Several years ago, I started the tradition of an annual charts and graphs email to wrap up the year. The motivation was simple: there are always a bunch of new climate change reports (with charts and graphs) at the end of the year to go with the annual COP meetings.

Those reports, and especially the charts and graphs, help people get the basic status of the crisis at a glance: emissions are up, the gap between what we pledged to do in 2015 with the Paris climate Agreement and what we’re actually doing keeps getting wider, etc. But doing it at the end of the year as a recap lets us focus on more than just the datapoints, it helps us put the year into context.

It's also because we're not a research group – we're a direct action group. But many years ago I fell in love with a slogan I saw on a friend's refrigerator that said "Don't mess with us, we've got charts and graphs to back this sh*t up." And so in that spirit I've carried on releasing an annual charts and graphs email every year to make the point: There is real evidence that demands radical direct action to confront the climate crisis.

As usual, there's a lot of stuff in our blog post including links and footnotes. And, also as usual, this is our last fundraising message of the year.
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Here's a TLDR recap for your busy inbox. There's a longer version, video, and link to the slides in the blog.

2023 started and ended with a fight against fossil fueled fascists. But what the year was really about was fossil fuels and the persistent forces that keep the planet hooked on them.

Right from the start of the year we were talking about two "gaps" between what we say on climate and need to do, and what we're actually doing:

The production gap, which is about the world, and especially the US, producing more fossil fuels than we can afford to burn without supercharging the climate crisis.
And the finance gap, which is about big banks and investors who continue to give money to fossil fuels and related projects (like carbon capture and sequestration) far in excess of what we can afford to meet our emissions reduction goals, or what those same lenders and institutions say is their goal of “net zero” emissions by 2050.

Those gaps are persistent, despite the fact that we are making progress on renewable energy and switching our economy to run on it. Renewable energy is booming, electric vehicle sales (cars, bikes, rickshaws and more) are up, and heat pump sales are getting a boost right now thanks to last year's big DPA win.

But our concern is that a lot of this year's progress is flowing from last year’s progress, like the Inflation Reduction Act. It's PRO-renewable, but it's not ANTI-fossil fuel, or anti-fascist.

And that's a problem because all through 2023 President Biden kept picking the side of fossil fuels (like the Willow Arctic Oil project, the Alaska LNG project, the MVP etc) and fossil fuel fascists (Manchin, negotiating with McCarthy or whoever runs the MAGA house these days etc).

So starting late in the summer, we tried our best to box Biden in – starting with general demands in September to end the era of fossil fuels. Big marches, rallies, and direct actions in New York and San Francisco, and more, took aim at the production gap and the finance gap. It made an impact on the public conversation and in how people around the world talk about climate change – most famously by getting the COP28 negotiators to agree to phase our fossil fuels.

Late in the year a bunch or new reports and data came out that Biden and the US' real problem was with new fossil fuel infrastructure and exports, in particular. So we've narrowed in on that, and the CP2 export facility in particular, right at the end of the year.

And finally, we came right back to fossil fuel fascists as Trump resumed a dominance of political headlines with new fascist talking points and plans; And at the same moment international allies from Ukraine made the point we’ve been making in the US, which is that there's a direct causal link between fossil fuel exports and fascism.

So, we're wrapping up 2023 having changed the narrative, but not (yet) changed the policies around fossil fuels. We'll start next month with a renewed focus on Trump and the 14th amendment (wining) and on fossil fuel exports (delay, but not decision, so far). Onward to 2024 - and chip in if you haven't yet to fund our fights!

Thanks,

Drew and the 198 charts and graphs crew

There are way too many sources to list them all here. But check out the blog post and scroll down to the long version for all of them - and feel free to grab charts and graphs from our slides and sources to spread the word.