James Bridle
@jamesbridle.bsky.social
Artist, author of New Dark Age (2018) and Ways of Being (2022). Free Palestine, Protect Trans Kids, for ever and ever. https://mastodon.social/@jamesbridle / jamesbridle.com
I don’t think solar panels will magically save us: I do think that the more of us actively engaged in the transition has benefits for the planet and our communities which will help us face an uncertain future. This is one way to do it.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
I don’t think solar panels will magically save us: I do think that the more of us actively engaged in the transition has benefits for the planet and our communities which will help us face an uncertain future. This is one way to do it.
It’s a nascent political form within the transition, and it’s #actuallyexistingsolarpunk: not just technology, but a shift in how we live. We can redistribute power. I’m helping to start an energy community where I live. You can too. We all can.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
It’s a nascent political form within the transition, and it’s #actuallyexistingsolarpunk: not just technology, but a shift in how we live. We can redistribute power. I’m helping to start an energy community where I live. You can too. We all can.
It’s not really about selling the excess: it’s about combating energy poverty and increasing energy democracy, while actually and actively changing the energy mix, and building community.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
It’s not really about selling the excess: it’s about combating energy poverty and increasing energy democracy, while actually and actively changing the energy mix, and building community.
It’s owned by the community, the community sells that power to the grid and gets money off their bills, and sells the excess. My friends at Hyperion Solar Community in Athens are a good example: hyperion-community.gr/en/
Home - ΥΠΕΡΙΩΝ
HYPERION's purpose is to provide its members with clean and cheap energy and to develop services and actions that contribute to a fair energy transition.
hyperion-community.gr
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
It’s owned by the community, the community sells that power to the grid and gets money off their bills, and sells the excess. My friends at Hyperion Solar Community in Athens are a good example: hyperion-community.gr/en/
Energy communities are when a group of people get together to make their own power. You invest together in a renewable energy plant – could be solar, wind, hydro, or even storage, like a battery site.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
Energy communities are when a group of people get together to make their own power. You invest together in a renewable energy plant – could be solar, wind, hydro, or even storage, like a battery site.
We can do it together. We can form our own energy communities: www.rescoop.eu/toolbox/comm...
Community Energy: A practical guide to reclaiming power - REScoop
www.rescoop.eu
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
We can do it together. We can form our own energy communities: www.rescoop.eu/toolbox/comm...
In that post about possibility, Ben talks about massive off-grid solar for direct use as one of the features of the coming transition – but there’s another aspect, which is more relevant to the point of the gift of the sun: you don’t have to go off-grid, or wait for governments to do something.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
In that post about possibility, Ben talks about massive off-grid solar for direct use as one of the features of the coming transition – but there’s another aspect, which is more relevant to the point of the gift of the sun: you don’t have to go off-grid, or wait for governments to do something.
In New York, the brilliant www.solarpowerforartists.com is creating tiny window mounts for solar panels, accessible even to those who rent: energytransitiondesign.com/products/
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
In New York, the brilliant www.solarpowerforartists.com is creating tiny window mounts for solar panels, accessible even to those who rent: energytransitiondesign.com/products/
I’ve used the microtransformers built for balcony solar installations in my solar panel artworks. This means they plug directly into the local network, without batteries or the grid, and power the gallery, institution or site hosting them (e.g. an archeological site): jamesbridle.com/works/things...
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
I’ve used the microtransformers built for balcony solar installations in my solar panel artworks. This means they plug directly into the local network, without batteries or the grid, and power the gallery, institution or site hosting them (e.g. an archeological site): jamesbridle.com/works/things...
But there’s more. Firstly, there are really interesting things happening around solar, driven by and shaping this transition, which you can meaningfully participate in. For example, balcony solar. This is solar at the scale not of a rooftop, or a garden, but a small apartment.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
But there’s more. Firstly, there are really interesting things happening around solar, driven by and shaping this transition, which you can meaningfully participate in. For example, balcony solar. This is solar at the scale not of a rooftop, or a garden, but a small apartment.
This is #actuallyexistingsolarpunk: the realisation that the tools we already have to hand are far more transformative, and more ecologically beneficial in every sense, than all the speculation around novel digital technologies: bsky.app/profile/jame...
