Challenging Climate

Pete and Jesse must bring Challenging Climate to a close. Since starting the podcast almost three years ago, we have each taken on more professional responsibilities and no longer have the time for this volunteer effort. In this short recording, we describe what we are now up to: The Degrees Initiative The Degrees Global Forum on SRM SRM360 Climate Reflections, the SRM360 podcast - coming soon to...

Our guest is Maarten Albers, a journalist who reports on agriculture and food for the Volkskrant, one of the Netherlands’ leading newspapers. In today's episode, we draw our attention to the 'nitrogen crisis' in the Netherlands - a major environmental story that has reshaped politics in the Netherlands and societal views on environmental regulation, science and technology, and even...

Our guest is Gwynne Dyer, an author, columnist, broadcaster and lecturer on international affairs. In this episode, we discuss the key messages from his new book Intervention Earth: Life-Saving Ideas from the World’s Climate Engineers , based on extensive interviews with the world’s top climate scientists. We discuss his insights from these interviews on the state of our climate, and address contr...

Jonathan Blake is Associate Director at the Berggruen Institute, where he leads the Planetary Program. Nils Gilman is Senior Vice President at the Berggruen Institute and Deputy Editor of Noema magazine. In this episode, we discuss the ideas in their recently published book, Children of a Modest Star: Planetary Thinking for an Age of Crises . We grapple with ideas of sovereignty, planetary governa...

Today’s guest is Dr. Shuchi Talati, a climate technology and governance expert and the founder of The Alliance for Just Deliberation on Solar Geoengineering. In this episode, we discuss ethics and governance of solar geoengineering, the formal cancellation of Harvard’s SCoPEx experiment, and the UN Environment Assembly deliberations on Solar Radiation Modification. Links: Shuchi Talati’s profile T...

Today’s guest is Ulrike Lohmann, Professor of Experimental Atmospheric Physics in the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science at ETH Zurich. Lohmann is also the Principal Investigator of the CLOUDLAB project, a multi-year project to investigate aerosol-cloud interactions in wintertime stratus clouds over the Alps.  In this episode, we discuss the role of clouds and aerosols in our climate. W...

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Benjamin Sovacool and Dr. Chad Baum, about their newly published, high-impact paper, “Public Perceptions and Support of Climate Intervention Technologies across the Global North and Global South”. Join us as we discuss the key findings of their work, and how these findings can and should influence policy and governance methods. Dr. Benjamin Sovacool is a professo...

George Monbiot is a renowned British author, The Guardian Columnist and environmental activist. George is the author of more than a dozen books, the most recent of which is Regenesis: Feeding the World without Devouring the Planet , and he was awarded the Orwell Prize for Journalism in 2022.  In this episode, we discuss topics of his insightful and provocative articles such as de-throning GDP, rad...

This episode’s guest is Janos Pasztor. He has four decades of work experience in the areas of energy, environment, climate change, and sustainable development, including roles as Executive Director of the Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative (C2G) and UN Assistant Secretary-General for Climate Change.  In this episode, we explore the political lens of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radia...

David Stainforth is a Professorial Research Fellow at the London School of Economics. David has had a long career studying the climate problem and the challenges of making predictions of future climate change. His research spans the philosophy of climate science, climate economics, climate modelling, and decision-making under deep uncertainty. In this episode, we discuss David’s new book ‘ Predict...

David Keith is a Professor in the Department of Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago and the Founding Faculty Director of the Climate Systems Engineering initiative. Keith previously led the development of Harvard’s Solar Geoengineering Research Program. In this episode, we discuss Keith’s Climate Systems Engineering initiatives, carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and geoengineering techniq...

Jennifer Allan is a Strategic Adviser and Team Leader with Earth Negotiations Bulletin, and Lecturer at Cardiff University. Jen has attended roughly 40 UN conferences where states negotiate the rules of global climate governance. Her work explores how global rules are made and remade, and currently focuses on the politics of ecosystem services and green recovery. In this episode, we discuss with J...

Today’s episode is brought to you in collaboration with our friends at the Energy vs Climate podcast. Energy vs Climate breaks down the trade-offs and hard truths of the energy transition in Alberta, Canada, and beyond with energy experts David Keith, Sara Hastings-Simon and Ed Whittingham.   In this episode, they speak with Greg Nemet, a Professor at the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s La Folle...

As we break for the summer, listen here for some highlights of our previous episodes and catch up on the ones you've missed. See you in October! Support the show Subscribe for email updates

Richard S.J. Tol is a Professor at the Department of Economics, University of Sussex and the Professor of the Economics of Climate Change, Institute for Environmental Studies and Department of Spatial Economics, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He is also the author of Climate Economics: Economic Analysis of Climate, Climate Change and Climate Policy . In this episode, Tol breaks do...

Emma Marris is an environmental writer and Institute Fellow at the UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability. She has also written for National Geographic, the Atlantic, the New York Times, Wired, and other publications. In this episode, we dive into the concepts introduced in her book Rambunctious Garden: Saving Nature in a Post-Wild World , such as wilderness and nature purity. We dis...

Dr John Moore is a Research Professor at University of Lapland, Finland and Chief Scientist of GCESS at Beijing Normal University. His research focuses on geoengineering, sea level change, and ice sheet dynamics. In this episode, we take a deep dive into the cryosphere – the state and future of glaciers, sea ice and permafrost, as well as consider marine glacier geoengineering. John also shares hi...

Dr Steve Smith is the Executive Director of CO2RE, as well as Executive Director of the Oxford Net Zero initiative, based at the University of Oxford’s Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment. He also previously co-led the Climate Science Team at the UK Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. In this episode, we take a holistic deep dive into Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) an...

Dr Heleen de Coninck is a Professor of Socio-Technical Innovation and Climate Change at Eindhoven University of Technology, and Associate Professor in Innovation Studies and Sustainability at Radboud University. She is also the newly appointed deputy chair of the Dutch Scientific Climate Council.  In this episode, we discuss the four Net Zero transitions set out in the 2018 IPCC 1.5ºC report, and...

Dr David Fahey is the Director of the Chemical Sciences Laboratory in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and he also serves as a Co-Chair of its the Montreal Protocol’s Scientific Assessment Panel, which produces the quadrennial assessments of stratospheric ozone depletion. In this episode, we discuss flying planes into the stratosphere to conduct experiments on ozone depl...

Chris Stark is the Chief Executive of the UK‘s Climate Change Committee. Previously, he worked as the Director of Energy and Climate Change in the Scottish Government. In this episode, Chris breaks down the role of the CCC in UK’s climate policy. We then take a close look at how UK has done so far in cutting emissions, what else needs to be done, and the challenges that lie ahead. We end off with...

Ken Caldeira is a senior scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science and is also a senior scientist at Breakthrough Energy. Ken has a wide-spectrum approach to analyzing the world’s climate systems - with particular interests in modeling the Earth system and the energy transition, and in using experiments and observation to study our changing coasts and coral reefs.  In this episode, Ken tak...

Andrew Revkin is one of the world's leading science and environmental journalists, with over 30 years' experience thinking and writing about climate change and sustainability. He has written at The New York Times and ProPublica, and his current outlet is “Sustain What?” at Substack. He is also the founding director of the new Initiative on Communication and Sustainability at Columbia Uni...

Dr Daniel Harrison is an oceanographer at Southern Cross University in Australia. His research focuses on how engineering intervention in marine systems can be used to improve ecological, environmental, or societal outcomes. In this episode, we explore Daniel’s work in applying Marine Cloud Brightening (MCB) to protect the Great Barrier Reef against global warming. We find out what MCB is, discuss...

Dr Erica Thompson is a Senior Policy Fellow in Ethics of Modelling and Simulation at the LSE Data Science Institute. Erica's research involves the appropriate use of mathematical and computational modelling to inform real-world decision-making. In this episode, we discuss Erica’s recent book, Escape from Model Land and tackle issues such as bias, disillusioning science communication to help u...