Three Podcasts That’ll Make You Think Differently About Climate Change

The two-sides-to-every-story approach to balance may have served journalism well for about a century now, but boy did it fuck up reporting on climate change. Long after there was scientific consensus that it was actually happening, nuance in climate change stories was easily taken care of by a nod to the sceptics. A story without some sort of scepticism could be seen as “unbalanced”, or hippy bullshit.

You know what does nuance well? Podcasts. Complicated stories full of grey area is where podcasts eat.

There are lots of great podcasts about climate and the environment, but these three were game changers for me. Also, they are just great storytelling.

1. This American Life: ‘Hot In My Back Yard’

May 2013

Sick of the ‘scientists said’/‘sceptics said’ back and forth, This American Life looked instead at stories of people trying to ‘unstick’ the conversation.

The first story is about a Colorado State Climatologist, working up to say publically for the first time that the extreme weather the state was experiencing was influenced by human-made climate change. The second tells the story of a former Republican Congressman trying to create a conservative coalition for climate change. It’s a little heartbreaking, if that’s the sort of thing that breaks your heart.

And it’s all set against a nicely painted backdrop of “shit is getting weird”. As illustrated in this wonderful introduction from producer Julia Kumari Drapkin:

“At first, the stuff I was hearing was kind of subtle. One woman started noticing squirrel road kill near her house, for example…The short winter meant squirrels were reproducing in greater numbers, spreading out to places they had never been before. Flowers bloomed weeks earlier than normal, way before farmers’ markets had even opened for the season. So people who sell flowers for a living had no place to sell…Meanwhile, bears were killing off livestock like crazy because they didn’t have enough to eat in the woods. Because there weren’t enough acorns. Because the oak leaves froze. Because they came out too early.”

Subscribe via iTunes here.

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2. The Hackney Podcast: ‘Wild Hackney’

May 2012

I have been forbidden by concerned friends from reading post-environmental-apocalypse fiction. The better it’s done, the more frightening it is. But there’s a loophole in this benevolent ban: post-environmental-apocalypse fiction podcasts. I’ve only come across one (which is a shame, make more please), but it is excellent.

East by Northeast’s Hackney Podcast has won all sorts of awards for this wonderful but terrifying piece of storytelling, which takes the listener through London after sea levels have risen. It uses field recordings of the area, and fictional interviews and reporting to create something that is at once incredible to listen to and terrifying to think about.

Look, I’ve made it sound terrible. It’s not, it’s great. By the end, it’s even strangely uplifting.

Subscribe via iTunes here.

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Planet Money: ‘Economists have a one page solution to climate change’

June 2013

Given what is happening to our carbon tax in Australia, this one is hard to listen to without pulling your hair out at the roots in frustration.

Spoiler: the titular ‘one page solution’ is a carbon tax. “If you do it right…a carbon tax can be nearly painless for the economy as a whole. That’s right, at least initially, you can fight climate change and do it for free.”

Producer David Kestenbaum goes on to explain what a carbon tax essentially is, in an interesting and simple way. Until I heard this podcast, I will admit I pretended to know, despite not understanding it much at all. Planet Money explains things super simply and earnestly, and is a great way to feel smart if you have no idea about economics.

And this is a policy area which, once I understood it, had me feeling smug. The same sort of smug we get when The Daily Show does a special on our gun control laws.

Subscribe via iTunes here.

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Jess O’Callaghan produces the Meanjin podcast. She writes for Right Now, Something You Said and Farrago.

Feature image via Wallpoper.com