Bionic Planet: Reversing Climate Change by Restoring Nature

We cannot adapt our way out of the climate mess, as Allie Goldstein of Conservation International and Mark Trexler of the Climate Web make clear.

We discuss the realities of systemic climate risk.

Research cited in today's show:

"The private sector's climate change risk and adaptation blind spots"

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0340-5

"Persistent Business Blind Spots on Climate Risk and Adaptation,"

http://gca.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Persistent_Business_Blind_Spots_on_Climate_Risk_and_Adaptation.pdf

The Climate Web: www.theclimateweb.com

Climate Web Roadmaps:

https://roadmapslite.climatesites.net

https://roadmapunderestimatedrisk.climatesites.net

https://systemicriskroadmaplite.climatesites.net

Videos: Playing Climate Chess using the Climate Web https://youtu.be/cnf7FM2zfNg

Actionable Climate Knowledge through the Climate Web https://youtu.be/L37v2-DXWk0

Solving Climate Change with the Climate Web https://youtu.be/Py9eJM2DRT0

Link to wildfire risk map: https://bra.in/6pygXQ

We cannot adapt our way out of the climate mess, as Alliee Goldstein of Conservation International and Mark Trexler of the Climate Web make clear.

We discuss the realities of systemic climate risk.

Research cited in today's show:

"The private sector's climate change risk and adaptation blind spots"

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0340-5

"Persistent Business Blind Spots on Climate Risk and Adaptation,"

http://gca.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Persistent_Business_Blind_Spots_on_Climate_Risk_and_Adaptation.pdf

The Climate Web: www.theclimateweb.com

Climate Web Roadmaps:

https://roadmapslite.climatesites.net

https://roadmapunderestimatedrisk.climatesites.net

https://systemicriskroadmaplite.climatesites.net

Videos: Playing Climate Chess using the Climate Web https://youtu.be/cnf7FM2zfNg

Actionable Climate Knowledge through the Climate Web https://youtu.be/L37v2-DXWk0

Solving Climate Change with the Climate Web https://youtu.be/Py9eJM2DRT0

Link to wildfire risk map: https://bra.in/6pygXQ

Carpetmaker Interface has won accolades for its carbon-negative carpet, the manufacture of which pulls more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than it emits. He're a look back on the company's 20-year journey from plundered of nature to climate leader.

Guest: Buddy Hay, Interface VP for Sustainability

What do Bill Gates, Mark Carney, Annette Nazareth, and Agustin Silvani have in common? They all believe that well-designed voluntary carbon markets can help the world achieve zero net greenhouse gas emissions in time to avert disaster. Today, they explain the new Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (TSVDM)

Most music provided by Blue Dot Sessions

The UN's Emissions Gap Report showed that the current Paris Agreement Climate Plans (NDCs )will leave us nowhere near where we need to be to avert a climate catastrophe.

Will Burns of the Institute for Carbon Removal Law and Policy at American University joins me in a year-end retrospective.

Today I speak with environmental scientist Jason Funk, who runs the Land Use and Climate Knowledge Initiative (LUCKI) about the important findings of a paper called "Long-term thermal sensitivity of earth's tropical forests," which looks at whether forests can continue to pull carbon from the atmosphere as temperatures rise. What they found is: it's complicated.

In this episode, we speak with oceanographer and sedimentologist Steve Crooks, one of the world's leading authorities on coastal ecosystems and climate change.

Related Link: https://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/articles/em-audio-and-video-em-vietnamese-deputy-prime-minister-opens-katoomba-xvii-vows-to-integrate-economy-and-environment/

In this episode, which originally aired in October, 2018, we speak with the Reverend Dr. Gerald Durley, who says climate change and civil rights are inexorably intertwined, and not just because the destruction of our living ecosystems is robbing us of our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Born in Kansas and raised in California, Rev Durley finished high-school in Oregon and then marched with Martin Luther King Jr while earning his first of may academic degrees -- this one in psychology at Tennessee State. While there, Bobby Kennedy noticed him and persuaded Durley to join the Peace Corp, which he did. That brought him to Nigeria, then to Switzerland before coming home to the United States and becoming a central figure in Atlanta's Civil Rights scene.

He says we can tap the same forces that galvanized the Civil Rights movement to fix the climate mess, but only if we recognize its inherently moral nature.

If there's one thing COVID-19 reminds us, it's that global institutions matter. For that reason, I'm replaying this 2016 episode looking at the Sustainable Development Goals.

Global greenhouse-gas emissions will drop 5.5 percent this year because of COVID-19, but they must drop 7.6 percent every year to meet the Paris Agreement's 1.5C target. Forest carbon offsets provide one way of getting there fast, but can we trust these offsets? Do they do what they say they do? This week, we hear how the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) handles carbon accounting at different scales. And my guest, Naomi Swickard, actually makes it interesting.