Today’s Solutions: January 17, 2025

Climate Action

What is Climate Action? Climate Action is humanity's efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and enhance our planet's resilience against climate change. From adaptation to mitigation, at The Optimist Daily you will learn about the most recent positive news stories and solutions targeting climate change and other environmental issues.

young healthy vegan couple prepares meal in kitchen

Plant-based pleasure—why vegans have better sex

It’s common knowledge in the emoji world that fruits and veggies (peaches and eggplants) have a sexy rep—but could the sexiness of plant-based foods translate to real life? The answer is yes. We’ve shared many stories about how eating more plants is better for the planet and our bodies, Read More...

Wind turbine in snow

100 percent renewable energy could prevent natural disaster blackouts

With storms growing in intensity the world over, such as Storm Eunice in Europe, solutions for enduring extreme weather are greater than ever. Adapting energy grids is particularly important to avoid blackouts.  Recent research shows, fortunately, that switching entirely to renewable energy Read More...

diverse team of professionals put hands together

A seat at the table for underrepresented communities

Climate change is already affecting all of us—however, those that bear the brunt of these consequences are predominantly from low-income, marginalized, BIPOC communities. So why is it that out of the organizations that are trying to confront climate change and find solutions, about 95 percent of Read More...

Underwater coral reef background.

Two-thirds of seafloor life is waiting to be discovered

Most of our planet is filled with water. Amazingly, though, two-thirds of life occupying the seafloor is still waiting to be discovered, finds a recent study published in Science Advances. DNA sequencing techniques also revealed that there is at least three times more life on the seafloor than Read More...

Oil spill on water

Sunlight helps dissolve oil spills

In a recent study of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, researchers discovered that approximately 10 percent of oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico was dissolved by sunlight.  Oil can partially dissipate and dissolve in seawater through natural processes, which scientists account for. These Read More...

variety of broken glass items with a mountain of cullet in the background

UK man has a plan to reduce glass waste

Lately, and for obvious reasons, there’s been a lot of attention on figuring out what to do with all the plastic clogging up our oceans and waterways. While solving this problem is obviously important, the plastic issue also highlights an overarching problem, not necessarily with hard-to-recycle Read More...

Serre Chevalier ski resort

“All we need is change”—Serre Chevalier makes skiing more sustainable

Does the climate catastrophe that we find ourselves in herald the end of ski resorts? Visiting the slopes for a weekend of skiing and snowboarding is now tinged with the guilt of all the environmental damage that goes along with it.  Between the short-haul, carbon-emitting flights many skiers Read More...

Novoloop founders

Female-led start-up Novoloop figures out how to upcycle plastic waste

A new, female-led US-based start-up, Novoloop, has an exciting announcement— they’ve come up with an effective solution to problematic polyethylene (aka the regular everyday plastic that’s polluting our planet). Scientists and Novoloop founders Jeanny Yao and Miranda Wang have been working Read More...

ethnic woman reaches into laundry machine

UK households get paid to curb daily energy use

Households in the UK could soon be paid to curb their electricity usage for a certain time of day (during peak usage hours) under a new scheme to help reduce energy bills while pushing for a zero-carbon power supply system. Starting in this past week, the trial for this plan, led by Octopus Read More...

solar panels in dry hot California

California shades irrigation canals with solar panels to boost energy and save water

Solar energy is one of the fastest-growing renewable energy industries in the world, however, that doesn’t mean that we aren’t faced with challenges in the widespread implementation and harvesting of solar power. One of the biggest issues with solar energy is that the land that is usually ideal Read More...