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In this episode:
We visit the Great Barrier Reef in Australia where scientists are researching 'cloud brightening,' a process that makes clouds more reflective.
We visit an aircraft carrier in San Francisco Bay where we find out why the same research was shut down.
Then it's off to Le Havre, France to hop aboard a sail-powered container ship.
Then author Herb Simmens talks about his book 'A Climate Vocabulary of the Future,' with a number of pithy and funny terms we might all use.
Artist and photographer Nikki Baxendale, who shares some of her breathtaking work on a vanishing Arctic world.
Andreia Fernandez introduces her podcast One Health: Human, animal and environmental health are all connected.
MARINE CLOUD BRIGHTENING
Making clouds more reflective
Transcript of Prof. Shaun Fitzgerald interview
So cloud brightening is an interesting and potentially very helpful thing to consider for shielding more of the Earth from incoming solar radiation. (read more...)
Could marine cloud brightening help stabilize the ocean temperature?
Southern Cross University, Australia
Transcript of Prof. Daniel Harrison interview
We first started working on the concept of marine cloud brightening for the Great Barrier Reef after the mass bleaching events in 2016 and 2017 devastated large parts of the Great Barrier Reef (read more...)
Short-term losses for long-term gains...
A short-term setback from a process that provides a long-term gain. Short-term warming due to cleaner skies, supporting the longer term goal of reducing the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Over 80% of global cargo is transported by ships
Globally we've been inadvertently conducting marine cloud brightening for decades. At the same time that we've been releasing greenhouse gases and warming up the atmosphere, ships traversing the remote oceans have been burning fuels and releasing sulfur compounds which also form cloud condensation nuclei. And so for decades we've been adding these extra cloud condensation nuclei into the atmosphere which has been brightening clouds and masking some of the effects of global warming. However in 2020 the International Maritime Organization brought in new rules limiting the amount of sulfur in ship fuels and so this was an effort to clean up air pollution in port cities where many ships congregate and the exhaust is concentrated and creates an air pollution problem. But an unintended side effect of these new rules is that now we're brightening clouds over the remote oceans much less and so this is amplifying the effects of global warming and some estimates are that this decade we will have doubled the rate of warming because of this dimming of the clouds.
It's great that the International Maritime Organization set policy to reduce emissions - but there are companies out there that recognize that isn't nearly enough - and they're working on using an energy that creates ZERO emissions - and is free. WIND!
Welcome to the world's largest sail-powered cargo ship
Are there really alternatives to the enormous container ships used to transport 80% of the world's cargo, which amounts to about 3% of fossil fuel emissions?
Yes. But are these alternatives scalable
Are they financially viable? Probably no - in terms of today, rolling out thousands of sail-powered ships in the next year. But we have to start somewhere, and Guillaume Le Grand has made a major start with a fleet of 20 transatlantic container ships.
A climate vocabulary of the future
Language plays a big role in shaping our reality. And in the climate era, the words we use carry a lot of power: power to inform, to divide, to inspire action, or to shut conversation down.
Herb Simmens' new book 'A Climate Vocabulary of the Future' arms you with the most complete lexicon of climate terminology - witty, wry and incredibly useful.
Science, statistics and data, aren't enough to move people into action...
In South Africa, one of the biggest factors that helped bring down apartheid was all the arts and music events that drew world attention to the terrible injustices on an emotional level. There's a big difference between knowing something and feeling something. You need both.
Our next story features Nikki Baxendale and her amazing art and photography.
Transcript of Nikki Baxendale interview
I've always been interested in the ocean and water - in fact I grew up in a chemistry lab, my father was a chemistry professor and so I spent a lot of time underneath the electron microscope and so macro patterns have always been a fascination to me... (read more...)
It's essential to be inclusive, involving communities with the research or work being done, because we can all be affected by the outcomes - for better or worse…
The climate work of Prof. Daniel Harrison in Australia was built on a relationship with the local community and stakeholders.
Similar research was started in San Francisco, USA, on the aircraft carrier USS Hornet. Harmlessly spraying salt water up into the air. But in this case, there was no interaction with the local community, so when the community found out about the research, they had it shut down.
It was a tough setback for important research that could have easily been avoided - and the lesson is so simple…
Inclusion has to be at the foundation of any research that has a bearing on any scale of life outside of a closed system - and the climate affects all life.
Introducing Dr. Andreia Fernandes:
Andreia shares her concept of One Health - where Human Health, Animal Health and Environmental Health are interconnected. Andreia features on her own popular podcast
We focus a lot on carbon removal, but this episode looks at research on ways of slowing the warming of oceans in coastal areas.
We also look at the importance of community engagement and what can go wrong without it.
Addressing climate change needs multiple approaches.