C4E Presents

Jim Hempstead evaluates credit risk for nuclear energy projects. Host Heather Lynch, producer J.D. Allen and Hempstead, managing director of Moody’s Ratings Global Project and Infrastructure Finance Group, discuss how credit ratings focus on default probability and cashflow stability, and expert analysis helps assess large-scale infrastructure and energy projects, including newer technologies like small modular reactors.

This is a director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media.

Learn more: 

• New nuclear technologies can play key role in decarbonization if costs are addressed (Moody’s, 2026)
• Can the US power grid keep up with the data center boom? (YouTube)
• Moody's: Nuclear plant construction poses risks to credit metrics, ratings (Moody’s, 2008)

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:09 Meet Moody's Jim Hempstead
• 02:38 How Moody's Rates Risk
• 03:48 Assessing New Nuclear Tech
• 05:36 Cash Flow Over Engineering
• 07:55 Nuclear Growth Outlook
• 09:39 Regulated vs Merchant Models
• 12:56 Tech Giants and PPAs
• 15:53 Costs Lifetimes and Labor
• 17:28 Workforce Risk 

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C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

This special episode of ⁠Collaborative for the Earth (C4E) ⁠examines how PFAS—the "forever chemicals" found in everything from firefighting foam to nonstick pans— represent a rare issue uniting political opposites.

Distributed by American Public Media from July through September 2026, C4E presents in its second national radio broadcast the growing body of evidence linking PFAS and other industrial chemicals to skyrocketing illnesses among children and young adults, as well as other vulnerable people. Both the MAHA movement's concerns about environmental toxins and progressive environmentalists' fight against corporate pollution are at a flashpoint over perhaps the most obvious explanation for declining public health. As both Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s supporters and environmental advocates demand action, this story asks: why has it taken so long to confront the chemical crisis hiding in plain sight?

Learn more with: 

• SBU’s Collaborative for the Earth’s Second National Broadcast Special Explores Forever Chemicals

• SBU Workshop Outlines Goals in Addressing PFAS Contamination

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 00:00 Forever Chemicals Everywhere
• 01:10 Better Living Through Chemistry
• 02:06 Why PFAS Last Forever
• 05:17 Detection and Drinking Water
• 08:30 Origins and Early Warnings
• 10:42 Corporate Knowledge and Coverups
• 13:49 Regrettable Substitution
• 14:36 Global Spread to Food
• 17:13 Long Island Farm Findings
• 21:44 Health Effects in the Body
• 23:55 Reducing Exposure at Home
• 25:40 Testing Water and Standards
• 28:21 Regulation Gaps and New PFAS
• 30:18 Politics and Superfund Liability
• 32:33 Who Pays for Cleanup
• 34:51 Regulatory Rollbacks and Delays
• 35:46 PFAS Awareness Challenge
• 36:56 Gen X Film Journey
• 41:46 Cookware Ban Backlash
• 44:56 Federal Policy Whiplash
• 47:33 Cleanup Tech Reality Check
• 52:41 Water Systems Under Strain
• 58:02 Personal Steps That Help
• 01:00:55 Firefighters and High Exposure
• 01:04:35 Labels Food and Daily Choices
• 01:10:02 Where We Go From Here
• 01:11:26 Closing Credits

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You can find all our episodes at ⁠www.stonybrook.edu/c4e⁠ or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: ⁠https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php⁠

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Special thanks to The New York Climate Exchange and Stony Brook’s Office of the Provost, Office of Marketing and Communications and the MS in Journalism program for their support.

Host: Heather Lynch

Writer: J.D. Allen

Editors: Terry Sheridan, Lori Kie

Producers: Jordan Vallone, Melanie Formosa

Post Production: Denis Murray 

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Edwin Lyman is concerned about nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism. Host Heather Lynch and Lyman, physicist and director of nuclear power safety at The Union of Concerned Scientists, discuss the organization’s decades-long role as a nuclear safety watchdog.

This is a director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media.

Learn more: 

• “Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear Disaster” (The New Press; 2014)
• “The NRC’s new Mission Impossible: Making Atoms Great Again (The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
• "Disposition of separated plutonium” by Edwin Lyman et al

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:07 UCS Nuclear Safety Stance
• 02:59 Renewables Versus Nuclear Hype
• 05:30 SMRs And Proliferation Risks
• 09:37 Fuel Types And Safeguards
• 13:13 UCS Views Over Time
• 14:49 Data Centers And Energy Demand
• 18:22 Race To The Bottom Warning
• 19:51 Industry Reality Check

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For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Mark Jacobson has spent the majority of the last two decades developing roadmaps to completely transition states to wind, water and solar renewable energies — not nuclear. Host Heather Lynch and Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University and co-founder of the non-profit group, The Solutions Project, with actor/activist Mark Ruffalo, spoke in November 2025.

