Climate Cast

Minnesota experienced a seasonably cold but relatively snowless winter. Now, the spring months are making up for lost time by dumping sloppy snowstorms. State climatologist Pete Boulay said what Minnesota is seeing is over time is a different start and end times for the seasons. “Winter is shifting around a bit,” said Boulay. “We’re not seeing as big of snow storms in November like we used to, but...

By creating the Snow, Ice and Permafrost Research Establishment (SIPRE) in 1949, the U.S. military became one of the earliest climate research groups on the planet. The group’s mission was to study the science and engineering of the warming Arctic and the national security implications that could follow. University of Vermont professor and geoscientist Paul Bierman wrote about this in his book, “W...

Wind and solar are among the cheapest energy sources available today, but even when clean-energy projects are ready to go, a cumbersome permit process is slowing down their implementation. Allison Prang wrote a New York Times article about a Minnesota experiment to cut the red tape that is impeding the state’s ability to achieve its clean-energy goals. She spoke to MPR chief meteorologist Paul Hut...

Nick Halter, a Twin Cities reporter at Axios, noticed a peculiar pattern on his morning walks — hundreds of ducks braving subzero temperatures . Many ducks still fly south for the winter months. But climate data shows Minnesota winters have warmed more than five degrees on average since 1970, creating a more tolerable environment for ducks and other birds. These ducks are deciding there’s no reaso...

It’s a post-pandemic world, and Minnesota’s greenhouse emissions are following the nationwide trend of going up. Based on recent state data from 2020 to 2022, emissions rose 6.4 percent with transportation and agriculture being the biggest contributors. Now, the state is off-track to meet its climate goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. “I think it will be difficult to meet,” said Walker O...

A technology that can slow or stop climate change already exists — and has a history of bipartisan support in Washington. But it has a few hoops to jump through before it can make a bigger impact. The method is called carbon capture, which removes carbon from the atmosphere and stores it deep underground. “You can think of this whole process as essentially putting carbon back where it came from,”...

The Antarctic is warming. This means, the ice sheet in the Antarctic Peninsula is shrinking, and ice is breaking off the continent. “The largest icebergs on the planet are going around the Antarctic Peninsula … because these are breaking off the ice sheets as there’s warming,” said MPR News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard, who recently traveled to Antarctica to witness the effects of climate change f...

Winter is the fastest-warming season in the Midwest — more than five degrees on average since 1970, according to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. All that warming is having an impact on ice formation. “Climate change is injecting more energy into our weather systems, and that’s resulting in in just more extreme extremes,” journalist Kristoffer Tigue told MPR’s Chief M...

The Trump administration has pivoted to fossil fuels. But one form of renewable energy has still gained support in Washington: Geothermal energy, which uses the warmth of the earth to heat and cool buildings. Minnesota has already tapped into geothermal power in Rochester where the city’s headquarters will soon be provided a future with carbon-free heating and cooling. By digging deep into the gro...

President Donald Trump has officially begun his second term. One of his first moves was to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement — again. What will that mean for greenhouse gas emissions and climate solutions? Jonathan Foley is executive director of Project Drawdown. He said, “This is not game over. It’s game on. It means the rest of us have to step up and do a lot more.” Foley shared more in...