Record number of deep sea explorers

Hey fam,

Happy Friday! Whatever your week was like, let's take a few moments to ground ourselves and remember good things are still happening.

And first up, a quick update for you all - about two months ago, you may remember that I came across an amazing app called Fathomverse where everyday people can help with actual species identification in real life just by playing a game on our phones... I thought it was so epic that I had to share the story.

They just reached out to let me know that my coverage "blew their stats out of the water" and led to a huge surge in players (as shown on this graph they sent me.) This was thanks to all of you! Together, we have a lot of power to do good in the world. Let's keep it up. They also have a brand new update to the game if you're interested!

This week we're covering the possibility of skyscrapers turning into power plants with transparent solar panel windows, the largest wildlife crossing in the world, a church turning their vacant land into a community farm, and much more. Enjoy!

March 2025's best stories

✈️ A planned airport near Toronto was scrapped to instead become a protected park (Emma McIntosh|The Narwhal)

🧪 530 safer alternatives to harmful PFAs were published in an open database (Paige Bennett|Ecowatch)

🐬 A failed whale tour decided to stay out a little longer and found a superpod of over 2,000 dolphins (Sara Ruberg|NYT)

🎭 In honor of Mardi Gras, students Alexis and Lauren invented a better version of the iconic beads using bio-based 3D printing (Kamrin Baker|GoodGoodGood, LSU)

🪧 Protests took place across all 433 US National Parks sites to fight for the protection of public lands (Resistance Rangers)

🌚 A blood moon happened on my birthday where a full lunar eclipse turned the moon a brilliant red (Caela Barry|NASA, Kelly Tyko|Axios)

🧑‍⚖️ The US Supreme Court rejected an attempt to let Big Oil off the hook for deceiving the public, so states will move forward with accountability lawsuits (Nate Raymond|Reuters)

🦅 A bald eagle live stream let 100,000 people witness the fascinating birth of a third eaglet to parents Jackie and Shadow (FOBBV)

📉 The UK’s emissions fell to the lowest level since 1872 (Carbon Brief)

📚 The 200,000th Little Free Library was created (Little Free Library)

🌳 A magical 300-year-old beech tree was voted Europe’s Tree of the Year (Maddie Molloy|BBC)

🚶 Paris voted to close 500 streets and 10% of their parking spots to become green paths for walking and biking (Feargus O'Sullivan|Bloomberg)

🔭 The first observation from the largest-ever cosmic atlas was released which will capture billions of galaxies(ESA)

🤝 And our community started a free ingredients library, regularly contacted their elected representatives, sewed a quilt from old memorable clothes, and so much more.

Let's keep this going in April, fam!

What if we built a solar-powered town in real life?

This was a paid collaboration just for social media, but I wanted to include it here as well to fill in today's gap and provide more interesting content that you may like :)

That's exactly what retired NFL player Syd Kitson thought as a child... and now he's made it a reality. I got to go check out America's first solar-powered town in person, touch a solar panel for the first time (it kinda just felt like glass though), and learn more about community-focused town design. I teamed up with Babcock Ranch to tell their story, and while I had a lot of interest in it and felt you all would too, I was paid to create this piece. Check it out if you're curious!

Tuesday, April 1

📜 1500 acres were just returned to the Prairie Band Potawatomi nation to become a preserved park managed by the tribe, which is the first federally recognized nation in Illinois, as the state returns the land stolen 175 years ago in another example of the Land Back movement gaining momentum (Violet Miller|Chicago Sun Times)

🌇 Skyscrapers could soon become power plants as researchers in Denmark just broke the record for power-generating transparent windows, reaching 12.3% efficiency which is getting close to regular solar panels that have around 20%, and the team says materials are highly affordable as well (Pascale Davies|Euronews, Anthony Cuthbertson|Independent)

🦅 A massive review of 67,000 animal species shows that in the midst of our current biodiversity crisis, targeted conservation efforts are working in many cases, showing that while we have a long way to go to protect the natural world, very smart scientists and researchers are leading the way (Phys)

🌱 sokabo (from our community) is working at their public library to educate people on saving native plant seeds to protect local biodiversity.

Wednesday, April 2

🛣️ The world’s largest wildlife crossing stretching over 200 feet across a major highway in California just started laying down soil, which should be completed next year to substantially reduce collisions between animals and cars, saving lives while avoiding repair costs (Will Conybeare|KTLA)

🏙️ New York City’s Local Law 154 which sets limits on gas emissions in most new buildings was just upheld in federal court, meaning the city’s electrification push can continue which will protect our health, modernize buildings, and lower costs (Paige Bennett|Ecowatch)

🦁 Five lions named Rori, Amani, Lira, Vanda, and Yuna have finally touched grass for the first time after a 10-month rescue mission from war-torn Ukraine, bringing these beautiful animals to the Big Cat Sanctuary in the UK, who are reportedly beginning to relax, explore, and play (Joshua Askew|BBC, Big Cat Sanctuary)

🌊 Penguin (from our community) gets to access and enjoy a private city lake that was just made public by a local judge.

Thursday, April 3

⛪️ A church in Ohio turned their vacant land into an urban garden to help feed their community back in 2009, which has now grown to six farming plots, growing 75 different kinds of fruits and veggies, providing 65,000 pounds of produce for community members (Kamrin Baker|GoodGoodGood)

⛏️ Portugal is the first country to pass a law banning deep sea mining until at least 2050, becoming the first of 32 countries advocating for a global ban of the harmful and unnecessary practice to take the next step and solidify their stance into law, hopefully spurring other nations to follow their lead (Oceanographic, Deep Sea Conservation Coalition)

🌡️ An Indian city’s intentional design has decreased temperatures by 2-3 degrees Celsius while rarely turning on air conditioning, trying to turn Palava into a net-zero city with all essentials within a 20 minute walk from homes, green spaces all over, and harnessing the natural wind for cooling, amongst other futuristic approaches (Allyson Chiu|Washington Post)

🌿 vec_veronanj (from our community) has been teaching neighbors how to remove invasive ivy that’s harmful to trees.

Bonus!

🔋 California now has 50% more electric chargers than gas stations

🦈 The first known recording of sharks sounds dropped... and it's a bunch of clicks

🤘 The cleanest concert of all time, by... Massive Attack

Spread this breath of fresh air🪴

By supporting Climativity, you're helping these good stories reach more people around the world.

Support good news & independent publishing

This newsletter was written by Jacob Simon from Brooklyn, NY. 900,000+ people are in our community across Instagram, TikTok, Threads, YouTube, and Bluesky. You can say hi on LinkedIn, or by emailing jacob@jacobsimonsays.com.