This is a director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media.

Learn more: 

• "No Miracles Needed: How Today's Technology Can Save Our Climate and Clean Our Air" (2023)
• "100% Clean, Renewable Energy and Storage for Everything" (2020)“Review of solutions to global warming, air pollution, and energy security” by Mark Jacobson

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:12 Meet Mark Jacobson
• 01:33 Why Wind, Water, Solar Works
• 03:58 From Global to State Plans
• 05:24 AI Data Centers Demand
• 07:56 Existing vs New Nuclear
• 11:25 China Nuclear Reality Check
• 12:59 Intermittency and Grid Balance
• 16:00 Policy Headwinds and Subsidies
• 17:25 Big Tech Bets on Nuclear
• 19:02 Closing Nuclear Is a ‘Duck’

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Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Investigative journalist Karl Grossman has had his eye on nuclear energy since the 1970s. Grossman, an author and nationally syndicated television host turned journalism professor and co-founder of the anti-nuclear proliferation group, Beyond Nuclear, told producer J.D. Allen that the shift to nuclear power to fight climate change is just baloney — a result of media failures since the fight to stop the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant on Long Island.

This is a director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media.

Learn more: 

• Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed to Know About Nuclear Power (1980)
• Why Is There More Media Talk About Using Nuclear Weapons Than About Banning Them?
• Stony Brook University Archives: Shoreham and Three Mile Island Collection

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:08 Grossman Origins
• 01:35 Three Mile Island Wakeup
• 04:51 Nuclear Green Claims
• 06:38 Disaster Death Tolls
• 10:02 Rickover’s Warning
• 11:44 Shoreham Nuclear Park
• 14:34 Investigating Shoreham Risks
• 18:56 Restarting Old Reactors
• 20:35 Media Accountability
• 23:54 Better Watchdogs

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You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Steven Biegalski closely monitored the development of the United State's first nuclear power facility in the last decade at Plant Vogtle near Augusta, Georgia. Host Heather Lynch and producer J.D. Allen spoke with Biegalski, chair of the Nuclear and Radiological Engineering program and Medical Physics program at Georgia Institute of Technology, in October 2025. 

This is a director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media.

Learn more: 

• “Evaluation of machine learning algorithms for nuclear monitoring applications” (2026) 
• Elevated radioxenon detected remotely following the Fukushima nuclear accident (2011)
• Nuclear Power Isn’t What You Think — and That’s a Good Thing (Georgia Tech)

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:11 Meet Steven Biegalski
• 01:32 What Nuclear Engineers Do
• 02:52 What Drives Nuclear Demand
• 05:39 AI Data Centers Inflection
• 08:42 Why Renewables Fall Short
• 11:41 Can Nuclear Scale Fast
• 14:23 SMRs Versus Big Reactors
• 17:48 Workforce Supply Chain Gaps
• 20:23 Community Perception Shifts
• 24:02 Three Mile Island Returns

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You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

More than 100 people joined students from New York University's debate team on Governors Island to argue what role nuclear energy should play in fighting climate change.

Hear the full arguments for and against going nuclear featured in C4E Presents’ director’s cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special from American Public Media in early 2026.

Learn more: 

• SBU Hosts 2nd Annual Environmental Forum on Nuclear Energy’s Role in Climate Solutions
• Preparing leaders through the transformative power of NYU debate

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:08 Debate Begins on Nuclear
• 01:25 Affirmative Case for Nuclear
• 05:13 Cross Examination One
• 07:03 Negative Case Against Nuclear
• 11:00 Cross Examination Two
• 13:05 Affirmative Rebuttal
• 15:12 Negative Rebuttal
• 17:27 Closing Statements
• 20:05 Thanks and Team Info

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You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Season 4 of C4E Presents will be a director's cut of America's Nuclear Future, a national radio broadcast special about whether the United States could have a future powered by nuclear energy. 

In early 2026, the broadcast special from American Public Media was aired across nearly 20 states in cities from New York City and Atlanta to Seattle and San Diego, as well as Tucson, Des Moines, and Missoula in between. 

Host Heather Lynch and J.D. Allen, the special’s lead producer and lecturer in the Department of Journalism, who also does climate communication strategy for Stony Brook University.

