Bioneers: Revolution From the Heart of Nature

John Todd, an ecological designer in the field of biomimicry, imitates nature's evolutionary genius to serve human ends harmlessly, using nature's processes as the design for buildings, technologies and practical solutions to environmental devastation. Educator David Orr suggests that true ecological design can take place only in a society willing to ask, "How would nature do it?"

Facing climate disruption, it’s imperative to fast-forward the transition to power civilization on clean energy. The growing global movement to transition off fossil fuels is challenging the fossil fuel industry and its political domination. Renowned author and activist Bill McKibben and award-winning biologist and author Sandra Steingraber illuminate the frontlines of these New Abolitionists.

In the burgeoning field of biomimicry, bioneers are designing a technological civilization that harmonizes with nature’s operating instructions. Inventor Jay Harman models the forms and dynamics of water with astounding results. Chemist Paul Anastas is re-inventing a “Green Chemistry” that transforms how we make things. Imitating nature is paying off for the economy, people and the planet.

Activists, scientists and grassroots groups are leveraging new technology and collaborative networks to accurately monitor the quality of the environment, expose governmental and corporate abuses, and enable large-scale ecological research to understand the web of life in the age of climate disruption. Hosted by Teo Grossman, Bioneers Director of Strategic Network Initiatives. With: Severine v T F...

Hosted by marine biologist Wallace “J.” Nichols, research associate, California Academy of Sciences; co-founder, OceanRevolution.org; author of Blue Mind. New ways of understanding our relationship with the world’s oceans and the ability of healthy waters to provide health, happiness and creativity will be considered by a panel of athletes, scientists, artists, and adventurers. With: Kevin Weiner,...

Black farmers have been leaving the land at three and a half times the rate of other farmers. It turns out that this loss of black farmers is due less to farming policies and practices than it is to generations of institutional racism. Civil Rights attorney J.L. Chestnut, in a brilliant and emotional speech, tells the story of the successful historic litigation against the USDA on behalf of these...

There is indeed a clash of civilizations today, between a sustainable civilization and a disposable one. Author and social entrepreneur Paul Hawken identifies a new superpower: the mighty river of global popular movements with real solutions. He tracks the unprecedented phenomenon of this biggest movement in the history of the world, the diverse face of a rising new culture of restoration, of reco...

How do you go from being a passionate tree-hugger to a business-suited change-maker on behalf of the forests? Enter ForestEthics Program Director Tzeporah Berman. With a string of conservation successes, including the "Amazon of the North," her inspiring story shows how innovative market-based strategies, strange bedfellows, and public embarrassment are powerful tools to preserve the wild places t...

At the Bioneers Conference in 2017, we spoke with Heather McGhee, Distinguished Senior Fellow at the organization Demos. McGhee describes how the election of Barack Obama resulted in both a racial backlash and the illusion that we were suddenly living in a post-racial society. She also shares a hopeful story that demonstrates a pathway towards healing the divisions that harm us all.

How do we align political governance with ecological realities rooted in watersheds, foodsheds, culturesheds and regional economies? Hosted by: Kirsten Schwind, Bay Localize. With: David Orr, Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics at Oberlin College; Louise Bedsworth, Deputy Director, California Governor’s Office of Planning and Research.

Imagine this: A popular character on a Spanish-language soap opera resonates so deeply with viewers that they become empowered and educated about literacy. Avatars in the virtual world called Second Life enable people of all faiths to better understand and respect Islamic culture. Digital and media entrepreneur William Ryerson effectively uses innovative media for social change. Digital citizen di...

One person's trash is another person's treasure, as the saying goes. Entrepreneur and activist Omar Freilla and "deconstruction" business owner Justin Green are solving for pattern: By working to eliminate waste, they are creating green collar jobs and improving the environment in some of the nation's most underserved communities.

This is Part Two of our conversation with tribal elder and matriarch Casey Camp Horinek. We discuss why a tribally led movement is the best hope for the planet, and how the unique legal and political relationship between tribes and the U.S. federal government is advantageous in efforts to truly protect ecosystems. Casey also discusses the journey her tribe is taking as they explore the best ways t...

In this first part of a two-part program, we travel back and forth in time to explore the battle between democracy and plutocracy. In today’s new Gilded Age of rule by the wealthy, rising anti-trust movements are challenging the stranglehold of corporate monopoly. This is “Democracy versus Plutocracy: Behind Every Great Fortune Lies a Great Crime” with leading democracy defenders Thom Hartmann, St...

“If success or failure of this planet and of human beings depended on how I am and what I do, then how would I be and what would I do?” asked visionary designer Buckminster Fuller. Buckminster Fuller Institute Board President David McConville says our view of the universe profoundly shapes our future as a species, and it’s changing radically.

The idea that a river or other natural feature is a living being, imbued with the right to live and thrive is nothing new to Indigenous Peoples around the world. In this episode with Matriarch Casey Camp-Horinek from the Ponca Nation, we talk about how a burgeoning indigenous-led Rights of Nature movement has the potential to protect ecosystems from destruction by granting legal rights to nature i...

As climate chaos and obscene inequality ravage people and planet, a new generation of visionaries is emerging to demand a bold solution: a Green New Deal. Is it a remedy that can actually meet the magnitude and urgency of this turning point in the human enterprise? With the late Tom Hayden, lifelong activist and politician, and Demond Drummer of Policy Link.

Native American students face racism throughout their education, from racist mascots to the historical erasure of the American genocide from textbooks. In this passionate conversation, Indigenous Rights Activists Dahkota Brown, Chiitaanibah Johnson, Jayden Lim, and Naelyn Pike share stories of their own experiences and how they are working to abolish racism in schools.

Deep Ecology extends an inalienable right to life to all beings. Yet as the naturalist Aldo Leopold observed, “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.” Either harden your shell, or be a doctor. Joanna Macy decided to be an Earth doctor. A systems theorist, author and lifelong activist, she describes how healing the world and healing your heart...

Hey podcast listeners! We’re launching a new series called Indigeneity Conversations. Produced by Bioneers and hosted by Indigeneity Program Directors Cara Romero and Alexis Bunten. This series is dedicated to amplifying and uplifting Indigenous voices, experiences and solutions. New episodes will be released on this podcast feed, so stay tuned. This series premiere episode features a conversation...

From the Canadian tar sands to the oil and natural gas fields of North America and the Amazon jungle, Indigenous peoples of the North and South are converging in one struggle. It is also the reconciliation of two different ways of knowing and being, between the head and heart, sometimes called The Eagle and The Condor. Five Indigenous women of the North and South are showing us how to keep fossil...

Do you think of the wilderness as something far away? Not in the age of climate change and human population growth. The real wilderness is always underfoot—the complex systems underlying life on Earth that we barely understand. It’s our inheritance, our guardianship to understand traditional and indigenous knowledge of Earth as a vast, cultivated landscape. Land managers such as Miguel Santistevan...

In this second of a two-part program, we plunge into the mind-bending proposition that we get a second chance to remake our broken food economy. Bren Smith, co-founder and co-Executive Director of GreenWave, has created a revolutionary polycultural farming model that has low upfront costs, is easily scalable, and can help mitigate climate change. It’s called regenerative ocean farming and aims to...

In this first of a two-part program, we take a deep dive into regenerative ocean farming, an extraordinarily productive and low-impact way of producing vast quantities of food for a growing population. It has the potential to re-make agriculture from the bottom up, while regenerating oceans, farmlands, farmer livelihoods, and the climate.  With Bren Smith, co-executive director and co-founder of G...

How does a virtue become a vice? How does a basic building block of life turn into a threat to life? And how do you turn that vice back into a virtue? In this half-hour we visit with two unlikely pathfinders who are helping to revolutionize farming. Calla Rose Ostrander and John Wick of the Marin Carbon Project are taking carbon out of the atmosphere and putting it back where it belongs: in the so...