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- 5 days ago50 min
The Jet Fuel Crisis: What’s next for aviation?
Are flights across the world about to be grounded? Is a terrible war about to create an unlikely good news story for the climate? As conflict in the Middle East threatens the Strait of Hormuz, jet fuel shortages are forcing aviation to confront a structural vulnerability it has spent decades avoiding.This week, Tom Rivett-Carnac, Christiana Figueres and Paul Dickinson examine what the shortage reveals: aviation's near-total dependence on fossil fuels, the structural reasons it has proved so hard to break, and whether it’s ever going to be possible to fix. They speak with Karel Bockstael and Roxanne van Rijn, former aviation insiders who co-founded Call Aviation to Action, a movement designed to reach the industry’s senior leaders and push for much-needed change. They explain why kerosene remains the only viable option for long-haul flight, how thin margins trap airlines into opposing the very regulation they need, and why this fuel shock may be the scarcity event that finally forces the model to shift. Could this crisis become aviation’s turning point? And in a world where up to 80% of people have never set foot on a plane - and 1% account for half of all aviation emissions - what would a truly fair future for flight actually look like?Learn More:✈️ Explore Call Aviation to Action - the movement co-founded by Karel and Roxanne and others, pushing for industry-wide transformation from within📊 Read the UK Climate Change Committee’s aviation analysis, and understand why aviation is on course to become the UK’s single largest emitting sector by 2040⛽ Get up to date on IEA data on global oil and jet fuel markets, including what the Strait of Hormuz disruption means for aviation fuel supply🌿 Learn more about Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) via IATA: what it is, why it currently accounts for less than 1% of aviation fuel use, and what scaling it would require💸 Pay the true price of your next flight via the Future Friendly Fund’s calculator, or check your CO₂ estimate on Google Flights. Check out Bumprints for practical tips or Travel Alternative, Roxanne’s recently launched platform highlighting alternatives to flying🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-HincksEdited by: Miles Martignoni Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- 1 weeks ago40 min
David Attenborough at 100
Monarch butterflies crossing a continent. Peregrine falcons above Manhattan. A giant lemur most of the world had never heard of, until one man pointed a camera at it. For seventy years, Sir David Attenborough has been asking us to look - really look - at the world we share with three and a half billion years' worth of other life. This week, Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac, and Paul Dickinson mark the 100th birthday of the world’s longest-serving television presenter. To celebrate, they're reaching into the archives to share the very first episode of the podcast - a conversation recorded in person with their friend Sir David himself, at the Attenborough Centre in Cambridge in 2019.They also take stock of seven years of Outrage + Optimism, and on a world that’s changed since that first episode dropped. What's moved faster than anyone expected, what's gone sideways, and what still keeps us at night?Then Sir David. On why young people's outrage is entirely justified. On what the natural world actually needs from us. On the rare moments in history when nations chose agreement over conflict. And on why understanding might be the thing that saves us.Learn More:🎂 Discover moments from Sir David Attenborough's life and career on the BBC🌿 Watch Secret Gardens, Sir David's recent series exploring the hidden natural world of the British urban garden, mentioned by Tom in this episode (UK login required)🐋 Explore the history of the International Whaling Commission moratorium, which Sir David cites as a rare model of nations choosing to act before it was too late🌍 Learn more about the global youth climate movement Fridays For Future, from the early days mentioned in this interview to its activity today🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-HincksEdited by: Miles Martignoni Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- 2 weeks ago45 min
“This is civilisation changing stuff”: Is AMOC the hardest climate story to tell?