"Actually existing AI" is a phrase I use a lot, to separate reality from hype. "Actually existing solarpunk" is one I might start using. Because I genuinely believe that a general energy transition is *more possible* than general artificial intelligence, and more exciting and more equitable.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
This is #actuallyexistingsolarpunk: the realisation that the tools we already have to hand are far more transformative, and more ecologically beneficial in every sense, than all the speculation around novel digital technologies: bsky.app/profile/jame...
In fact, this is already happening, as the FT reported last year. Once you factor in the savings on an electricity bill, it is already cheaper in the Netherlands and Germany to install solar PV panels as garden fencing, than to use wood: archive.is/elGzu
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
In fact, this is already happening, as the FT reported last year. Once you factor in the savings on an electricity bill, it is already cheaper in the Netherlands and Germany to install solar PV panels as garden fencing, than to use wood: archive.is/elGzu
Ben pointed out in that piece that the price of solar panels is getting so low, that you can buy a panel for just twice the price of a wooden fencing sheet the same size:
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
Ben pointed out in that piece that the price of solar panels is getting so low, that you can buy a panel for just twice the price of a wooden fencing sheet the same size:
Ben Jones wrote about this as “the magic lump of possibility” – the period of negative pricing when the sun is shining, when you can get so much done for free.
climate.benjames.io/solar-off-gr...
climate.benjames.io/solar-off-gr...
Solar will get too cheap to connect to the power grid.
The cost of solar panels is plummeting, and this will flood the power grid with cheap electricity. But that’s just Act 1. We won’t stop building solar at the limits of the grid - we’ll build a lot mor...
climate.benjames.io
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
Ben Jones wrote about this as “the magic lump of possibility” – the period of negative pricing when the sun is shining, when you can get so much done for free.
climate.benjames.io/solar-off-gr...
climate.benjames.io/solar-off-gr...
It’s hard to get your head around at first, but once those electrons are moving they really are “free” in the best sense, and you might as well use them for something (including storage for later, yes).
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
It’s hard to get your head around at first, but once those electrons are moving they really are “free” in the best sense, and you might as well use them for something (including storage for later, yes).
Solar tech is falling in price so fast that in many and increasing numbers of places we can have this kind of “free energy”.
November 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
Solar tech is falling in price so fast that in many and increasing numbers of places we can have this kind of “free energy”.
Thinking about this photo again.
November 6, 2025 at 10:01 AM
Thinking about this photo again.
Anyway, and more importantly, Robert's wonderful album is available to pre-order and listen in advance here: archaicfuturerecordings.bandcamp.com/album/10000-... Enjoy!
October 31, 2025 at 3:20 PM
Anyway, and more importantly, Robert's wonderful album is available to pre-order and listen in advance here: archaicfuturerecordings.bandcamp.com/album/10000-... Enjoy!
I was also thinking a lot about Evan Roth's Multi Touch Paintings, which I've always loved, which document these intimate gestures we make every day www.evan-roth.com/~/works/mult... Here, "Slide to Unlock", 2013:
October 31, 2025 at 3:20 PM
I was also thinking a lot about Evan Roth's Multi Touch Paintings, which I've always loved, which document these intimate gestures we make every day www.evan-roth.com/~/works/mult... Here, "Slide to Unlock", 2013:
I should mention that this process was very much inspired by conversations with Robert about digital art and history. In particular, we were both very taken by Charles A. Csuri's "Sine Curve Man", a classic work of digital art from 1967.
October 31, 2025 at 3:20 PM
I should mention that this process was very much inspired by conversations with Robert about digital art and history. In particular, we were both very taken by Charles A. Csuri's "Sine Curve Man", a classic work of digital art from 1967.
Robert also created a video for one of the songs, using the process video, where you can see how the hand tracking works. Here's a taste of it:
October 31, 2025 at 3:20 PM
Robert also created a video for one of the songs, using the process video, where you can see how the hand tracking works. Here's a taste of it:
I wrote some code to track his hand movements during the course of that presentation, and it's these gestures that form the basis of the cover art for Robert's new album, 10,000 Rivers:
October 31, 2025 at 3:20 PM
I wrote some code to track his hand movements during the course of that presentation, and it's these gestures that form the basis of the cover art for Robert's new album, 10,000 Rivers: