Reversing Climate Change

Sometimes, we skip right over the life stories of guests. Othertimes, it's everything. Today, it's everything. Returning to the show after several years is Carbon180's Executive Director, Erin Burns. Erin grew up in a coal mining family in West Virginia, got her start in Joe Manchin's Senate office, and has had a long and impactful career in carbon removal. Today, Erin (re)explains...

The clean energy transition sure needs a heck of a lot of mining. What do we do when there are environmental or spiritual costs to getting the materials we need for EVs and batteries? Ernest Scheyder is a Reuters reporter covering critical minerals, and the author of The War Below: Lithium, Copper, and the Global Battle to Power Our Lives . His reporting strives to let audiences draw their own con...

Nearly a decade ago, I was introduced to the concept of the Keynesian Beauty Contest. It is one of those concepts that I keep coming back to time and time again. I recently participated in a two-month Product-Market Fit workshop led by Peter Nocchiero of Alternate Future and Koray Parmaks of Carbon Zero Capital. So I've been living and breathing PMF. Here is a short monologue bonus video episo...

I first heard the idiom "worse things happen at sea" in Monty Python's Life of Brian , and it's true. Ian Urbina has made a career of telling stories of the ocean. From piracy, illegal fishing, and sea slavery to seasteading and rogue carbon removal experiments, he's covered the gamut. How does one continuously report on topics of concern to relatively intimidating people? As the old line goes, "J...

For fans ages 21 and up! It's often hard to know how sustainable or ethical an alcoholic drink is. Very little disclosure is required on most labels, and many of the recipes are proprietary. What is a conscientious drinker to do? Shanna Farrell wrote A Good Drink: In Search of Sustainable Spirits in order to answer this exact question. She and host Ross Kenyon discuss the strange world of amaros (...

What is geopolitics, and has it returned? Did it ever really leave? And how will this affect the future prospects of carbon removal? Today's guest is Sarah Godek, a Washington DC-based international relations researcher. She and Grant Faber co-wrote an article on Carbon-Based Commentary called, "Carbon security and the geopolitics of carbon removal". We discuss the tension between st...

My podcasting editing platform Descript informed me of a new integration with ChatGPT where it would make me a custom video. I complied in perhaps the most annoying and meta way possible. That video exists at the end of this podcast, but first, I have thoughts I'd like to share on what this process made me feel and think about. I've heard so many takes on artificial intelligence and art, and I hav...

When you take a major pay cut to work in government, you don't expect unceremoniously fired by the Department of Government Efficiency with a change in administration. But it happened to friend of the show, Grant Faber. Grant Faber was the United States Department of Energy's Direct Air Capture Hubs Program Manager until he was let go as part of the recent firing of probationary federal em...

There are a lot of companies that want to buy carbon removal and don't have the budget to participate in Frontier or Symbiosis. What are they to do? Until now, they either had to pay expensive consultants or vet projects and contracts themselves and stand by their choices alone. No longer! The new AirMiners Buyers Club could not be arriving at a better time. Federal policy for carbon removal is in...

Seemingly nothing generates hotter passions in carbon credits than forestry. Can credits count against fossil emissions? Is there enough of it to make a difference? What is the appropriate way of funding it? Today's guest is Lisett Luik, Co-Founder and COO of Arbonics, an innovative forestry company in the Baltic that straddles the line between carbon removal and other services forests can pro...

How do registries create carbon removal methodologies? Who should be involved in the process, and to what degree? How does one balance all of the competing attributes and stakeholders? Today's episode is a show in three parts: First, Nori co-founder and host of Reversing Climate Change introduces the context for the main segment which was recorded the better part of a year before its airing. H...

Dear listener, Thank you so much for being a fan of the show. You could be listening to anything with your one wild and precious life and I do not take that for granted. From the bottom of my heart, thank you! Now that the show is independent, I am working to make it financially viable. Can I count on you to help support Reversing Climate Change by doing any of the following? In your podcast app o...

