The Climate Question

The rise of renewables is good news for the climate, but for millions of families who rely on fossil fuels for a paycheque, it means big changes. People have been talking about a “just transition” for decades. The term was first used in the 1990s, when US unions were demanding help for those who'd lost their jobs because of tightening environmental laws. Now it means looking at how we decarbonise...

Drastic change is needed to limit the increase in the global temperature caused by climate change. More than two-thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions come from how we live our lives. But the behaviours that drive these emissions tend to be deeply habitual and hard to shift - the way we heat our homes, what we eat and how we travel to work. And our behavioural good intentions all too often fai...

It seems we all love trees. Politicians, celebrities and big businesses love trees too. They’re seen as a natural climate fix because they eat carbon dioxide, one of the main gases that cause global warming. The number of trees pledged in the coming years runs into the billions. Pakistan wants to plant more than three billion trees in the next couple of years. Ethiopia claims to have planted 350 m...

When a man sitting on nearly $9 trillion dollars of funds speaks, CEOs, investors and politicians listen. In late January, Larry Fink, boss of the world’s largest hedge fund, BlackRock, announced in his annual letter that "climate risk is investment risk. But we also believe the climate transition presents a historic investment opportunity.” He's not alone in championing big money's green awakenin...

The big tech firms of the world have reported record profits during lockdown. These firms are some of the industrial titans of the digital age. Their ability to manipulate vast quantities of data is revolutionising, well, everything. From streaming games and movies, to automating mining operations, controlling medical devices and even simple emails, the internet has brought incredible advances rig...

Africa has an electricity crisis. Hundreds of millions of people lack cheap, steady supply, crippling lives in countless ways. Every other continent has electrified off the back of fossil fuels but Africa, on the face of it, has the opportunity to do it differently. Researchers found that some 2,500 power plants are planned across the continent. But the majority are expected to run on fossil fuels...

Lockdown saw historic drops in global emissions in every sector, except one: sports utility vehicles, or SUVs. They are among the best-selling cars in markets around the world, from India to China, South Africa and Germany. But these vehicles pollute much more than a normal sized car, and require more fuel to move and energy to make. Seen as a status symbol and wrongly thought of as safer than oth...

Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate is on a mission to make sure Africa is listened to on climate justice. In early 2019 she started taking to the streets of Kampala to protest about climate change. It was a lonely pursuit. She was often on her own, or at best with a couple of her siblings or friends. But she quickly started gaining recognition, and has since spoken at the UN and Davos. However, a yea...

As sea levels rise due to global warming, what does the future hold for our coasts? Already threatened by rising tides, Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, is in a perilous situation - it is sinking. We join reporter Resty Woro Yuniar on a crumbling sea wall to hear the reality of living under sea level, and speak with the engineer responsible for fighting flooding from both the sea and the mountai...

Five years ago, there was widespread celebration after world leaders signed up to the Paris Agreement. However, despite pledging to pursue efforts to limit global warming to just 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, emissions have continued to rise. Many are saying the COP26 conference in late 2021, where world leaders will meet again, is a make-or-break moment to turn words into action. What needs...

Not only has this year been one of the hottest on record, but there has also been a catalogue of record breaking extreme weather events. From the unprecedented bush fires in Australia to the most active Atlantic hurricane season on record, we pick apart how climate change is impacting weather systems and the lives of millions of people around the world. Justin Rowlatt, the BBC’s Chief Environment...

In 2015, Pope Francis asked Catholics the world over to protect our planet. But five years on, with emissions and extinctions rising, what difference has it made? And have any other religions followed suit? For answers, Neal and Graihagh are joined by two leading voices on the environment: Christiana Figueres, who helped the world reach the Paris Climate Agreement, and Cardinal Peter Turkson, the...

If we educate and empower girls and young women, they are likely to have more control over their fertility. And with fewer people on the planet, it becomes the number one climate change solution. But it’s more complicated than it sounds, and not without controversy. Experts: Christina Kwauk, a fellow in the Center for Universal Education at Brookings, and Paul Hawken, founder of Project Drawdown R...

The record-breaking Atlantic hurricane season has devastated parts of the Caribbean and Central America. We’ll hear what it has meant to one neighbourhood in Nicaragua. In a speech this week, the UN Secretary General said that “apocalyptic fires and floods, cyclones and hurricanes are increasingly the new normal.” What, if any, is the link between hurricanes and climate change, and should we be pr...

Climate scientists have shifted the definition of what they believe is the "safe" limit of climate change. Researchers argued the global temperature rise must be kept below two degrees Celsius by the end of this century to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But what are those worst impacts in reality? What does it mean to people, communities and the world we live in? In this episode, we go...

Many people have worried that the Covid-19 pandemic meant the harm of climate change was being ignored. But could the opposite be true? Neal Razzell and Graihagh Jackson look at the links between both emerging pandemics and deforestation. We’ll be on the ground in Nigeria, with BBC reporter Nkechi Ogbonna showing us the reality of farming and land use change in the tropics. While in the bush, she...

Will a Joe Biden presidency be better for the environment than President Trump’s policies? Is China really set to take the lead on tackling climate change? And can the world's two biggest emitters of greenhouse gases work together for the good of the planet? We're joined by former governor of California Jerry Brown, now with the California-China Climate Institute at Berkeley, and Daily Telegraph j...

Not just a show about climate, it’s also about how we can change. What’s stopping us from stopping climate change? Finding new ways of understanding what is happening to our world and the solutions that are out there.