Europe plunged into a deep freeze. Life as we know it upended. The 2004 film ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ gave a generation of terrified journalists an impossible task: how do you communicate the counter intuitive threat of dramatically colder winters caused by global warming? David Shukman was one of them.This week, Tom Rivett-Carnac is joined by the veteran BBC Science Editor and author of the upcoming ‘The Response’, to explore the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC: the vast system of currents that helps regulate weather, rainfall and temperature across the Atlantic and far beyond. Recent research suggests it may be weakening faster than previously understood - with potentially profound consequences for food systems, ecosystems and global stability.They speak with Dr Willem Huiskamp of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, who explains what AMOC does, and what a much weaker system could mean in practice. Then Tom and David reflect on the harder questions. How do we communicate a risk this vast and uncertain without paralysing people or losing them entirely? Are we socially and politically prepared for -50C winters in parts of Europe? And are we even capable of responding to a threat that may unfold over decades rather than across news cycles and political terms? Learn More:🌊 Discover more about the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and why scientists are watching it closely 🔎 Read the latest paper referenced in this episode, which projects an approximate 50% weakening of AMOC by the end of the century📘 Check out David’s book, The Response, which will be published by Witness Books on 7th May🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-HincksEdited by: Miles Martignoni Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- 3 weeks ago43 min
Beyond the Oil Crisis: What’s actually blocking the transition?
The Iran crisis continues to prove how dangerously dependent the global economy is on fossil fuels. But what will it actually take to move beyond them?In this episode, Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickinson look at what the latest oil shock continues to reveal. And they turn to the upcoming First Conference on the Transition Away from Fossil Fuels in Santa Marta, where governments, campaigners and other actors are gathering to build new relationships and explore new routes towards a just transition in an age of geopolitical instability.Christiana speaks with former President of Ireland Mary Robinson and Ugandan climate activist Vanessa Nakate, who lay out the big structural barriers still slowing the shift. From debt traps that make fossil fuel extraction a financial necessity, to vested interests, and subsidies flowing in the wrong direction.The evidence is clear: the transition is happening. The question is, will it be political machinations or economic urgency that determines how fast? Learn More:🌍 Explore the official page for the First Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels, including its aims, format and participants🛢️ Understand why the Strait of Hormuz matters so much through the IEA’s Oil Market Report hub📜 Read the UNFCCC summary of the 2023 COP28 agreement, which for the first time called for “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems”⚡ See the figures behind the boom in renewables in BloombergNEF’s latest Energy Transition Investment Trends🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Apr 16, 202642 min
It’s In Our Blood: Communities vs Forever Chemicals
There are chemicals in your blood that weren't there fifty years ago. They are in the products you use, the water you drink, the food you eat - and for years, almost nobody was told the full truth about the risk.This week, Christiana speaks to two women who found contamination in their communities and refused to accept it.Emily Donovan and Sarah Alexander have spent decades fighting for greater regulation of PFAS or ‘forever chemicals’. Through their work, and the work of many others, some progress has been made on regulation, and on supporting the communities most impacted. But this story is far from over. Because these chemicals don't break down. They move through soil, through water, through the food chain and through us. And the impacts on our health and on our ecosystems are only beginning to come to light.So, with environmental protection rollbacks at the US federal level, can progress endure? And can community action take on the big companies and the big money behind this scandal?This episode is about what happens when institutions fail, what accountability actually requires, and why the clean energy transition is incomplete if we trade one toxic system for another.🔗Follow the work of Clean Cape Fear 🔗Learn more about the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association🎬 Watch Dark Waters (2019) - the film that brought the DuPont PFOA story to a wider audience 📋Read the Relief for Farmers Hit with PFAS Act 🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Apr 9, 202642 min
The Health Emergency Hiding in Rising Seas
Sea-level rise is often spoken about in centimetres, forecasts and future scenarios. But what if we understood it as a health emergency that is already reshaping lives, harming bodies and minds, and displacing entire communities?This week, as a landmark Lancet Commission launches, Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac argue that sea-level rise must be understood not just as a climate threat, but as a health crisis currently unfolding. And, as co-chair of the Lancet Commission on Sea-Level Rise, Health and Justice, Christiana brings us inside the thinking behind this urgent new effort.Christiana speaks to commissioners ‘Ofa Kaisamy, Professor Anne Poelina and Dr Sandro Demaio, who paint a vivid picture of what happens before and as the water arrives. This is a story of food insecurity, damaged clinics and hospitals, disease, displacement, trauma, and the loss of ancestral knowledge and cultural continuity. But it also points to an opportunity to finally see sea-level rise in fully human terms, with those on the frontlines shaping the response.What changes when we stop treating rising seas as a distant environmental problem and start recognising them as a present health emergency? And what might become possible if the people most affected are no longer treated as victims, but as leaders?Learn More:🌊 Read The Lancet Commission launch paper on sea-level rise, health and justice.🩺 Read Christiana’s opinion piece on health and sea-level rise in the Guardian🏝️ Explore WHO Western Pacific’s work on climate change and health in the Pacific📈 Go deeper with the IPCC on sea-level rise and low-lying coasts and islands.🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Apr 2, 202636 min
