Living on Earth

Eels play an important ecological role in many rivers and streams, but they’re so eel-usive that even eel scientists have been challenged to observe them mating in the wild. Ellen Ruppel Shell is author of the 2024 book Slippery Beast: A True Crime Natural History, with Eels, and she sheds light on the eel’s murky ecology and path through the seafood industry.   And the relentless heating of the E...

The US Environmental Protection Agency is shutting down its Office of Research and Development, which represents 50 years of independent scientific research. We explain the impact of this federal decision on both EPA employees and science. Also, National Parks are undergoing increased layoffs and funding cuts under the second Trump administration stretching staff short. A former NPS employee speak...

Weather forecasting, climate research and climate resilience are being hit with major budget and staffing cuts by the Trump administration, impacting emergency preparedness for floods such as the one that devastated the Texas hill country. Also,research has long shown that the top two coffee species, Arabica and Robusta, are vulnerable to climate impacts like increased drought and heat. And by 205...

As the climate crisis brings ever more devastating floods, storms, heat waves and fires, the Republican-led Congress and President Trump have slashed around half a trillion dollars in clean energy tax credits that would have reduced climate pollution and helped America to better adapt to climate change. Also, catastrophic floods like the one that claimed at least 100 lives in Texas this July are b...

19-year-old Eva Lighthiser has experienced climate anxiety for most of her life, as her home state of Montana faces worsening floods, wildfires, and extreme heat. Now she and 20 other young people are suing the Trump administration over its efforts to boost fossil fuels while suppressing climate science and renewable energy. Also, ten years since nations adopted the historic Paris Agreement, green...

This June the US Environmental Protection Agency proposed eliminating regulations that limit climate changing gases from power plants, about a quarter of US emissions. Harvard Law Professor Richard Lazarus speaks about the perils of the broader Trump administration effort to weaken federal environmental protections. Also, the ugly truth of plastic is that the world produces over 400 million metric...

Just as the enslavement of people was driven by commercial interests, today the enslavement of nature for profit violates a morality that sees value in all living things, according to the Rev. Mariama White-Hammond, pastor of New Roots AME Church in Dorchester, Massachusetts and former Chief of Environment, Energy and Open Spaces for the City of Boston. She joins us to reflect on how overcoming sl...

One of the development initiatives affected by the Trump Administration’s shutdown of USAID is the Soybean Innovation Lab, which works to improve soybean yields and production in Africa to help boost farmers’ income. Our guest discusses her work with the Soybean Innovation Lab and why helping improve farmers’ yields is so fulfilling. Also, a recent study finds the Colorado River Basin has lost a t...

The 2025 hurricane season is underway, and the U.S. is likely to see higher than average activity. The past couple of years, extremely warm water in the Gulf of Mexico helped storms rapidly intensify to major hurricanes. But cuts to federal weather monitoring and hurricane modeling could leave the U.S. underprepared for strengthening storms. Also, record-breaking heat in the oceans has led to the...

California’s car culture, trucking industry, and weather contribute to chronically bad air that it’s been gradually improving with its own laws and regulations and the blessing of the EPA. But now under President Trump, the EPA and Republican Congress are taking away California’s ability to clean up its air.  Also, the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" that passed through the House of Representatives o...

Last-minute changes in the House budget reconciliation bill included scrapping one of the more controversial amendments that would have sold off public lands in the southwest to private developers. But the overall bill isn’t a complete win for the environment, with even deeper cuts to clean energy tax credits added at the last minute. Also, a new White House memo instructs federal agencies to disr...

The new Pope, Leo XIV, has worked with interfaith environmental networks and there’s hope around the world that he may follow in the footsteps of his predecessor Pope Francis and bring issues of the environment and climate change to the forefront of his agenda. Also, autism spectrum disorder is now diagnosed in about 1 in 31 children in the United States, a rise of 70 percent in just four years ac...

