
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
you know i didn't understand the story i just wrote until the men of energy twitter explained it back to me. thanks all!
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
@sarafischer this is a strange take to tweet literally as we find out who of our colleagues are affected.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
Say you have decided to ditch the gas. What are your alternatives? Enjoyed this interview with a chef who prefers induction (different from the old electric that most people hate) A great starting point he recommends is a plug-in induction hotplate
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
Carbon dioxide levels have hit a record high at 419 parts per million. The last time carbon concentrations were this high, sea level was about 78 feet higher than today per @noaa
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
never seen a methane campaign poster before
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
Explained more on why electrification of the home is a climate solution here, and our options to tackle not just the stove, but all gas appliances:
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
I've written more than a dozen articles on gas stoves, and even more on the natural gas industry over the past 3 years. Will keep chipping away at this and appreciate your tips and commentary (lots of comments already on fireplaces... tbc...)
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
The reason all this blew up this week is because media picked up on the Consumer Product Safety Commissions' Dec decision to consider the health impacts of the stove. There is no regulation yet and never likely to be a ban. I catch up to speed here:
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
i still hear from people telling me i ruined gas stoves for them. i'll take it. it's the small things
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
when I started reporting on this years ago, no one really suspected gas stoves to be a source of methane emissions. It turns out that might have been wrong. Methane leaks are more common than we realized, even when the stove is off.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
I'm asked all the time about how not to leave people to despairing on climate change or what gives me hope. It feels like I'm expected to give others more excuses to not worry too much.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
@sarafischer you tweeted praise while vox was in the process of emailing the people affected.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
It's funny the gas industry always promotes the gas stove as "natural gas stove". I'm more mindful about how I use "natural gas" now in my writing. I still use it, because that's what people know it as, but always define it as methane, a fossil fuel
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
four years ago today, Trump erased climate change from and replaced it with his "American First Energy Plan" climate change is back baby.
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Rebecca Leber
1 year
Before the uproar this week, there was already a big backlash brewing in red states after some cities passed bans on new gas lines to buildings. 20 Republican-led states passed preemption laws banning cities from passing gas bans when I wrote this
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
A profile of one of the watermark moments when NYC, one of the most gas-reliant cities in the country, joined the electrification momentum
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
Gas stoves DID have an image problem & leading trade orgs were worried. RMI had reviewed the scientific literature that spring on the health risks of gas stoves, and the industry wanted 1) consumers devoted to gas cooking 2) to ward off climate campaigns
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
John Kerry injecting nuance into the conversation about how international climate action must work: You can't get strong global agreements without proof we mean it domestically. "The world will measure us by what we can do at home."
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
There are plenty of barriers to electrifying the home. It's hard to report on one-size-fits all solutions, but I do feel pretty confident about things eventually getting easier now that IRA is incentivizing these kinds of products
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
The US could be run on clean energy in about a decade. But it's all riding on Dems going bold in reconciliation. My new story on the clean electricity standard:
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
overlooked news that >10% of shareholders at Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and Citigroup voted yesterday to end finance for fossil fuel development. It doesn't sound like a lot but it's enough to get execs' attention- and it shows some momentum to gain ground next year
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Rebecca Leber
4 years
The US is officially OUT of the Paris agreement. Rejoining would be the easy part. I wrote about what we can expect next.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
it's a struggle to report on climate in the summer season during a never-ending news cycle fires, extreme heat, drought, flooding. been quiet on here, maybe because I'm exhausted from years of reporting on these climate warnings
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
8 months
a new story! Kids’ biggest exposure to pollution can come on the school bus. That is finally on the cusp of change. But one arm of the fossil fuel industry has other ideas.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
Who here has stopped saying "natural gas"?
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
the climate journalists are tired
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
Caroline Dennett was a Shell safety consultant for 11 years and publicly quit today in an email to top execs. Shell is “blindly ignoring all the alarm bells" and “failing on a massive planetary scale” I interviewed Caroline about her public resignation:
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
40% of the US runs on nuclear and clean energy today. By 2030, Biden wants to get to 80%. Would get the US halfway towards big cuts in climate emissions. These are wild numbers to imagine: Pollution from power plants mostly a thing of the past
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Rebecca Leber
1 year
We should be talking more about the risks of petrochemicals. Reporting this piece was eye-opening
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
This is devastating on climate change. the US almost certainly won’t get another chance like this this decade more on why in this story:
@JenniferJJacobs
Jennifer Jacobs
2 years
BREAKING: Manchin says he’s opposed to Biden’s Build Back Better tax and spending plan. “This is a no on this legislation,” @Sen_JoeManchin says on Fox News Sunday. “I just can't. I've tried everything humanly possible. I can't get there.”
