Zero

In this episode, I reflect on the wisdom, insights, and lessons learned that Kim Wasserman, Hilton Kelley, and Diane Wilson shared throughout the season. I examine the different topics and themes that all three speakers bring to try and understand the journeys they take in effecting change. I explore a range of topics including connection to place, community empowerment, the role of government, ci...

Diane Wilson is a fourth-generation shrimper, former boat captain, author, and mother of five. She has launched environmental campaigns, demonstrations, hunger strikes, and climbed towers in the fight against local industrial polluters that make her rural Texas Gulf Coast community one of the most polluted in the country. She joins to discuss her connection to the San Antonio Bay Estuary, her figh...

Hilton Kelley is Executive Director and Founder of Community In-Power and Development Association (CIDA). CIDA is located in Port Arthur, TX and works to challenge the environmental violations of the petrochemical plants that loom over the community he calls home. He joins to discuss the health impacts the community faces, the willful negligence of local and state regulators, the role of air pollu...

Kim Wasserman is the Executive Director of the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO), where she has worked since 1998. She joins to discuss her ten year campaign to close two local power plants, the importance of working together with various communities to effect change, and the intergenerational nature of community organizing. Kim was the recipient of the Goldman Prize for No...

Prof. Youba Sokona has over 40 years of experience addressing energy, environment, and sustainable development in Africa. He is currently Special Advisor for the Sustainable Development at South Centre, was Inaugural Coordinator of the African Climate Policy Centre, and Executive Secretary of the Sahara and the Sahel Observatory. He is currently Vice Chair of the IPCC. Youba joins to discuss susta...

Prof. Joyashree Roy is Chair Professor at the Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand, and has been a Coordinating Lead Author in Fifth and Sixth assessment cycles for Working Group III as part of the IPCC. Her research interests include resource and environmental economics, economics of pollution and climate change, sustainable development, and more. Joyashree joins to discuss demand-side emissio...

Dr. Yamina Saheb is a lecturer and researcher at SciencesPo (Paris), a lead author of the IPCC report on climate change mitigation, and a Senior Fellow at OpenExp. She was previously Senior Fellow Researcher at the University of Munster and University of Lausanne, where her research focused on energy efficiency. Yamina joins to discuss the role of the built environment on climate emissions, the co...

Prof. Minal Pathak is Associate Professor at Ahmedabad University as well as Senior Scientist for IPCC Working Group III. Her publications focus on low carbon scenarios for India, demand-side mitigation actions and their interlinkages with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Minal joins to discuss deep decarbonization, the need to rapidly scale up climate change mitigation strategies, and the ef...

Prof. Hans-Otto Poertner is a physiologist and marine biologist at the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre. He explores the impact of climate change on ecosystems and physiology, with a focus on polar and marine regions. He is currently Co-Chair of the IPCC's Working Group II and was previously Coordinating Lead Author of Oceans Systems Chapter. Hans-Otto joins to discuss the relation be...

Muhammad Irfan Tariq has over 32 years of experience working in the public sector in Pakistan's federal and provincial governments focusing on policies, programmes, and projects related to environment, climate change, and sustainable development. He was most recently the Director General of Pakistan's Ministry of Climate Change where he led the provision of strategic guidance on climate ch...

Dr. Aida Diongue-Niang has worked for over twenty years in the Meteorological Service of Senegal in various roles including research, research-operations interface, and service delivery of weather and climate information. She has also been a lead author on the IPCC Working Group I. She has investigated monsoon system variability and predictability. Aida joins to to share the impact of climate chan...

Dr. Jean-Pierre Gattuso is a CNRS Scientist at Sorbonne University and the Institute for Sustainable Development an International Relations. He studies the effects of climate change on marine ecosystems, as well as investigates ocean-based solutions to mitigate and adapt to climate change. He also coedited the first book on ocean acidification and has contributed to several IPCC reports. Jean-Pier...

Prof. Mark Howden is Director of the Australian National University - Institute for Climate, Energy and Disaster Solutions, an Honorary Professor at Melbourne Universitym, and Vice Chair of the IPCC Working Group II. His work over the last thirty years ahs focused on climate variability, climate change, innovation and adoption, and he has partnered with many industry, community, and policy groups....

