TILclimate

By MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative

What's TILclimate about?

Get smart quickly on climate change. This award-winning MIT podcast, Today I Learned: Climate, breaks down the science, technologies, and policies behind climate change, how it’s impacting us, and what our society can do about it. Each quick episode gives you the what, why, and how on climate change — from real scientists — to help us all make informed decisions for our future.

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TILclimate episodes:

04.11.2024
Do wind turbines kill birds?
MIT Professor Michael Howland returns to the podcast to answer a listener's question about the risks of wind energy to birds—and explain how wind turbines compare to coal plants, power lines, office towers, housecats, and other threats to birdlife in...
04.04.2024
Do wind turbines freeze up in the cold?
You might have heard how wind turbines failed in Texas during a terrible cold front in 2021. Does this mean we can’t rely on this clean, renewable source of energy when the weather turns extreme?
03.28.2024
Won’t more CO2 help plants grow?
Plants take in CO2 from the air to grow—and today’s atmosphere has about 50% more CO2 than it did before we started burning massive amounts of fossil fuels. So, is that great news for plants?
03.15.2024
Season 6 Preview: Something a Little Different
People all around the world write into our team with questions about climate change. So this season, we’re working with scientists and experts at MIT and beyond, to answer those questions in language we can all understand.
12.07.2023
Why does it take five years to build a wind farm?
The United States has a goal to power the country with 100% clean electricity by 2035. Unfortunately, our energy regulations are not set up to make this much change this quickly. Energy economist John Parsons of MIT joins the show...
11.30.2023
Energy storage: keeping the lights on with a clean electric grid
The large majority of new energy we’re building today comes from clean, renewable wind and solar projects. But to keep building wind and solar at this pace, we need energy storage: technologies that save energy when the weather is favorable,...
11.16.2023
A public health expert’s guide to climate change
We all want to live full, healthy lives. But climate change is threatening a growing number of people’s lives and well-being. So we’ve invited a guest on the show to help us see climate change not in tons of carbon...
11.09.2023
TILclimate presents: What the heck is El Niño, anyway? (from Outside/In)
We were going to produce an episode on El Niño, and its relationship to climate change. And then we found out that Outside/In, from New Hampshire Public Radio, already did that. And they did a really good job.
11.02.2023
Wildfires and how we're changing them
If you live in the U.S. Mountain West, the Pacific Coast of the Americas, or large parts of Australia or southern Europe, there’s a good chance a major wildfire has passed near you in the last five or six years—maybe...
10.26.2023
Can desalination solve water scarcity?
Today we’re talking about desalination: turning saltwater into freshwater, so we can drink it or use it to grow crops. And we’re talking about this because, in many parts of the world, freshwater is getting harder to come by. So…...
10.19.2023
Don’t throw away your refrigerator
Refrigerants are in every refrigerator, freezer and air conditioner, and the world is on track to make a lot more of them in the years to come. They’re also powerful greenhouse gases: often thousands of times more warming than carbon...
10.12.2023
How tackling methane cools the planet fast
Carbon dioxide—CO2—is the greenhouse gas you’ve probably heard most about, on this podcast and elsewhere. But it turns out, methane is an incredibly important greenhouse gas too.
10.05.2023
Wait, how do greenhouse gases actually warm the planet?
You probably know that today’s climate change is caused by certain gases—what scientists call greenhouse gases—that human activity has been adding to our atmosphere. But—how do these gases actually keep heat from escaping into space? And why these gases in...
09.21.2023
Coming Soon: TILclimate Season 5
On October 5, TILclimate is returning for our fifth season! If you're looking to get smart quick on climate change – without the jargon and without the politicking – this podcast is for you! In each episode, we work with...
08.16.2023
America’s Big Year of Climate Action
On August 16, 2022, President Joe Biden signed into law the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). It was the largest of three bills signed over the course of 10 months that together make up the United States’ largest investment in addressing...
04.11.2023
Announcing TILclimate's Live Event: "America’s big year of climate action"
On Wednesday, April 19, TILclimate will host its first live event at the MIT Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts! Reserve your seat at tilclimate.org to watch a live recording and join the questions as your host Laur Hesse Fisher sits down...
02.16.2023
TIL about recycling
We often hear about recycling as a way to make an impact on climate change right in your own home. But how big a difference are we really making when we recycle?
12.15.2022
TIL about winter storms
Winters are warming faster than any other season here in the U.S. So why are some winter storms getting even more intense? Today, we’re going to explore the connections between climate change and extreme winter weather.
11.17.2022
TIL about carbon offsets
What if you could pay someone else to cancel out your carbon emissions? For this episode, we sat down with Dr. Barbara Haya from the University of California Berkeley to talk about how “carbon offsets” work and whether they are...
09.15.2022
TIL about everyday travel
Roughly ten percent of the world’s CO2 emissions come from passenger vehicles: cars, pickups, motorcycles, buses, and taxis. So today, we’re going to zoom in on how people get around every day and what to consider when thinking about reducing...
08.25.2022
TIL about electric cars
Electric vehicles (EVs) are being touted as a major solution to climate change. But why is that? How do they work and what kinds of changes are needed as more EVs hit the road? To dig into this, we brought...
07.14.2022
TIL about hydrogen energy
Hydrogen gas acts like a fossil fuel, but with no carbon emissions. Is it the silver bullet we’ve been waiting for? Prof. Svetlana Ikonnikova of the Technical University of Munich joins us to bring light to how hydrogen works and...
06.02.2022
TIL about the changing ocean (part 2)
The ocean is a critical piece of the climate change puzzle. It's estimated that the ocean has absorbed about one third of the excess CO2 humans have added to the atmosphere and more than 90% of trapped heat in the...
06.02.2022
TIL about the changing ocean (part 1)
The ocean is a critical piece of the climate change puzzle. It's estimated that the ocean has absorbed about one third of the excess CO2 humans have added to the atmosphere and more than 90% of trapped heat in the...