At the direction of President Trump the U.S. Department of Justice has sued four states -- Vermont, New York, Hawaii, and Michigan -- that are trying to recover some climate costs from major fossil fuel companies through climate superfund laws and litigation. The DOJ cases are seen by some as frivolous extensions of the other actions the Trump administration has taken to aid the fossil fuel indust...

The latest “State of the Air” report by the American Lung Association finds that nearly half of people living in the U.S. breathe unhealthy levels of air pollution. Soot and smog are on the rise in part because climate change is bringing more wildfires and ozone-forming conditions. Also, a key climate modeling program within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or NOAA is slated for...

As the world remembers the legacy of Pope Francis we return to his groundbreaking writings on climate and environment that called for a fundamental shift in our economic system, and a rethinking of our relationship with God's creation: the natural world. Also, a 2025 Goldman Environmental Prize recipient was repeatedly told there was nothing to worry about when it came to PFAS “forever chemicals”...

Living on Earth is celebrating 55 years of Earth Day with a solution-based broadcast. Grammy nominated singer and Earth Day ambassador Antonique Smith uses the art of storytelling and music to promote environmental justice and climate action in communities of faith and color. Nalleli Cobo is a young activist who was awarded the 2022 Goldman Prize for North America after fighting an oil company who...

President Trump has issued an executive order that directs the U.S. attorney general to identify and block state laws that deal with climate change, environmental justice, and carbon emissions. A study from Johns Hopkins researchers found that residents near or on the fence line of polluting enterprises are at higher risk for multiple health problems because of the toxic mix of air they breathe. T...

Experts are still trying to piece together how tornado patterns have changed in the last century and are likely to keep changing as the world gets hotter. A meteorologist explains the eastward shift of tornadoes in the US and how newly vulnerable populations can stay safe. Also, the Trump administration is slashing personnel and research grants at two dozen federal agencies, including those conduc...

 A North Dakota jury found in favor of pipeline company Energy Transfer and ordered Greenpeace to pay more than $600 million in damages over its role in helping protest the Dakota Access Pipeline. Some legal experts call the case a classic SLAPP or Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation suit and a threat to free speech.   Also, a program funded by the 2021 bipartisan Infrastructure Law...

As President Trump and the Republican-led Congress aim to shrink the federal government and renew major tax cuts, hundreds of billions of dollars in clean energy tax credits could be on the chopping board. Twenty-one House Republicans whose districts are benefiting from the tax credits are petitioning GOP leadership to keep them intact. Also, under President Biden the Department of Justice and EPA...

The Trump administration announced plans to roll back multiple environmental regulations, cut EPA spending and push back environmental justice programs. We cover how recent federal actions impact environmental policy as well as the role our guest Christine Todd Whitman played as the former Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency during the Bush administration. Also, plastics can conta...

To help cover the rising costs of climate impacts like extreme floods and sea level rise, New York State has enacted a climate superfund law that asks major fossil fuel companies to pay up, based on their historic sales of coal, gas and oil. We discuss how the revenues would fund climate adaptation and resilience.  Also, the Trump Administration barred government scientists from attending a key UN...

The thousands of homes that burned in Los Angeles this January included the home of Marketplace Morning Report Host David Brancaccio. He shares what he’s learning about the challenges of rebuilding with a limited supply and huge demand for contractors. David says there’s an opportunity to rebuild a more wildfire-resistant Altadena, and to heal the community itself.  Also, sea otters were hunted ou...

The Trump EPA is trying to cancel $20 billion dollars of funding in what’s known as the “Green Bank”, which provides loans for local clean energy, energy efficiency upgrades and more. Without providing evidence, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin accused the program of being rife with fraud and waste. Also, as costly climate disasters multiply around the planet, some financial experts are raising alarms...

The Trump administration’s attempt to freeze all foreign assistance and bid to lay off nearly all USAID staffers are bringing disastrous consequences for millions of acutely hungry people, including those in war-torn Sudan. A Sudanese climate activist describes the desperate situation and sends a warning to the US about the perils of isolationism. Also, global warming is increasing the frequency a...