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
i've peaked
@ratemyskyperoom
Room Rater
3 years
Strong plant game. Lamp. Love the Rock Creek poster and what may be Taft Memorial Bridge. 10/10 @rebleber
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
Why “moderate” is meaningless when talking about Joe Manchin’s climate politics.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
Trump today is finalizing a surprise rule that bars the EPA from regulating oil and gas and refineries, deeming them "necessarily insignificant" sources of greenhouse gas pollution.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
11 months
fun fun @elonmusk made it so the climate deniers are verified and the climate journos and experts are not
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
4 years
the fun thing is i interviewed experts in summer 2019 about what a president could do on climate change without congress... now a few of those experts are on Biden's transition team. here's a new look at the same question:
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
getting far less attention than Marjorie Taylor Greene but there is a GOP lawmaker who opened the Oregon capitol door to rioters who has refused to resign or apologize. He's been stripped of committee assignments
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
how long do you think it was before the IPCC report was bumped from the news cycle
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
A few of you read my gas stoves feature when it first published this winter. It's now in print! Running now in the July/August issue of Mother Jones, and just republished online. It's my last, last story at @MotherJones
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
icymi this weekend Splitting the difference between doing nothing and doing everything in our power does not halt the crisis. The “moderate” path leads us somewhere between devastating warming and catastrophic warming.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
every reporter should ask Manchin about this
@frankthorp
Frank Thorp V
3 years
MANCHIN asked by @AriNatter whether an energy company he founded is a conflict of interest as he negotiates reconciliation: MANCHIN: "I've been in a blind trust for 20 years, I have no idea what they're doing. Ari: You're still getting dividends. MANCHIN: "You got a problem?"
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
My new story on the ticking climate time bomb in West Texas, and the difficult decisions ahead for the Biden administration. It could very well lead to a political showdown.
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
My favorite tweet of all time was a conservative outraged that raising the minimum wage to $15 would turn a $2 fast food burger into a $17 one. Then the guy had to respond to hundreds of tweets concerned he doesn't know how math or burgers work.
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
This really is our last chance on climate change. I walk through the science and arguments and emissions data on why:
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
first day of school at @voxdotcom . I spent a few minutes savoring the empty inbox, now there's no turning back.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
these 72 hours don't play well in 10 to 20 years when we're looking at the fire no one bothered putting out
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Rebecca Leber
7 months
NEW STORY Newly uncovered documents show how natural gas industry paid Julia Child and Hollywood for promotion, at a time the health risks of gas stoves were becoming clear
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
should i thread the too-many stories i've done over the years on gas stoves
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
Big Oil companies have tried to escape blame for causing climate change. I dove into why it matters that investors and courts are saying that doesn’t cut it anymore.
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Rebecca Leber
4 years
Pence treats each climate disaster as isolated. Trump takes a similar approach with COVID-19: 200,000 deaths from COVID are unrelated to the White House’s actions—instead of a consequence science denial. Pence doesn’t want people to see the pattern:
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
The White House moved even faster with its environmental rollbacks, using the pandemic as cover.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
Media Matters answered my question. Climate is an afterthought by day 3
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
some underrated parts of the IRA that I hope folks don't miss
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
literally spent the last three days trying to figure out if there's any possible way the US can still cut climate pollution because Manchin, et al won't support a $150 billion clean energy program
@rtiron
Roxana Tiron
3 years
BREAKING: Senate defense appropriations bill is out giving the Pentagon more than $10 billion than requested, $725.8 billion
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
Absolutely embarrassing false equivalence from the @washingtonpost editorial board. Mother Jones deserves an apology (and financial support) for its investigative nonprofit journalism
@MonikaBauerlein
Monika Bauerlein
2 years
please tell me this is meant to be funny
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
first broken on Mother Jones!
@realsambee
Samantha Bee
3 years
The gas industry is paying Instagram influencers to promote gas stoves. Yes, you read that right! So @AllanaHarkin becomes an induction stove influencer to draw attention to the harmful effects of cooking with natural gas. Featuring @bradytoday and @heidiismighty !
