Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 23h

thank you so much Juan!!

Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Juan Meneses | Postpolitics and the Aesthetic Imagination @dissentum.bsky.social · 23h

Yesterday I attended a great talk by @triofrancos.bsky.social on the complexities of the energy transition. Go see her talk if she stops near you!

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 23h

🙏

Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Newton @tworooks.bsky.social · 1d

i’ve read many ecological economics and climate books and papers over the last twenty years, this is one of the very best.

focusing on lithium, a tremendous achievement in weaving an excruciatingly complex topic - the green transition - into a coherent illuminating narrative.

tinyurl.com/3xatdvby

Extraction

'Dazzling in the bold questions it asks.…An immense contribution.' —Naomi Klein<br /><br />An in-depth investigation into the growing industry of green technologies and the environmental,...

wwnorton.com

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 23h

thank you! i’m so glad you enjoyed it

Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Ilias Alami @iliasalami.bsky.social · 2d

Look forward to speaking at the online launch of @transitionsec.bsky.social this week (link below)

I’ll discuss how the recent turn to state capitalism changed the nature of US empire, w/ @pmbigger.bsky.social sky.social @lalehkhalili.bsky.social @triofrancos.bsky.social @stephensemler.bsky.social

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Noah Berlatsky @nberlat.bsky.social · 17d

it's a great book. highly recommended. (though it's really depressing) www.versobooks.com/products/704...

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Noah Berlatsky @nberlat.bsky.social · 17d

Daniel Denvir's book on immigration explains that Ds have spent decades trying to get to the right of Rs on immigration, with the result that support for immigration has cratered and everyone thinks there's a crisis.

Elad Nehorai @eladn.bsky.social · 18d

Ezra Klein explains why he is against the “oppositional” approach of Dems. One example he gives is blatantly false: immigration.

But more important: Klein shows how folks like him almost always casually throw vulnerable people under the bus in the name of “practicality.”

What happens is Trump then wins, which is taken as truly shocking, and the Democratic Party begins to take on the opposite positions of Trump in many ways. Trump is the most anti-immigrant President of our lifetime— not just in his desire to build a wall but emotionally anti-immigrant. The Democratic Party becomes much more pro-immigrant. If you're going to build a wall, we're going to debate legalizing, decriminalizing, illegal border crossing.

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Daniel Aldana Cohen @aldasky.bsky.social · 2d

Green economic populism fights fascism by rooting green progress in working class life

—make modern, green housing affordable to all, instead of yelling at immigrants

—build free tranist & EV chargers everywhere, instead of yelling at immigrants

—unionize green economy, instead of elevating Elon

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Daniel Denvir @danieldenvir.bsky.social · 4d

New @thedigradio.bsky.social: SECOND of two w @melindacooper.bsky.social on Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance. How asset boom and bust drove MAGA’s rise and also revealed powerful monetary tools that could make socialism—that and more www.thedigradio.com/podcast/from...

From Fiscal Austerity to Monetary Abundance w/ Melinda Cooper

Featuring Melinda Cooper on Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance. Balanced budget conservatism and supply side populism engineered a politics of austerity and budget deficit...

www.thedigradio.com

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 4d

thank you! appreciated

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 5d

very curious where the debates are at these days re: "climate politics should be about the wonky details of energy transition" vs "climate politics and advocacy should be vocally connected to all the other progressive issues"

jael holzman @jael.bsky.social · 5d

SCOOP: The Bureau of Land Management says the largest solar project in Nevada — the Esmeralda 7 mega-farm — has been canceled

The news was quietly dropped via a sudden website update with no public word from any of the companies involved or a statement from the agency

@heatmap.news

Esmeralda 7 Solar Project Has Been Canceled, BLM Says

It would have delivered a gargantuan 6.2 gigawatts of power.

heatmap.news

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 4d

thanks! @commiedharma.bsky.social I also wrote a response to that piece from Commune, years ago when it was published fwiw viewpointmag.com/2019/05/16/p...

Plan, Mood, Battlefield - Reflections on the Green New Deal - Viewpoint Magazine

"At every node in this global chain, the technical and the political are intimately entangled. Declaring by fiat that decarbonization is unlikely or impossible amounts to an avoidance of the complex, ...

viewpointmag.com

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Clayton Oppenhuizen @csoppenhuizen.bsky.social · 4d

That's interesting, it could be proximity (as in i follow them) but @triofrancos.bsky.social has a great new book that is all about the costs of green. And it joins a broader literature of 21st-century environmental costs of our economy (see red cobalt among others).