It is sometimes claimed that adoption could be a climate solution. After all, if there are kids needing parents and parents wanting kids, adopting might replace the desire to create more children. Is adoption something we should encourage to reduce environmental risk? Today we have four(!) parents of adopted children on the podcast. Each of them tells their story at the start of the show, includin...

Additionality is typically considered a major marker of quality in carbon removal. But what do we do when carbon removal suppliers are producing other types of products and services that make them less dependent upon voluntary carbon market revenue? Perhaps even more importantly, how do we have a productive disagreement on this topic? Bringing up some concerns can open one to criticism. But we als...

Of all of the world's climate podcasts, here is why you should, with your one wild and precious life, listen to Reversing Climate Change. The tl;dr is I am a long-time carbon removal and climate tech entrepreneur who comes from the humanities (rather than science) and I am programming shows on climate unlike what you're likely to hear elsewhere. Shows with legendary travel writers to worlds that a...

When we think of climate change, we might think of droughts, floods, wildfires, emigration and climate refugees: but what if the call is coming from inside the house? What if it impacts the way we think and act? Today's show is with Clayton Aldern, Senior Data Reporter at Grist and author of The Weight of Nature: How a Changing Climate Changes Our Brains. Clayton explains where additional climate...

This is a (Spotify) video excerpt from episode 332 with Clayton Aldern, Senior Data Reporter at Grist and author of The Weight of Nature: How a Changing Climate Changes Our Brains . In this video clip, we discuss how we hold people accountable when the heat has a statistically relevant negative impact on decision-making, impulsivity, etc. If we are so embodied as to predictably make worse conditio...

The wildfires in Los Angeles have gripped the country this past week. How could so much valuable real estate in prestigious zip codes populated at least in part by the rich and famous burn without recourse? Today's Reversing Climate Change podcast sees alumna of the show, Allison Wolff, return to discuss Vibrant Planet and the LA wildfires. We were originally scheduled just to catch up because it...

Content warning: This episode discusses a scene in a video game that involves sexual assault during war. If you'd like to skip that section, it is from 7:57-8:35. There is a response that discusses the ethical choices in the game beyond that point, but it is more abstract and general about choices. Video games have not historically been amazing at storytelling. Games prioritize mechanics and gamep...

In discussions about technology, and maybe especially within climatetech, the concept of the "Faustian bargain" is common. But what does it actually mean, and is it as simple as concept as it is typically considered? In today's special Halloween episode, Reversing Climate Change host, Ross Kenyon, intros the show by giving the necessary historical context to understand Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s...

The  Grounded  podcast takes over  Reversing Climate Change ! Tom Previte of  The Carbon Removal Show , founded a new biochar company in the United Kingdom called Restord. And like any good podcaster, he decided to make a show about it! Grounded: A Climate Startup Journey , just wrapped its five-episode first season documenting Tom's attempts to start a new biochar company. He walks listeners...

How do we conduct science when there isn't a single isolated variable? What does that mean for carbon removal not taking place in a controlled environment? How does science even work?! Today's show originated from a question of how open-system carbon removal research can be conducted given that in a less-controlled environment, isolating for a single variable with replicability is less obv...

What is it like to go to war? What does the experience have to teach us, and could it in any way be a spiritual endeavor? What does the Temple of Mars have to teach us in a climate-changing world? Karl Marlantes is a Rhodes Scholar who put aside graduate studies at Oxford University to lead a Marine rifle platoon in Vietnam in 1968. He is featured extensively in the Ken Burns/Lynn Novick documenta...

If you're going to write about the Oregon Trail or the Mississippi flatboat era, why not go gonzo? Does it make for better history or just better bar stories? What can you really learn about change by recreating epic journeys in contemporary times, and what can that teach us about how we live upon this planet? Today, adventurer and author Rinker Buck is on the show to discuss his odysseys. In part...

When the world feels increasingly tame, what does it mean to reclaim our wildness? Can we appreciate the benefits of industrial civilization while connecting with our evolutionary roots? Can we get ourselves back to the garden? In this poignant conversation, Academy Award-winning filmmaker Craig Foster shares insights from his experiences diving in the Great African Sea Forest and the inspiration...