05.05.2022
Season 4 Preview
At MIT, we have a commitment to sharing what we know about climate change. That’s why, this summer, we’ll be back soon with a fourth season of TILclimate, bringing you new episodes that dive into even more climate topics, like...
02.03.2022
TIL what it costs
When people talk about how much it costs to stop climate change, what are we paying for? And who’s paying, exactly? And if we don’t pay to stop climate change – how much will that cost us?
01.20.2022
TIL about what I eat
Today we bring climate change to the dining room table. In this episode, we reinvited Dr. Cynthia Rosenzweig onto the TILclimate podcast to tell us just a little more about the connections between the food we eat and climate change.
11.18.2021
TIL about farming a warmer planet
Over the last fifty years, our world has made remarkable progress in reducing hunger around the world. How can we keep our farms and food system resilient in a warming climate?
10.07.2021
TIL about planting trees
In our last episode, we talked about using technology to suck out extra carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But you might also be thinking—don’t trees do that? Yeah, they do! In fact, some people have proposed that by planting enough...
08.19.2021
TIL about removing CO2 from the atmosphere
Professor Niall Mac Dowell of Imperial College London joins host Laur Hesse Fisher to demystify the process and feasibility of removing CO2 from the atmosphere.
07.22.2021
TIL about national security
Is climate change really a national security issue, in the same way we think about terrorism or nuclear weapons? And if so, what are our governments doing about it?
07.01.2021
TIL about sea level rise, part 2
Sea level rise is already happening and affecting people right now. We invited Prof. James Renwick back to TILclimate to talk about the near future: what will sea-level rise look like for coastal areas in the next 20 or 30...
06.17.2021
TIL about sea level rise, part 1
If you’ve heard only one thing about climate change, it might be that sea levels are rising, and many of the Earth’s islands and coastlines are at risk. But, why?
02.25.2021
TIL what Americans think about climate change
Surveys show that both left- and right-leaning Americans support policies that slow climate change. So why aren’t we seeing more of these policies pass as legislation? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), MIT alum Parrish Bergquist joins...
02.25.2021
Season 3 Preview
Climate change can be confusing, and there’s so much to know. That’s why we’re back with a third season of TILclimate, bringing you new episodes that explain the basics, like why exactly is sea level rising, how climate change affects...
10.29.2020
Is it too late?
Is it too late to prevent climate change? Are the scary predictions that we hear about inevitable? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned Climate), MIT Prof. Noelle Selin joins host Laur Hesse Fisher to answer these questions. They...
10.29.2020
TIL about cleaning up clean tech
Technologies like solar panels and batteries help us slow down climate change, but they’re not inherently perfect. In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned Climate), Suzanne Greene of the MIT Center for Transportation and Logistics and the MIT Environmental...
08.13.2020
TIL about fusion energy
Let’s talk about a technology that could change our whole energy system, but so far hasn’t generated a single watt. In the season finale of TILclimate (Today I Learned Climate), Professor Dennis Whyte sits down with host Laur Hesse Fisher...
07.16.2020
TIL about carbon capture
This season, we’ve talked about alternative energy sources that don’t emit carbon dioxide -- but what if there was a way to continue using fossil fuels for energy without emitting CO2 into the atmosphere? In this episode of TILclimate (Today...
06.18.2020
TIL about nuclear energy
We know how to generate tons of electricity without pumping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, using a technology that’s already mature, widespread, and competitive with fossil fuels -- and also, very controversial: nuclear power. In this episode of TILclimate (Today...
05.07.2020
TIL about energy efficiency
We hear a lot about technologies that produce carbon-free energy, but what about actually using less energy to begin with? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned Climate), Harvey Michaels, lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management, joins...
04.02.2020
TIL about wind and solar
What will it take to generate the electricity our society needs, without generating carbon emissions? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned Climate), Dr. Magdalena Klemun at the MIT Institute for Data, Systems and Society joins host Laur Hesse...
02.13.2020
Is it energy or electricity?
In this mini-episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), host Laur Hesse Fisher breaks down what we’re actually talking about when we use the word “energy”. In a few minutes, we cover the difference between energy and electricity, and the...
02.06.2020
TIL about fossil fuels
Fossil fuels -- coal, natural gas, and oil -- provide the large majority of our power in the United States and around the world. In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), John Reilly of the MIT Sloan School...
01.30.2020
TIL about the electric grid
The electric grid are networks that carry electricity from central power plants to our homes. But how exactly is electricity generated and brought to our door? And what needs to change if we’re going to transition to generating “clean” electricity?...
10.03.2019
TIL what I can do
Here at TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), there’s one question we get from our listeners more than any other: “What can I do to make a difference on climate change?” In this special episode of the podcast, three guests who...
05.01.2019
TIL about geoengineering
When talking about climate change solutions, we often hear about reducing emissions and adapting to climate impacts, but a third option is starting to get more attention: altering the atmosphere. In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate),...
04.24.2019
TIL about carbon pricing
What exactly is a carbon price, and how does it work? What would it look like and how would it change everyday life? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), MIT economics professor Christopher Knittel joins...
04.17.2019
TIL about climate impacts
With climate change, some parts of the world will get more water, but others will experience droughts. Some will start seeing more mosquitoes, but some fewer. And some regions might actually benefit economically. What’s the deal? In this episode of...
04.10.2019
TIL about uncertainty
How do we make choices in the face of uncertainty? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), MIT professor Kerry Emanuel joins host Laur Hesse Fisher to talk about climate risk. Together, they break down why the climate...

