The most downloaded report of 2022 / 2023 from the University of Cambridge, Absolute Zero is an overview of climate mitigation. For twenty years we’ve been trying to solve the problem with new or breakthrough technologies that supply energy and allow industry to keep growing, so we don’t have to change our lifestyles. But although some exciting new technology options are being developed, it will take a long time to deploy them, and they won’t be operating at scale within thirty years.

We do it well, but a year after we produced #PlayEnergetic, Julian Allwood and co. released Absolute Zero, and it's even better to start there.
ukfires.org/impact/publi...

#PlayEnergetic #migrantcrisis

Nueva Innovative Learning Conference: Energy Literacy is Environmental Justice View more about this event at Nueva Innovative Learning Conference

It's an honor to have #PlayEnergetic presented at The Nueva School's Innovative Learning Conference today, in San Mateo:
nuevailc2026.sched.com/event/2EkSn/...
And a double-honor to have @jgkoomey.bsky.social helping us explain the game! The truth is, all high school & undergrad curricula shd change

BROOKLYN: Can you decarbonize NYC?
#PlayEnergetic at the library, 2pm to 5pm Saturday (3/7) -- join us!

350Brooklyn presents ENERGETIC, a board game where you build a carbon-free NYC | Brooklyn Public Library Can you keep the lights on in 2035?ENERGETIC poses a cooperative challenge in which you and your team build a zero carbon New York City by 2040, with politics, budget, and engineering matched to the r...

Saturday, 3/7, 2pm to 5pm. Register here:
www.bklynlibrary.org/calendar/350... #PlayEnergetic

Energy & Climate Game Afternoon at the Brooklyn Public Library Do you have what it takes to decarbonize NYC's electric grid? Play Energetic with us to find out!

#PlayEnergetic Saturday March 7, 2PM - 5PM, hosted by
@350brooklyn.bsky.social & @bklynlibrary.bsky.social
www.eventbrite.com/e/energy-cli...

350Brooklyn presents ENERGETIC, a board game where you build a carbon-free NYC | Brooklyn Public Library Can you keep the lights on in 2035?ENERGETIC poses a cooperative challenge in which you and your team build a zero carbon New York City by 2040, with politics, budget, and engineering matched to the r...

In NYC? Come #PlayEnergetic in Brooklyn, March 7:
www.bklynlibrary.org/calendar/350...
Thanks to:
@350brooklyn.bsky.social & @bklynlibrary.bsky.social

Energetic Driving the Energy Transition From NYC To Mumbai A four-player Cooperative Challenge to Decarbonize the World's Greatest Cities Can you build 16GW of green energy? Explore technologies and trade-offs, and deal with challenges BUDGET Renewables Grid Stability III Policy & Elections 88 Budget Challenges More about Energetic: Energetic is a four-player cooperative challenge in which you work to decarbonize New York City by building 16 GW of carbon neutral energy. You will gain hands-on insight into the infrastructure and cooperation required to meet Paris Agreement goals. Scan to Register Energetic has been enjoyed by a wide range of players including engineers, policymakers, business professionals, consultants, professors, college and high school students, advocacy coalitions, and more. K J Somaiya Institute of Management 11th & 14th February 2026

Interrupting the climate anthropology notes to say, we're very glad to have #PlayEnergetic in use in Mumbai, in workshops held yesterday and this upcoming Saturday, preceding Mumbai Climate Week:

20 people playing a board game about the future of NYC.

DSA last night: These are Activists, Politicians, Entrepreneurs & Engineers. Teams collaborate to build a zero carbon NYC w/accurate data, budget, & elections. We can match this method to any city around the world & once everyone knows how to do it, the global public can't be stopped. #PlayEnergetic

#PlayEnergetic is great, but to really understand climate change (and the motors at work in this thread), you need this book.
bsky.app/profile/city...

Matches Between Energetic and the Real World Energetic is developed to give everyone a chance to see the scope of changes and cooperation needed to transform the city's energy demand and supply in time to meet goals of the Paris Agreement.

On the mundane, tracking energy stories basis, #PlayEnergetic is amazingly accurate (and once we add data center demand will tweak into alignment again). A @cornelltech.bsky.social student is building us this news aggregator:
energetic-xi.vercel.app

#PlayEnergetic has been amazingly accurate (links follow). We developed it in 2018 and have made a couple of tweaks since then. But we would never have guessed this twist, which is unfolding now:
bsky.app/profile/davi...
This will go into our next update.

February Energy & Climate Game Night Join us to collectively solve climate change in the most fun way possible. February game night Come join us for a fun-filled evening gaming out the future of New York City at the NYC-DSA Office! We ...

#PlayEnergetic in NYC this Friday, 2/6 at @socialists.nyc
14 Jefferson St. on Lower East Side, 6:30 - 8:30
actionnetwork.org/events/febru... @petesikora.bsky.social

#PlayEnergetic - at SVA in NYC today

#PlayEnergetic or we'll be trying to solve the energy problem the completely wrong way, acre by acre across the state.