Forecasting Disaster: A ‘super’ El Niño? And the case for early action
As headlines warn of a possible ‘super El Niño’ later this year, we ask: how do we respond to a warning before it becomes a catastrophe? The last major El Niño brought record heat, crop failures, flooding and deepening food insecurity across large parts of the world. This time, the question is not only what may be coming, but whether we are any better prepared to act on the warning?Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickinson look at what the forecasts do and do not tell us about the climate ahead in 2026, and what it means to prepare for a crisis that is still uncertain, but increasingly hard to ignore. And in a world of shrinking aid budgets and rising climate risk, they’re joined by Andrew Kruczkiewicz from the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre and Columbia Climate School - how do you justify spending on a crisis that hasn’t happened yet? From anticipatory finance and early warning systems to the politics of aid cuts and the difficulty of communicating risk in real time, they explore what climate preparedness looks like when the stakes are already human and immediate.Learn More:🔴 Browse the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre’s work on linking climate science and action🩺 Read the WHO explainer on ENSO and health🌊 Get up to date on NOAA’s latest ENSO Diagnostic discussion for the clearest official snapshot of what forecasters are currently saying about the chances of El Niño emerging in 2026🛰️ Explore the World Food Programme’s work on anticipatory action and see their Bangladesh case study to see how it’s used in practice🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
- Mar 26, 202636 min
Flooded: Is extreme weather shifting the climate front lines?
We used to be shocked by this. Hundreds of thousands displaced, millions affected, whole communities washed out. But somewhere along the way, extreme weather events have become background noise.This week, Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickinson explore what it means to live in a world where extreme rainfall, displacement and repeated flood damage are no longer rare shocks but part of a rapidly changing climate reality. Last year alone, Southern Africa, Pakistan, Brazil, South Sudan, and many other countries were devastated by catastrophic flooding. We reflect on the scale of the global crisis, the lives upended, and the huge economic losses that too often go uninsured.Then Paul speaks with Louis Ramirez, co-founder of Flooded People UK, about what happens when flooding stops being just a weather event and becomes a political force. They discuss the growing toll of flooding in the UK, from mental health impacts to rising insurance costs and falling property values, and ask what collective action looks like when communities are forced to confront climate damage on their own doorsteps.As the front lines of climate change move ever deeper into the Global North, will governments finally respond with the urgency this crisis demands? And can the devastation that flows from climate impacts help rally a social movement for change?Learn More:About flooding in the UK…🌧️ Explore Flooded People’s resources on the state of flooding in the UK🏠 Read about the government-backed Flood Re insurance programme mentioned in this episode📍 Check the long-term flood risk for your area (England only, with links to other UK nations)About flooding internationally…🌍 Read more about worldwide flood risk from the World Bank🔎 Explore how extreme weather events are being attributed to climate change at World Weather Attribution🚨 Understand how flooding is displacing people across the globe at the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipeJoin the conversation:Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimismOr get in touch with us via this form.Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks Edited by: Miles Martignoni Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan Exec Producer: Ellie CliffordThis is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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About Outrage + Optimism: The Climate Podcast
Outrage + Optimism: The Climate Podcast is for anyone who is not ready to give up on making the world a better place. For unrivalled conversations with decision makers, visionary thinkers and a community of like-minded climate optimists, join former UN climate chief Christiana Figueres, political strategist Tom Rivett-Carnac and sustainable business consultant Paul Dickinson. Each week they make sense of all the top climate news stories, go behind the scenes at crucial talks and ensure you stay informed and inspired ahead of what is set to be the consequential year for climate action.As we approach the middle of the decisive decade for world emissions, and the 10 year anniversary of the Paris climate agreement, subscribe to Outrage + Optimism: The Climate PodcastAnd join us for our special Inside COP series with co-host Fiona McRaith where we bring you behind the scenes of COP30 in Belém! And to see video content from the
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