What's TILclimate about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

TILclimate episodes:

Do wind turbines kill birds?

Do wind turbines freeze up in the cold?

Won’t more CO2 help plants grow?

Season 6 Preview: Something a Little Different

Why does it take five years to build a wind farm?

Energy storage: keeping the lights on with a clean electric grid

A public health expert’s guide to climate change

TILclimate presents: What the heck is El Niño, anyway? (from Outside/In)

Wildfires and how we're changing them

Can desalination solve water scarcity?

Don’t throw away your refrigerator

How tackling methane cools the planet fast

Wait, how do greenhouse gases actually warm the planet?

Coming Soon: TILclimate Season 5

America’s Big Year of Climate Action

Announcing TILclimate's Live Event: "America’s big year of climate action"

TIL about recycling

TIL about winter storms

TIL about carbon offsets

TIL about everyday travel

TIL about electric cars

TIL about hydrogen energy

TIL about the changing ocean (part 2)

TIL about the changing ocean (part 1)

Season 4 Preview

TIL what it costs

TIL about what I eat

TIL about farming a warmer planet

TIL about planting trees

TIL about removing CO2 from the atmosphere

TIL about national security

TIL about sea level rise, part 2

TIL about sea level rise, part 1

TIL what Americans think about climate change

Season 3 Preview

Is it too late?

TIL about cleaning up clean tech

TIL about fusion energy

TIL about carbon capture

TIL about nuclear energy

TIL about energy efficiency

TIL about wind and solar

Is it energy or electricity?

TIL about fossil fuels

TIL about the electric grid

TIL what I can do

TIL about geoengineering

TIL about carbon pricing

TIL about climate impacts

TIL about uncertainty