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 5d

I hope you enjoy it and it’s useful for your research!

Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Marina Nagornaia @marinagornaia.bsky.social · 5d

One more added to my ever growing To Be Read list.

Very on topic for the short article I'm writing for student magazine Rostra Economica: an exploratory article showcasing the negative externalities related to lithium mining in Chile, incentivized by rising demand for electric vehicles.

Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · Mar 3

Why are minerals so central to geopolitics? How green are electric cars? Why is anti-mining protest increasing? Can the inequalities of the global economy be transformed?

I tackle these topics in my book EXTRACTION: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism

👀 September 2025 @wwnorton.bsky.social

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Climate and Community Institute @cplusc.bsky.social · 5d

The official launch of @transitionsec.bsky.social is in just one week! Join CCI & @cmmonwealth.bsky.social
at the free inaugural panel event featuring our strategic co-dir @triofrancos.bsky.social:
🔗 shorturl.at/NwJCL

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Patrick Bigger @pmbigger.bsky.social · 5d

Join us next week for our launch webinar featuring @lalehkhalili.bsky.social @triofrancos.bsky.social @stephensemler.bsky.social & @iliasalami.bsky.social to get some of the best new thinking on how to move from economic precarity, climate crisis, & unsettled geopolitics to genuine human security

War, Climate Crisis and the Economy: Transition Security Project Launch

A collaboration between Common Wealth and Climate & Community Institute to investigate the US and UK military industrial complexes.

www.eventbrite.co.uk

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Transition Security Project @transitionsec.bsky.social · 6d

🚨 1 WEEK TO GO!
🎟️ 350+ tickets gone!

Join us to launch @transitionsec.bsky.social with a panel on the war economy, climate crisis & the geopolitics of the climate transition.

🎙️ @stephensemler.bsky.social @iliasalami.bsky.social @triofrancos.bsky.social
🪑 @lalehkhalili.bsky.social
shorturl.at/njU0q

War, Climate Crisis and the Economy: Transition Security Project Launch

A collaboration between Common Wealth and Climate & Community Institute to investigate the US and UK military industrial complexes.

shorturl.at

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

James Belcher @jamesbelcher.bsky.social · 6d

"I say this more to our liberal or centrist counterparts—that when you don’t think critically about extraction, you can find yourself having promoted all this mining supposedly for the energy transition, but now it’s not even being used for that."

"Centering the Climate-Economy Intersection Is Our Only Way Forward"

An interview with Thea Riofrancos on climate left strategy, asymmetric polarization, and "critical" minerals

open.substack.com

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Matthew Haugen @mjhaugen.bsky.social · 6d

I interviewed @triofrancos.bsky.social for @cplusc.bsky.social climatecommunityinstitute.substack.com/p/centering-...

"Centering the Climate-Economy Intersection Is Our Only Way Forward"

An interview with Thea Riofrancos on climate left strategy, asymmetric polarization, and "critical" minerals

climatecommunityinstitute.substack.com

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 7d

Read my analysis here www.ft.com/content/6ff9... and reporting on Trilogy here www.ft.com/content/8951...

Trump’s resource nationalism is the worst of all worlds

Demand for rare earths is greatest in the clean energy sector that the US president is intent on dismantling

www.ft.com

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 7d

The US government has acquired stakes in a 3rd mining company, Trilogy Metals. The Trump admin now owns equity in rare earths (MP Materials), lithium (Lithium Americas), and copper (Trilogy). This "right-wing resource nationalism" derisks mining assets, inflates share values & deregulates governance

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Thea Riofrancos @triofrancos.bsky.social · 7d

The feeling is mutual Rosie !! Thank you so much. Glad you enjoyed this

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Reposted by Thea Riofrancos

Rosie Collington @rosiecollington.bsky.social · 7d

At this point I am just a @triofrancos.bsky.social superfan & wanna recommend everything she’s doing but I particularly enjoyed this interview with @jathansadowski.com & @edwardongwesojr.com on all things extraction, stranded renewables assets, China, & much more 🫡
open.spotify.com/episode/4kfb...

425. The Oxymorons of Green Capitalism (ft. Thea Riofrancos)

open.spotify.com

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