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
Sometimes I entertain it because I don't want to depress people either. But you're also asking a journalist if they can make readers think a little less critically and soften the pressure on politicians to do more
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
Trump's damaging agenda on the environment is worse than most people realize. Like his corruption and disregard for other humans, his mission to dismantle the EPA was in plain sight before his 2016 election. Much of the media missed the story
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
There were 0 laws stopping city climate action at the beginning of 2020. Now there are TWENTY with three more bills pending this year. Cities are falling behind on climate fight because of a partisan use of preemption
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
why can't climate news ever break at 11am
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
too much happening on the climate beat but it's also (mostly) not disaster news. what is this feeling.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
Engine No. 1 and climate activists now say they've won the third seat on Exxon's board. That's 3 out of 12 seats. Here's more on what that means:
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
I've been hearing wild stories from people having a hard time trying to get fossil fuels OUT of their homes. I got to the bottom of one of the biggest barriers.
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Rebecca Leber
9 months
was watching an influencer review 12 swimsuits she just got, and at the last one, talked about how she bought a "sustainable brand" because "you know we have to care and do our part" and in that moment i felt doomed
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Rebecca Leber
1 year
You can walk into a store and come out confident that your dishwasher, fridge, or laundry machine are all reasonably efficient. That’s not something to take for granted! We should recognize Carter’s legacy on energy efficiency.
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
This deserves more attention. The COVID bivalent booster "could well be the last free shot; it is the final one Congress has funded."
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
programming note: lately, burnout & relentless climate news has been taking a toll on my health. I'm grateful that Vox managers encouraged me to take extra time off when I finally spoke up So, I'm off work, Twitter & email until July 18. Please try to spare my inbox til I'm back
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
The Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments for an extremely important case today. SCOTUS is likely to restrict the EPA's powers to regulate water pollution. Read @imillhiser on the case:
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
So the US Postal Service is replacing 165,000 trucks with more gas guzzlers. <10 years it will be outmoded and unnecessarily polluting (consider all the idling). And if history repeats, it will be decades before the US replaces THIS fleet
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Rebecca Leber
4 years
i see everyone took a break from legal scholar to be a doctor again
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
today's my final day at Mother Jones, but to say a fitting goodbye, I have one last scoop coming out tomorrow.
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
I remember 10 years ago writing about an all-male congressional GOP hearing trying to take away the right to abortion and a bunch of male journalists thought that criticism was going ~too far~
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
a shift in tone, even compared to the Obama years. Workers have been fed a "false narrative...that somehow dealing with climate is at their expense." "This is not a choice between having good jobs and having good quality of life."
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
!!! 4 big oil execs, 2 trade groups will testifying in the House Oversight committee for a hearing on climate disinformation
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
Hellooo from the White House 👋 I will be covering the signing of the Inflation Reduction Act.
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Rebecca Leber
1 month
I'm at the Senate Budget hearing today reporting for @WeAreDrilled . The hearing spotlights new revelations about Big Oil's climate disinformation campaigns. Democrats released a bicameral report yesterday publishing thousands of pages of subpoenaed documents
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
3 years
How Exxon spent decades shifting attention away from its carbon pollution to yours using “cutting-edge propaganda”
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
1 year
we're running out of ways to say it too. we've got a few years (not decades) to shift course
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@rebleber
Rebecca Leber
2 years
When I first started reporting on gas stoves, I heard from scientists that they probably weren’t a big factor in climate change. Now new research is challenging that assumption. A new study finds stoves are leaking much more methane than expected.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
A thread: At the time I published an investigation into the natural gas industry early in 2021, only a few states had laws preventing pro-climate electrification campaigns. The industry was in an aggressive fight it appeared to be losing
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
It's been a month since the Texas disaster, and politicians are content with blaming it on ERCOT and the grid and moving on. They're blind to half the crisis—the fragility and pollution of the oil and gas supply chain
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Rebecca Leber
6 months
disorienting to be unemployed during a huge climate event rife with big oil greenwashing, and the hottest year ever!
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Rebecca Leber
2 years
A historic and hopeful moment in the decades of US climate inaction. The Senate just passed $370 billion more to fight climate change. It's on track to becoming the first law to address fossil fuel pollution across the entire economy.
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Rebecca Leber
3 years
the stories in this brief about people traveling out-of-state for an abortion are crushing
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