Image credit: Over the Garden Wall

“Is the dove never to meet the sea, for want of the odious mountain?” — Wirt, Over the Garden Wall

After the intoxicating rush of Spotify Wrapped, then frantically texting my sisters to see how we compare (turns out we’re a homogeneous group of indie lovers), I’m sobered by the reminder that there seems to be zero privacy to the things I subject my eardrums to. It seems harmless enough, the tacit tracking of my listening habits, yet I’m concerned with the extent to which the omnipresent surveillance is hiding in plain sight.

It also appears to be a one way street. We, the consumers, have extremely little visibility into the minds of the giants that serve us our dopamine hits. There’s a lot to unpack here: algorithms, willful ignorance, self expression,  free speech, media distortion, multinational corporations, unchecked wealth, corruption, market freedoms, environment, rights, dignity, deterrence, and myriad other collisions of the systems we participate in.

There’s so much that I tend to shut down. It is far easier to put on another podcast and do the laundry than it is to look existential dread in the face and do something about it. But occasionally I get curious and like to look at outcomes. While I may not be able to ride the invisible hand around, reading the material impact on our globe is an increasingly acute way to get a sense of the real cost of our habits. So, to honor the year end tradition, here are some of the greatest climate hits of 2025.

We (aren’t quite) the champions!

Average global temperature for this year is set to be 1.48°C above pre-industrial levels. That’s a tie with 2023 for second place, with 2024 still holding the champion’s title.

Smoke on the Water (and over a lot of land)

40,000 acres and 12,300 structures were scorched in LA as over 200,000 people needed evacuation. But that was a taste of what would come. 63,880 fires burned 4,949,852 acres in the US. In Canada, 6,117 fires burned over 20,509,746 acres (converted from hectares).

Emission Control?

Despite Fossil Fuel CO2 emissions projected to increase by 1.1 percent globally (the numbers aren’t in yet), thirty-five countries were able to reduce their emissions while growing their economies. Are future leaders of the green economy emerging?

Artist of the Year—The Department of Energy

The new DOE came out swinging this year with their riveting Critical Review of the Impact of Greenhouse Gases on the U.S. Climate. Under the guise of advocating for nuclear energy, which is only mentioned once in the secretary’s forward, six researchers slapped together a report that misrepresents others’ research in two months. For context, it took hundreds of scientists three years to put together the congressionally mandated Fifth National Climate Assessment.

Our Controversial Genre—Techno Optimism

Bill Gates is not wrong to report the fact that climate projections are improving. They are, and we should celebrate accordingly. However, a US Billionaire asking COP30, with no official US representation, to trust the innovative process feels a bit like Poseidon telling the octopus to stick to the tide pools while he zips around claiming more of the ocean.

I actively engage in habits that contribute to all of this. Some by necessity, others by choice. I try my best to be a conscious consumer, but it’s clear to me that the scope of environmental risk is too great to be offset by individual choice alone. The promise of a greener future is an invigorating prospect, one that we will need our systems to embrace.

As it stands, I may have the chance to put together fifty to sixty more of these annual check-ins. It is my hope that they would trend toward celebrating the work we will do, but, as the future is wont to be, I imagine it’ll be more complicated than I can imagine. So, let me leave you with Jane Hirshfields’s hauntingly hopeful poem Let Them Not Say:

Let them not say:   we did not see it.
We saw.

Let them not say:   we did not hear it.
We heard.

Let them not say:   they did not taste it.
We ate, we trembled.

Let them not say:   it was not spoken, not written.
We spoke,
we witnessed with voices and hands.

Let them not say:   they did nothing.
We did not-enough.

Let them say, as they must say something:

A kerosene beauty.
It burned.

Let them say we warmed ourselves by it,
read by its light, praised,
and it burned.

Clint Wilson

Clint Wilson (‘23) graduated from Calvin with an official degree in philosophy and unofficial degree in outdoor rec. They currently live in Denver and are working remotely for an LSAT prep company. You’ll likely find them slowly jogging a trail, belaying their wife up some rocks, or reading beneath a heap of blankets.