Learn more: 

• Civic Science Media: Reimagining How We Communicate Science
• SBU’s Collaborative for the Earth Debuts National Broadcast Special on Nuclear Energy

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 00:32 Season Four Intro
• 00:46 Nuclear Special Recap
• 01:19 Writing The Billboard
• 01:52 Why Nuclear Now
• 04:10 Hurdles And Economics
• 04:49 Who We Are
• 06:57 Host Credibility
• 09:05 AI Power Hunger
• 10:03 Three Mile Island Returns
• 14:19 SMRs And New Nuclear
• 17:28 Debate Stakes Ahead
• 18:53 Climate And Enviro Shift
• 24:03 Safety And Fear

Tell a friend and share a link to this episode.

You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

This special episode of Collaborative for the Earth (C4E) examines how U.S. efforts to move away from fossil fuels collide with surging electricity demand from AI and data centers, prompting companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google to pursue nuclear power. 

Distributed by American Public Media from January through April 2026, C4E presents in its first national radio broadcast the history of nuclear energy in the United States, from Eisenhower’s 1953 “Atoms for Peace” through Three Mile Island, and changing public opinion under the Trump administration. Today, approximately 94 reactors supply just over 18% of U.S. utility-scale electricity. The narrative episode explores the restarting of shuttered plants, the promise and skepticism around small modular reactors, and shifts in energy policy as climate solutions that were discussed during an April 2025 Governor’s Island forum debate, in partnership with The New York Climate Exchange.

Learn more with: 

• SBU’s Collaborative for the Earth Debuts National Broadcast Special on Nuclear Energy
• SBU Hosts 2nd Annual Environmental Forum on Nuclear Energy’s Role in Climate Solutions
• Understanding Nuclear Energy with C4E’s ‘Nuclear 101’ Conversation

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:25 Three Mile Island Shock
• 04:05 Nuclear Numbers Shift
• 05:54 Why This Podcast
• 07:21 AI Power Hunger
• 11:13 Restarting Old Reactors
• 13:47 Debating Nuclear Role
• 20:47 Safety After Fukushima
• 25:34 Regulation Lessons Learned
• 27:01 Nuclear Waste Dilemma
• 31:31 Do We Need Nuclear
• 32:50 Long Island Case Study
• 35:28 Build Times and Costs
• 37:23 Safety Versus Speed
• 41:10 Geopolitics and Supply Chains
• 45:43 Four Paths to Expand
• 47:43 Small Modular Reactor Hype
• 51:55 Financing the Nuclear Bet

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You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Special thanks to The New York Climate Exchange and Stony Brook’s Office of the Provost, Office of Marketing and Communications and the MS in Journalism program for their support.

Host: Heather Lynch

Writer: J.D. Allen

Editors: Terry Sheridan, Lori Kie

Producers: Jordan Vallone, Melanie Formosa

Post Production: Denis Murray 

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday

Ben Novak is bringing back the extinct passenger pigeon. Host Heather Lynch and Novak, program manager for the Biotechnology for Bird Conservation Program for Revive & Restore, discuss de-extinction, restoring ecosystem function by using gene editing or selective breeding to give living relatives traits needed to fill extinct species’ ecological roles, and correcting Jurassic Park misconceptions about using ancient DNA directly. Novak explains how museum specimens provide fragmented DNA for sequencing and the limits of mapping genomes, emphasizing goal-oriented trait recovery over perfect genetic identity. 

Learn more with: 

• “Could Extinct Species Save Today’s Forests? Scientist Makes the Case for Darwin Day”
• “De-Extinction” by Ben Novak
• “Towards Practical Conservation Cloning: Understanding the Dichotomy Between the Histories of Commercial and Conservation Cloning” by Ben J. Novak, Stewart Brand, Ryan Phelan, Sasha Plichta, Oliver A. Ryder and Robert J. Wiese
• “First endangered black-footed ferrets, Mustela nigripes, cloned for genetic rescue” by Ben Novak, et al.
• “Natural Selection Shaped the Rise and Fall of Passenger Pigeon Genomic Diversity” by Ben Novak, et al.

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:40 Defining De-Extinction
• 02:44 Jurassic Park Myths
• 05:32 Where The DNA Comes From
• 08:41 Sample Quality And Tissues
• 11:44 Mapping Ancient Genomes
• 14:16 How Close Is Close Enough
• 23:04 Naming De-Extinct Species
• 25:30 Tiny Mutations Big Traits
• 28:12 Building Diversity In
• 30:56 Passenger Pigeon Progress
• 31:33 Ferret Genetic Rescue
• 33:55 Why Birds Are Hard
• 35:52 Germ Cell Workaround
• 37:55 Mitochondria Purity Myth
• 44:16 Policy And Release
• 46:46 Stem Cells Future Tools

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You can find all our episodes at www.stonybrook.edu/c4e or wherever you stream audio.

Sign up for our newsletter: https://www.stonybrook.edu/commcms/c4e/newsletters.php

For all things Stony Brook on social media: https://gosbu.co/m/social

C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday