Ten Across Conversations

The U.S. Atlantic hurricane season has changed. A recent study by Climate Central found that over the last six years, manmade warming amplified the average Atlantic hurricane’s strength by as much as 18 miles per hour. For context: it only takes an increase of 16 miles per hour to advance a hurricane from "minimal" Category 1 to "major" Category 3 — but the difference in damage is 140 times greater. Evidence of such a potent connection between climate-warmed ocean temperatures and the energy of tropical cyclones has many meteorologists raising alarms.  

In May, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration published their ‘most aggressive season outlook’ ever, according to the Washington Post. The agency projected 17 to 25 named storms, up to 13 of which were likely to strengthen into hurricanes. Of those, it was predicted that four to seven would rank as Category 3 or above. With just a week left in the standard June-through-November hurricane season, the forecast has proven devastatingly accurate.  

The southeastern portion of the Ten Across geography and north into Central Appalachia saw the greatest human and property loss this season from one Category 4 and two Category 5 storms that rolled into the Gulf Coast region.  

This episode of the podcast discusses the greatest impacts from these events, as well as the advances that NOAA, the National Weather Service, and National Hurricane Center are making to limit harm from extreme weather as much as possible during both hurricane season and the rest of the year.  

Listen in as Ten Across founder Duke Reiter talks with National Hurricane Center Director Michael Brennan and the National Weather Service’s Southern Region Director Michael Coyne to explore the evolving responsibilities of meteorologic sciences and communications in a changing climate landscape.

Extreme heat, when compared to other natural disasters, can be slow-moving and hard to observe. There aren’t homes to repair or debris to clear following a heat wave, but the devastation is revealed in the rising number of heat-related fatalities and declining public health measures across many vulnerable populations within Ten Across communities like Phoenix, Los Angeles, Tucson and San Antonio.  

Rising temperatures already pose a risk to this region's critical physical infrastructure, as reported by nonprofit Climate Central: the US experienced 60% more hot season power outages during the last 10 years than in the period from 2000 to 2009. And the risk of heat-related grid failures across California, Arizona, Nevada, and Texas is expected to grow quickly, according to findings released earlier this year by global advisory firm ICF.  

Federal, state, and local leaders are now focused on mitigating the most severe outcomes for heat-vulnerable communities. This summer the Biden Administration hosted the first ever White House Summit on Extreme Heat, pulling together more than 100 experts on the cutting edge of heat research and adaptation to develop shovel-ready resilience projects. Topping the list of priorities were long-term interventions like improved tree canopy and installation of cooling infrastructure in the most at-risk cities and suburbs.  

In this episode, Ten Across founder Duke Reiter speaks with Dr. V Kelly Turner, assistant professor of urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles, who participated in the White House Summit and has been a leading voice in reimagining the built environment for a hotter climate.   Earlier this year, Kelly was appointed director of the National Integrated Heat Health Information System’s (NIHHIS) Center for Heat Resilient Communities. The Center will begin accepting applications on November 20, 2024, from communities in need of technical assistance to determine the best locally tailored heat solutions.  

Listen in as Duke and Kelly discuss what these strategies might look like and why they are so immediately needed in the Ten Across region.  

Relevant links and resources:  

Information for cities and tribes to apply for heat mitigation grant technical assistance (APPLICATIONS DUE January 24, 2025): https://cpo.noaa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/CHRC-Application-Supplement-10-31-2.pdf

 “New climate projections show rising exposure to extreme heat in disadvantaged communities” (ICF, May 2024)  

“What Some of the Hottest Cities on The 10 Are Doing to Address Deadly Heat” (Ten Across Conversations, August 2024)  

“10X Heat Series: Covering Climate Change as It Unfolds with Jeff Goodell” (Ten Across Conversations, July 2023)

The cost of housing has risen nationwide, but this change has been particularly acute in the Ten Across geography. With the exception of California, the Sun Belt has been known for decades to offer abundant and affordable housing, attracting young families and retirees alike.  

However, development of new single-family housing has shown more hesitancy since the 2008 housing bubble collapse, and proposed multifamily properties can be deterred by NIMBY (Not in My Backyard) attitudes. Both factors have contributed to a significant housing shortage in Arizona and its neighboring states, according to report by ARCHES, the Arizona Research Center for Housing Equity and Sustainability. Further compounding the issue, the recent growth in domestic migration to the region has outpaced this weaker rate of real estate development.  

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the median home price in Arizona surged 50% to $470,000 and nearly half of all renters are considered cost-burdened, meaning they are spending more than 30% of their income on housing. Local land use policies have overwhelmingly favored single-family development, so much so that it represents nearly 78% of all housing units built in Arizona since 2000.  

Today, lacking a diverse stock of housing options, service industry workers, teachers, first responders and other professionals earning less than $60,000 a year are struggling to find affordable places to live. Researchers warn that such an unbalanced mix of housing opportunities leads to economic instability, poorer health outcomes and social division over time. Rising rates of homelessness tend to be an early warning sign, and in 2023 homelessness in Arizona reached its highest recorded level since 2010.  

Housing is a universal need. To thrive, communities need to become better at cultivating a sufficient and diverse inventory. In this episode, ARCHES housing researchers Alison Cook-Davis and Kristi Eustice discuss the findings and recommendations contained in their center’s first report as a HUD-funded resource for furthering housing equity in the U.S. Southwest.    

Relevant links and resources:   

2024 State of Housing in Arizona Report (Arizona Research Center for Housing Equity and Sustainability at the Morrison Institute for Public Policy, August 2024, PDF file)

 “Housing is Health Care” (Morrison Institute for Public Policy, May 2021, PDF file)  

“America’s housing problem—and what to do about it” (Harvard Magazine, November-December 2024)  

“Why Phoenix is the ‘Most American City’ with George Packer” (Ten Across Conversations, August 2024)  

“Local Experts Answer: Why Are People Still Moving to Phoenix?” (Ten Across Conversations, February 2024)  

“Understanding Housing and Homelessness in America with Gregg Colburn” (Ten Across Conversations, December 2022)

On October 10th —25 days ahead of the 2024 presidential election—Ten Across founder Duke Reiter and veteran political correspondent James Fallows sat down to discuss journalism’s role in American democracy today. Fallows has been a notable observer of this dynamic since at least 1996, when he published Breaking the News, a book which described the origins of the public’s mistrust of the news media.  

Fallows believed as much then as now that most political journalism is a source of entertainment focused on the gamesmanship of policymaking, rather than practical information for civically engaged citizens. This disconnect has only grown as many local news publications have proven unable to adapt to the digital age, leaving many communities to become ‘news deserts.’

Together with his wife Deborah, both have sought to alleviate distrust of the media and the related knowledge gaps by reporting from small towns in their book and HBO documentary Our Towns. Their work has led them to conclude that the national media lacks sufficient capacity or interest to provide a platform for all the complexity and ideological nuance found among the voting populace. They now operate the Our Towns Civic Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to uncovering stories of civic renewal and local success.  

In this live conversation recorded at the Arizona State University campus in Tempe, Duke Reiter and James Fallows discuss how the imperfect barometer of national-scale journalism can shape citizen behaviors and tensions between the major parties, especially in an election year.  

WATCH THIS DISCUSSION on the Ten Across YouTube channel.

Fact check of today’s episode:

The Barry Goldwater Range Complex located in Arizona’s Gila Bend is incorrectly referred to as the John McCain Bombing Range in this discussion.  

Relevant links and resources:  

James Fallows | Substack: Breaking the News  

Breaking the News (Fallows, 1996)  

Our Towns: A 100,000-Mile Journey Into the Heart of America (Fallows, James and Deborah Fallows, 2018)  

“A Kansas town offers transportation for voters but many are unaware” (NBC News, 2018) 

“Why Phoenix is the ‘Most American City’ with George Packer” (Ten Across Conversations, 2024)

In the last month, the Ten Across Conversations podcast has explored a variety of influences on modern U.S.-Mexico relations, including a lack of cooperation on immigration policy, climate change impacts on transboundary water-sharing and the outsized role Mexico plays in the recent revitalization of North American manufacturing. For the final episode of this limited series on the border, we’ll examine major political considerations as both nations prepare to transition presidential administrations and then to renegotiate the critical United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement in 2026.  

This conversation draws on the perspective of Tony Payan, executive director of Rice University’s Baker Institute Center for the U.S. and Mexico. The Center publishes an annual Mexico Country Outlook report that provides insights for business leaders, policymakers and the public with regard to the state of affairs within the country and how these trends may impact its relationship with the U.S.  

Their 2024 Outlook, published in January, anticipated many challenges within Mexico’s democracy, infrastructure and energy security, but also significant economic opportunity as the U.S. evolves its own industrial policy in support of nearshoring its supply chain.  

Ten Across founder Duke Reiter discusses these implications with Tony Payan, paying particular attention to policy changes anticipated with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum's recent election and the implications for the current U.S. presidential candidates’ respective platforms.  

Relevant links and resources:  
The Baker Institute’s Mexico Country Outlook 2024  

Border Series Episode 1: “Why U.S. Immigration Reform is Critical to Our Future with Dr. David Shirk”  

Border Series Episode 2: “Climate-Induced Drought Tests U.S.-Mexico Water-Sharing”  

Border Series Episode 3: “Perspectives From a Binational Trade and Economic Development Hub”

Culture, finances and people have always moved with fluidity across boundaries within the binational, three-state metropolitan region known as ‘the Borderplex.’ Together, Las Cruces, El Paso, and Ciudad Juarez are an economic powerhouse with a combined population of 2.7 million and the largest bilingual and binational workforce in the Western Hemisphere.  

After the North American Free Trade Agreement was reached in 1994, Borderplex assets—including its urbanization and industrialization—exploded for decades. The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement updated NAFTA commitments in 2018, realigining regional trade in a way that paid off as COVID-19 brought volatility to global commerce for years to come. With instabilities persisting today in the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Asia, the appeal of an international supply chain physically closer to U.S. markets has only grown.  

Connected to the greater U.S. by Interstates 10 and 25, The Borderplex is a growing arterial for international trade and is further optimized by collaborative economic planning between leaders in all three of its cities. As a result of all of these and other factors, last year, Mexico surpassed China as the top importer to the U.S.-- a position China had held since 2009.  

The Hunt Institute for Global Competitiveness at the University of Texas at El Paso and The Borderplex Alliance are two prominent organizations supporting the assets and relationships that make The Borderplex so critical to the U.S. They each provide expert analysis and guidance to companies and individuals interested in engaging this regional binational economic hub.  

In this episode, Jon Barela, CEO of the Borderplex Alliance, and Mayra Maldonado, executive director of the Hunt Institute, offer their perspectives on these exchanges and what it means to be a binational region within the current political climate.  

Fact check of today’s interview:  
In this interview, a guest refers to El Paso, Texas, as the second safest city in the US with a population of half a million or more. Although this distinction appears to have been given in 2017 and is not the city’s current ranking, El Paso consistently ranks as one of the safer cities in the US for its population size.  

Relevant links and resources:  

Episode one of the series: “10X Border Series: Why U.S. Immigration Reform is Critical to Our Future with Dr. David Shirk”  

Episode two of the series: “10X Border Series: Climate-Induced Drought Tests U.S.-Mexico Water-Sharing”  

“The Transformative Power of Reduced Wait Times at the US-Mexico Border” (joint report between the Hunt Institute, Atlantic Council and El Colegio de la Frontera Norte)  

Hunt Institute’s overview of the Paso del Norte Region

Alongside immigration, there is another issue testing diplomacy between the U.S. and Mexico in 2024. Increasingly unpredictable weather patterns in combination with growth in both population and industrial demand have made it difficult, if not impossible, for the two nations to meet the obligations defined by their 1944 U.S.-Mexico Water Treaty.  