#PlayEnergetic

Last minute shopping for an unforgettable gift? Sets of our game #PlayEnergetic, which teaches how to solve climate change on the scale of a city, are available to ship tomorrow (12/17) to arrive by Christmas!
youtu.be/5QsXyq-Dukg
energetic.thecityatlas.org @katharinehayhoe.com

But his thinking has been deeply influenced by what might be thought of as the cheap-glasses conundrum: the inadequacy of addressing complex societal issues with technological ingenuity alone. Nowhere is this problem more apparent than with his main preoccupation these days: energy use and global warming. The world’s most urgent environmental need, he has come to believe, is not for some miraculous-seeming scientific breakthrough but for a vast, unprecedented transformation of human behavior. That conviction makes him doubly unusual: an extraordinarily innovative engineer who is trying to think his way around the limits of innovation.

This article led to us developing #PlayEnergetic in 2018, as a way to put the energy problem into people's hands for them to solve themselves.
www.newyorker.com/magazine/201...

If you're a 17 year old New Yorker and you want the city to succeed, building public understanding based on accurate information is crucial to your life.
youtu.be/6kUW7t-2hlk
#PlayEnergetic

Skylight on Instagram: "We’re LIVE at the Society for Ethical Culture, where Skylight is cohosting a decarbonization game night with @350nyc @cityatlas_nyc and more!" 4 likes, 0 comments - sky.lightnyc on November 20, 2025: "We’re LIVE at the Society for Ethical Culture, where Skylight is cohosting a decarbonization game night with @350nyc @cityatlas_nyc and more!"...

Once we teach everyone how to build a zero carbon NYC, no one can stop us. Then we'll do the same for every other city.
Thanks, @skylightnyc.bsky.social @350nyc.bsky.social @ethicalnyc.bsky.social for co-hosting! #PlayEnergetic
www.instagram.com/reel/DRTEeqD...

#PlayEnergetic tonight! In NYC, with @skylightnyc.bsky.social & @350nyc.bsky.social at
ethical.nyc/events/build...

...which has been about 15 students. (So, even then, not a lot.)

Ross Pinkerton teaches that class and uses our game, #PlayEnergetic.
youtu.be/eZOV74PBOYM

We have a card for this in #PlayEnergetic. The sooner we communicate broad understanding of the next 15 years, the better.

Thank you, Christian. For those in NYC on Thursday, November 20, there's intergenerational gameplay with #PlayEnergetic at @ethicalnyc.bsky.social.
Hosts @350nyc.bsky.social, @skylightnyc.bsky.social & more
RSVP:
www.eventbrite.com/e/november-e...

High school students laughing and playing a very accurate board game in which they work as a team to decarbonize NYC in fifteen years. They each have a role: Activist, Politician, Entrepreneur, and Engineer. They have to build 16 GW of zero carbon power, in the process retiring all of NYC's fossil fuel power plants and allowing for enough electricity to heat buildings with heat pumps, fully decarbonizing the city.

High school students laughing and playing a very accurate board game in which they work as a team to decarbonize NYC in fifteen years. They each have a role: Activist, Politician, Entrepreneur, and Engineer. They have to build 16 GW of zero carbon power, in the process retiring all of NYC's fossil fuel power plants and allowing for enough electricity to heat buildings with heat pumps, fully decarbonizing the city.

High school students laughing and playing a very accurate board game in which they work as a team to decarbonize NYC in fifteen years. They each have a role: Activist, Politician, Entrepreneur, and Engineer. They have to build 16 GW of zero carbon power, in the process retiring all of NYC's fossil fuel power plants and allowing for enough electricity to heat buildings with heat pumps, fully decarbonizing the city.

#PlayEnergetic at Stuyvesant HS in NYC this morning and all week.

Teams are exploring how to build a zero carbon NYC, in 15 yrs, with accurate data, budget, & politics. We can do this in any city around the world + once everyone knows how to do it, the public can't be stopped.

Skip to the final positions and design that society. (We thought about this at the same time we were starting #PlayEnergetic.)

NYC is in this boat too; needs major offshore wind, needs success with hydrogen or a substitute, and/or nuclear. Heat pump-heated NYC is 16 GW minimum, which is the goal of #PlayEnergetic. With war mobilization it could be possible by mid 2040's, if wind resumes in 2029. @jeffsseidman.bsky.social

...but mainly, the original design of #PlayEnergetic centered around offshore wind, as that option would do the heavy lifting for NYC under normal circumstances.
As events would have it (2024 election), we've updated rules for a solar-heavy approach to be more realistic about solar in the process.

A single Solar + Batteries piece in #PlayEnergetic represents 8 projects that size, so the +1 in Public Opinion we gave it is a little bit optimistic 😬.
We knew that but wanted to support solar optimism, like the first few paragraphs in the article, not the later paragraphs...

“It’s a very game-like problem: You’re trying to build… | Skylight A Q&A with Richard Reiss, developer of decarbonization board game Energetic and founder of City Atlas

Here's an interview about why we developed #PlayEnergetic, in which an activist, a politician, an entrepreneur, and an engineer cooperate to decarbonize NYC:
www.skylight.nyc/articles/res... Thanks, @skylightnyc.bsky.social!