Dr. Greg Flato is the Acting Director - Climate Research Division within Environment and Climate Change Canada. He has spent his career in the development of global climate models to simulate historical variations and project future climate change. He has been involved in a number of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) cycles as author, and most recently was elected Vice-Chair of the...

Charlie Martin oversees the BlueGreen Alliance's federal Buy Clean policy and campaign. His work includes close collaboration with the US Biden-Harris Administration, environmental groups, labor partners, and lawmakers. Charlie joins to discuss the transformative nature of "buying clean" at the federal level and its role in decarbonizing the industrial manufacturing sector. 

John Red Cloud is the Managing Director of Red Cloud Renewables and 6th generation direct descendant of Chief Red Cloud. He was born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and is one of the Oglala Lakota Oyate. John joins to shared Red Cloud Renewables' mission to assist tribal communities to move towards energy independence through renewable energy and sustainable living projects and tra...

Chibeze Ezekiel coordinates the Strategic Youth Network for Development (SYND), a youth-oriented NGO in Ghana that promotes youth inclusion in governance of the natural resources and environment. He's a member of the board of 350.org and the International Experts of the Environment of Peace 2022 project, and is a 2020 Goldman Enviromental Prize recipient. Chibeze joins to discuss the importance of...

Julien Vincent is the founder and Executive Director of Market Forces. He has been an environmental activist and campaigner for over twenty years, working also at Greenpeace as a Climate and Energy Campaigner. He also writes the "Always Happy, Never Satisfied" substack. Julien joins to discuss his successful grassroots campaign to defund coal in Australia by receiving commitments from Australia's...

Juan Jose Guzman Ayala is an economist and sustainable development professional. His work lies at the intersection of climate policy, economic policy, and financial decision-making, with a focus on the Global South. He co-founded Pacto X El Clima in 2019, a youth climate activist organization working to bring the voices of climate justice leaders to policy-making spaces in Colombia. Juan joins to...

Tanvir Chowdhury is a journalist currently working for Al Jazeera Intl Media Network. Based in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tanvir has covered the great exodus of Rohingya refugees, climate change, and politics. Tanvir was part of a team to win a Webby People's Voice for his coverage of the Rohingya plight. Tanvir joins to share his insights of the state of climate activism in Bangladesh and community's res...

Adam Minter is a columnist with Bloomberg Opinion, where he writes about emerging markets, technology, waste, and other topics. From 2002 to 2014, he was based in Shanghai, where he covered the trans-Pacific trade in recycling; he continued that coverage from Kuala Lumpur, where he was based from 2014 until Covid. His first book, "Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion Dollar Trash Trade," is an...

Adrian de Groot Ruiz is the Executive Director of the Impact Institute in The Netherlands, where he leads the development of the Integrated Profit & Loss accounting method and technologies. He is also the Co-Founder and Director of True Price, a social enterprise with a mission to realize that all products are sustainable and free of external costs. Adrian joins to discuss his motivation for f...

Jacqueline Omania has been an environmental educator in the Berkeley, California Schools for over 30 years. She has worked to infuse sustainability into her curriculum, including starting a farm and garden at her school and developing a zero waste classroom. Her students have enjoyed the zero waste challenge, have reduced their annual waste down to one mason jar, and have set goals for a zero wast...

Pascal Peduzzi is the Director at GRID-Geneva at the UN Environment Program, focusing on transforming data into information to support decision making processes relating to global environment, change, and risk. He and his team recently published a report, Ore-Sand, aimed at improving the sustainability of sand extraction and use throughout the world. Pascal joins to share his findings and discuss...

Mary Nyaruai is the Co-Founder of Nyungu Afrika, a social and environmental impact start-up that is adding value to agricultural waste of pineapple and corn husk fibres into eco-friendly and body friendly sanitary pads. Mary joins to share her motivation for using circular design to end period poverty by making use of underutilised, locally abundant materials.