The Tijuana, Rio Grande, and Colorado Rivers have long supported the growing border region. However, like the Colorado River Compact between U.S. states, the 1944 international treaty was developed during a 30-year period of unusual regional water abundance--extremely disparate from today's climate and demand. Intense strain is already being felt by water users on both sides of the border, and the future will be increasingly difficult if aging policies and infrastructure cannot be quickly brought up-to-date.   

The International Boundary and Water Commission (“Comisión Internacional de Límites y Aguas”) is the binational governmental agency that administers this expansive treaty. Beginning in 2021, the Commission worked with experts to adjust the treaty's terms to 21st-century constraints. Though the team was unable to meet a target date to complete renegotiation in December 2023, increased activity in domestic legislation and binational research have since demonstrated growing motivation to master the availability of water resources in the region.     

To help us understand this complex issue, Ten Across founder Duke Reiter speaks with two renowned transborder experts, Francisco Lara-Valencia and Stephen Mumme. Francisco and Stephen were among those who answered the IBWC’s request for expert policy recommendations in 2021. Together, they’ll discuss a confluence of factors requiring the IBWC to modernize transboundary water governance, and what this means for the Ten Across region.  

Relevant links and resources:   

Episode one of our ‘Border Series’: “10X Border Series: Why U.S. Immigration Reform is Critical to Our Future with Dr. David Shirk” (Ten Across Conversations, 2024)  

“Managing Groundwater on the US-Mexico Border is Challenging—But Vital” (APM Research Lab/Ten Across, 2024)  

“Water treaty between Mexico and U.S. faces biggest test in 80 years” (NPR, 2024)  

“Water Management on the U.S.-Mexico Border: Achieving Water Sustainability and Resilience through Cross-Border Cooperation” (Lara-Valencia, Francisco, Irasema Coronado, Stephen Mumme, et al. 2023)  

Border Water: The Politics of U.S.-Mexico Transboundary Water Management, 1945-2015 (Mumme, Stephen, 2023)  

“Alternative Visions of the U.S. Southern Border Yesterday, Tomorrow, and Today” (Ten Across Conversations, 2023)

For more than a decade, the topic of immigration has remained at the center of national debate in the U.S. and has become an unfortunate source of rancor between the two major political parties. As a result, efforts to reform an aging and ineffective immigration system have been largely unsuccessful. Meanwhile, pressures on the U.S.-Mexican border continue to grow.  

A convergence of factors, including climate change and a rise in organized crime and authoritarian leadership, is forcing desperate families from Central and South America and other parts of the globe to seek refuge in the U.S. Many experts point to these externalities and the expiration of Trump-era asylum restrictions as the combined cause for the Border Patrol's record-breaking numbers of migrant encounters in the second half of 2023.  

In response to this surge and a growing backlog of asylum and immigration cases, Congress attempted to pass historic bipartisan reform under the Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act in February 2024. The bill would have increased support for border security efforts and the immigration court system. Like many previous attempts at reform, it succumbed to politics.  

Why has the U.S. dragged its feet on improving immigration processes and monitoring for more than 20 years? What does this mean for frontline communities in the Ten Across region as global trade becomes more regionalized, and climate and political tensions intensify? Listen in as Ten Across founder Duke Reiter and U.S.-Mexico border relations expert David Shirk explore these questions, as well as the history of this fraught political boundary, from its establishment to its significance to modern American isolationism.  

Relevant links and resources:  

justiceinmexico.org  

“Takeaways from the Texas Tribune-Associated Press report on 24 hours along the Texas-Mexico border” (The Texas Tribune, 2024)  

“How the 10X Region Can Plan for Climate Migration with Abrahm Lustgarten” (Ten Across Conversations, 2024)  

“10X Trendline: Unprecedented Migration Patterns Are Testing U.S. Diplomacy in the Ten Across Region” (Ten Across Blog, 2024)

“Alternative Visions of the Southern U.S. Border Yesterday, Tomorrow, and Today”  (Ten Across Conversations, 2023)

Whether humid or arid, summer heat indexes from Southern California to Florida have become increasingly fatal when people lack access to air conditioning or some form of cooling. Last year in Arizona's Maricopa County, alone, almost 25% of the more than 600 heat-related deaths were people who had been sheltered indoors, but with broken or insufficient air conditioning.    

