Dr Helena Wright

Executive Director, Oxford Climate Policy Monitor. Climate, food, oceans, saving the planet. Former @FAIRRInitiative @wwf @govuk @E3G. Views my own.

[Food and Agriculture Organization @FAO]

🔥 For every 1°C increase in average global temperatures, we are seeing up to a 6% decrease in yield for the four major crops – maize, rice, soy and wheat – that provide 60% of global calories.

More in @FAO-@WMO report👉 https://t.co/dyTg4xyBHp

#ExtremeHeat

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@MethaneData @IEA @Gmethanehub @MethanePledge @ember_energy 🧵/4 Agriculture makes up largest human source of methane. 13 jurisdictions - including EU & France, making up 20% of emissions - did not have any agri #methane policies. The focus on energy neglects other high impact pathways, such as dietary changes. @ChangingMarkets

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

🧵 NEW blog by me on *methane* @ConversationUK

"How methane policy will make or break the climate crisis"

There’s no sign that methane emissions are declining globally. Oxford analysed methane policies across 32 jurisdictions..

https://t.co/mjO0tGMJHs

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@MethaneData @IEA @Gmethanehub @MethanePledge 🧵/3 On methane policies related to fossil fuels, most policies targeted oil and gas. In the current context of high energy prices, cutting methane emissions can also help improve energy security & reduce wastage. Think tank @ember_energy also identified #coal methane as a gap

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@paulpowlesland Every parents group I have been in has been sharing recommendations for splash pads & lidos to cool off in the recent #heatwave. Cooling & #shade #trees must be considered critical infrastructure to cope with urban #heat. We have to #plant them now.

https://t.co/ajVhEIjlY2

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@SadiqKhan @metecoban92 Would be great to have more urban #trees at playgrounds & more splash pads for children to #adapt to #climatechange.

Every #parent group I am in is sharing recommendations for #splashpads and #playgrounds with #shade.

#heatwave #london #children

[Rosie P 🦇 🦎 🕷️ 🦭 🐌 🍃🌳🚲💧 @RosieP4]

This is utterly heartbreaking- what is wrong with developers?
The swifts are seen trying to return to their nests and the nests are no longer there

https://t.co/f3pRJMJM3T

[Ed Miliband @Ed_Miliband]

1/ NEW: The net zero economy is now supporting:

✅Over 1m jobs
✅£105bn in GVA
✅22,000 small businesses

This analysis from @CBItweets is a reminder that net zero is a great British success story. And exactly why this Government is doubling down.

https://t.co/ppuG7DKY2B

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@YadaYadaKvp @MikeLevin It would be interesting to calculate but I wonder if any politician, alive or dead, has ever amassed more from corruption whilst in office.

[Mike Levin @MikeLevin]

Follow the money on this one. It is rotten to the core.

The Pentagon just lent $620,000,000 to a tiny North Carolina startup called Vulcan Elements. The company is two years old.

It had fewer than 50 employees.

And three months before the deal was announced, Donald Trump Jr.’s venture firm quietly took a stake in it.

Here is the part the administration tried to bury.

Of the dozens of companies the Pentagon was weighing, Vulcan was the only deal initiated by a top White House aide. That aide was Peter Navarro, a close friend of Trump Jr. The order came down to move fast.

One official put it plainly: The call came from the White House. We have to get this done.

Staff worked late nights to push it through in weeks. Deals like this normally take many months of vetting. And when it closed, Vulcan’s valuation jumped from about 200 million dollars to roughly 2 billion.

A windfall for the investors, including the president’s son.

This is public money. Your money.

Routed through the Pentagon to enrich the president’s family and their friends. The Bush administration’s own chief ethics lawyer called it corruption we pay for.

And there is more coming.

A drone parts company Trump Jr. holds a stake in is also under Pentagon review.

This is not a one-off. It is a pattern. The president’s family is treating the federal Treasury like a private bank, and the bill lands on every taxpayer.

https://t.co/4kB1cZNmlE

[Erika Guevara Rosas @ErikaGuevaraR]

Generative AI doesn’t run on magic. It runs on massive data pipelines built on privacy violations by design.

Our new @Amnesty report exposes how big tech’s AI systems are powered by surveillance, data extraction, and abuse of people’s rights, at scale.

We researched the models powering some of the most popular publicly available standalone generative AI tools, including GPT 3 by Open AI, Google’s Gemini, Meta’s Llama, DeepSeek and tools by Midjourney and Stable Diffusion.

This is not innovation at any cost. It comes at a high price: our human rights.

Read the report: https://t.co/MGRonqai7o

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@jeffrsebo But AI sentience is a future possibility that is many decades away. Agree it's an interesting theoretical issue but worry about diversion of funds & priorities which I already observed. If there is diversion of funds from animal welfare, that has a real world impact today.

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@jeffrsebo I think AI will mimic consciousness, and it will be difficult to disprove. The article claims there is a risk we will mishandle AI welfare in the future. But we are already mishandling animal welfare now, so why not focus on that.

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@jeffrsebo I am pretty sure that AI research is taking funding away from work on animals. Because there is funding in it. Energy and attention have been taking away from efforts to improve the lives of animals, and towards the new hype of AI.

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@jeffrsebo Animals are sentient, whereas AI is a pattern recognition software. People are being sold the idea that AI is truly intelligent when it is not. https://t.co/y0Dz9L8gmA

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@jeffrsebo I am sorry but I think equating the rights of animals, which we know are sentient, with AI systems, is flawed and wrong.

[Dr Ellie Chowns MP @EllieChowns]

Honoured to take part in the launch of the River Wye charter, a landmark recognition of the rights of our beloved river and the urgent need to do everything possible to protect and restore the Wye catchment💚

[Financial Times @FT]

Pope Leo warns AI revolution driven by ‘idolatry of profit’ https://t.co/6Mq352otCF

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

@SadiqKhan @metecoban92 Would be great to have more urban #trees at playgrounds & more splash pads for children to #adapt to #climatechange.

Every #parent group I am in is sharing recommendations for #splashpads and #playgrounds with #shade.

#heatwave #london #children

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

Hottest May Day on record. It is only going to get hotter with #climate change.

Does the UK need more splash parks for #children and to #plant more #trees for shade to adapt to this heat?

#heatwave #climatechange
@MayorofLondon @TreesforStreets

https://t.co/Fhy3ZlqocN

[Dr Helena Wright @_HWright]

Attenborough's new documentary "Secret Garden" points out that some wildlife-friendly gardens can be almost as diverse as a patch of rainforest

#gardens #wildlife #nature #restoration #diversity

https://t.co/ghHEp216aU

[Tony Juniper @TonyJuniper]

It’s striking how much wildlife can live in even quite small gardens. Plenty of damselflies emerging from the pond at the moment, & three species too.