𝐇𝐞 𝐝𝐮𝐠 𝐭𝐨𝐨 𝐝𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐄𝐥𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐫'𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐥 𝐟𝐮𝐞𝐥 𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬: "𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐝"

If you're into science or medicine, you may have heard of journals like Cell or The Lancet. You might also be familiar with their parent company Elsevier / RELX, and their predatory practices: sometimes charging more than 10,000 dollars for publications whose running costs don't reach a tenth of that amount.

What you might not know is that beyond pocketing public research money, Elsevier is also contributing to climate breakdown, pouring millions into tools and journals providing information about areas yet to be exploited for oil and gas extraction, as well as new technologies needed to dig up oil more efficiently in the Arctic and the Canadian tar sands. The motto of one of their online tools, Geofacets, used to be that, thanks to it, “exploration has never been more seamless.”

But that's the tip of the iceberg. For years, RELX's political action committee REPAC has been providing support to climate denialist politicians in the US, preventing carbon mitigation bills from reaching a vote in Congress.

I document this and other complicities of big academic publishers in my new book Science in Resistance, where I interview Kip Lyall, a former employee of the journal Cell, who was fired after asking too many questions about the company's fossil fuel ties.

Excerpt below. 👇

#Science #OpenScience #Fossilfuels #Climate #Climate #Activism #Journal

Yes, you may be killed by falling human made space junk, but the odds remain small(ish) that will occur. The (almost inevitable) #KesslerSyndrome may also prevent future #space flights if all those #satellites in Low Earth Orbit start colliding, creating countless debris.

However, we *ALL* have to worry about the ‘chemical problem’ being created by SpaceX et al in the upper atmosphere. I have been banging on about this for a while and the attached article summarises the science in an easy to understand way - I have pasted the bit about the ‘chemical problem’ below because we *ALL* need to understand what the billionaires are doing to the planet while we are watching.

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Quote:

Debris on the ground attracts immediate attention, but atmospheric scientists are tracking a slower process with potentially larger consequences. When satellites vaporize in the mesosphere, 50 to 80 kilometers above Earth, they release clouds of vaporized metals that condense into aerosol particles. Those particles descend into the stratosphere, where Earth’s protective ozone layer resides.

Aluminum is the element of greatest concern. Upon reentry, aluminum oxidizes into aluminum oxide nanoparticles. A single 250 kilogram satellite generates roughly 30 kilograms of these particles. Unlike chlorofluorocarbons, which directly destroy ozone, aluminum oxide acts as a catalyst. One particle can facilitate chemical reactions that destroy thousands of ozone molecules over decades without being consumed.

Researchers from the University of Southern California’s Department of Astronautical Engineering documented an eightfold increase in atmospheric aluminum oxides between 2016 and 2022, directly correlating with the proliferation of satellite constellations, a finding reported in detail by CNET. In 2022 alone, reentering satellites released an estimated 41.7 metric tons of aluminum, approximately 30 percent more than the natural input from micrometeoroids.

Projections based on current deployment schedules suggest annual aluminum oxide emissions could reach 360 metric tons, a 646 percent increase over natural background levels, according to research highlighted by Popular Mechanics. Because these particles take 20 to 30 years to descend into the ozone layer, the atmospheric chemistry of today’s satellite fleet will not manifest as measurable ozone loss until the 2040s. By then, the upper atmosphere could already be saturated with catalysts.

NASA high altitude sampling flights over Alaska in 2023 detected the signature of this process. At approximately 60,000 feet, instruments found that 10 percent of stratospheric sulfuric acid particles larger than 120 nanometers contained aluminum and other metals traceable to spacecraft reentries, according to data presented at the American Astronomical Society meeting that year. The atmosphere now bears a permanent chemical marker of human activity in space.
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#space #science #TheBillionairesAreKillingUsAll

indiandefencereview.com/starli…

please #Share / Boost widely in your #AcademicNetworks : A #SeniorLecturerPosition in botany and mycology with a research activity in #PlantPhysiology will be open for competition in spring 2026 at the Silva joint research unit / Université de Lorraine, Nancy, France.

silva.nancy.hub.inrae.fr/actua…

The lecturer will be involved in teaching (lectures, tutorials and practical work) as part of the pharmaceutical studies programme, focusing mainly on botany, mycology and plant biology. Teaching has to be done in French.
Whereas the research will focus on the acclimation of trees by molecular mechanisms to the increasingly severe environmental constraints (ozone, drought, heat waves). The research will be done int he PHARE team
silva.nancy.hub.inrae.fr/equip…

Application dates for positions on the Odyssée platform: 3 March (10 a.m.) to 3 April (4 p.m.) 2026
odyssee.enseignementsup-recher…

#science #career #sciencejobs
#Forests #PlantScience #Botany #Mycology #SciJobs #Vacancy #JobVacancy #JobOpening #JobOpportunity #ResearchJobs #LecturerOpening
#Academia #Biodiversity #ClimateChange @academicchatter@a.gup.pe