Most AC units are still highly energy inefficient and can be prohibitively expensive to use. What’s more, most also rely on chemical refrigerants that are atmospheric pollutants. The resulting energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions contribute to a feedback loop, further warming the planet and our region.  

In 2022, Ten Across began partnering with Clean Cooling Collaborative, an initiative of the ClimateWorks Foundation, on a regional student competition seeking environmentally friendly cooling solutions for underserved populations along Interstate 10. Over 700 colleges and universities throughout the Ten Across region were invited to submit engineering, design, policy, health or finance innovations that could increase access to low-carbon, artificial cooling.   

Five finalist teams advanced through a rigorous application and stakeholder engagement process to participate in an online fast-pitch event this past March. Their proposed solutions were each adjudicated by a panel of five heat resilience experts in front of a live online audience of supporters and peers. The student teams with their faculty and community partners all took home grants of varying sizes to support continued development of their experience in climate innovation.  

In this episode, Ten Across founder Duke Reiter narrates and explores the rationale, process, and outcomes of the inaugural 10X Prize, featuring perspectives from the competition sponsor, two jurors, a student competitor and their community partner.  

Relevant links and resources:  

Learn more about the competition and our sponsor:

10X Prize website  

cleancoolingcollaborative.org  

Learn more about heat resilience or the urban heat island effect:   

“What Some of the Hottest Cities on The 10 Are Doing to Address Deadly Heat”

“10X Heat Series: Covering Climate Change as It Unfolds with Jeff Goodell”  

Learn more about cooling associated emissions:  

“10X Heat Series: Solving the Cooling Paradox” (with Ankit Kalanki)
 
“Rethinking How We Cool Buildings with Dr. Alexandra Rempel and Christiana Moss”

Many scholars, energy experts, and federal politicians agree the U.S. electric grid is antiquated and increasingly ineffective at meeting the demands of the 21st century. Power demand over time, or “load growth,” has reached historic heights with the expansion of artificial intelligence, electric vehicle ownership, and American manufacturing. As a result, utilities like Arizona Public Service have warned they may run out of transmission capacity by the end of the decade.  

Real and imagined climate-fueled energy disasters such as 2021’s Winter Storm Uri or a recent hypothetical model of a summertime blackout scenario in Phoenix, have heightened our awareness of grid-related risks. Whether the focus is climate adaptation or mitigation, our success depends on an increased and secure energy supply.    

Michael Skelly, founder and CEO of Grid United, U.S. wind energy pioneer, and the protagonist of the 2019 book Superpower: One Man’s Quest to Transform American Energy, first recognized and began addressing this dilemma decades ago.  

Through more than 10 years of developing wind projects, Michael encountered firsthand the limits of renewable energy potential within the existing grid. Solar and wind are intermittent and regionally specific energy resources. Current infrastructure does not allow pathways for these abundant and inexpensive supplies to reach the entirety of the nation. His company Grid United is hoping to change that, with strategic grid-to-grid transmission development projects.  

Listen in as Ten Across founder Duke Reiter and Michael Skelly discuss an emerging joint effort between the public and private sectors to revolutionize transmission planning and development and realize the U.S. electric grid of tomorrow.  

Relevant links and resources: 

 “FERC Issues Order No. 1920 To Accelerate Regional Transmission Planning” (Inside Energy & Environment, 2024)  

“UK and Denmark launch Viking Link underwater cable project” (Euro News, 2024)  

“What Will We Do With Our Free Power?” (The New York Times, 2024)   

“Why the U.S. Electric Grid Isn’t Ready for the Energy Transition” (The New York Times, 2023)

“Explained: Why perovskites could take solar cells to new heights” (MIT News, 2022)