Editor's Note for October 2025 Networker
Whether it’s climate tipping points or the destruction in Gaza that’s occupying my mind at any given moment, I know I’m likely exuding this heaviness in every personal interaction. So I’m glad to have in my back pocket a shareable tiny-but-inspiring discovery: Helianthus angustifolius L., or, the swamp- or narrowleaf sunflower. As the latest-blooming sunflower (August through November, depending on where you are; for me, blooming began in September and is only now winding down), it’s a very helpful, bright burst around now, as the darkening days we expect of the season cycle seem to take on a potent metaphorical quality too. Intrigued, I’d grabbed a still-bloomless one at a nursery in the mid-summer and will now add it to my application to join my region’s Pollinator Pathway (the linked page is searchable for such projects all around the United States). Listed as a threatened native plant in my state, New York, I’m now a self-appointed ambassador spreading the joy of this plant that is noted to be “a valuable late season nectar and pollen source for pollinator species,” and to “have special value to native bees.”
And of course these things actually do meet up. I’ve been slowly reading through a report by the Center for Applied Environmental Diplomacy (CAED) at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, with Damour for Community Development, that offers a blueprint for Palestinian-led and governed “nature-based and decentralized solutions for Gaza’s recovery.” The writing is alternately utterly devastating (in laying out the present reality) and inspiring (in its vision), as well as idealistic in the best sense. A long list of solutions in what the plan calls the “transformative stage” includes green corridors with “networks of vegetated areas connecting larger green spaces to support wildlife, pollinators and protect migratory routes of birds while providing urban cooling.” Native seed varieties that were developed over generations would be part of an “equitable food future for Gaza.” I deeply hope for this kind of future.
We continue our collective work defending public health and environment. Complementing Carolyn Raffensperger’s “13 Questions to Ask Your Public Officials About the Water Footprint of a Locally Proposed Data Center or Carbon Capture and Storage Project” last month, this month SEHN Fellow Peter Montague contributes, “When a Data Center Proposal Comes to Your Town.” This is both a primer—what is a data center and what is artificial intelligence (AI)?—and a guide covering the range of potential impacts of a data center on a hosting community. Peter also describes how these industrial facilities could actually be planned and constructed in far more environmentally- and economically-sound ways than we are typically seeing in the current mad rush to build them, and the community input and monitoring activities that these developments will require of us.
Stepping out further for a big picture view, Carolyn revisits a 2009 essay of her own exploring the idea of a “morally mature culture.” She recalls first hearing the term “moral maturity” in a stirring piece by environmental writer Reverend Benjamin Webb (unfortunately not available online to share here). In her new essay, Carolyn asks what is required right now of the dominant U.S. culture, in order to change course and veer toward collective wellbeing. She writes, “If we are to develop moral maturity as a culture we will have to evolve beyond our technophilia and develop principles for covenants with the natural world and with each other,” and lays out several resolute steps for how to do so.
The idea of prophetic voices, past and present, animate Carolyn’s essay. This month Carolyn also pays tribute to her friend and friend of SEHN, Joanna Macy, who died over the summer. Macy was described as a “powerful prophetic voice in global movements for peace, justice, and ecology,” in her obituary.
Our senior scientist and writer in residence Sandra Steingraber was recently invited to speak at a Congressional forum on fracking in Mexico, with long-time colleagues of ours at the Alianza Mexicana Contra el Fracking. Her column this month is Part 2 of “The Intended Consequences of the Permian Basin.” It explains the links between U.S. fracking, Mexican sovereignty, how fracking in Mexico became—through a certain lens—an anti-Trump policy, and the voices resisting this perilous path.
Today, October 23, 2025, marks ten years since the discovery of the largest methane gas release in U.S. history, the Aliso Canyon blowout near Los Angeles. A coalition of groups is hosting a town hall this Sunday to hear updates on the UCLA-led study on health impacts of the blowout, fenceline monitoring of airborne chemicals, and other topics relevant to this disaster’s aftermath. Despite ongoing pressure from the heavily impacted nearby community, late last year the California Public Utilities Commission voted to continue to keep the Aliso Canyon underground gas storage facility in operation. Next month we’ll be releasing our update to the section of our fracking science Compendium addressing gas-fired residential appliances: the “fracking tailpipes” in homes that, in spite of a now extensive body of literature on their harms, help keep methane gas demand high. We’re eager to add our report to the toolbox for community and policy work to rapidly change this.
Warmly, with solidarity,
Carmi Orenstein, MPH