Every year we highlight the work of a scientist who excels in communicating their work to the world by awarding them the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Science Communication. 

Stephen H. Schneider was a professor of interdisciplinary environmental studies at Stanford. He was also a professor of biological sciences with a PhD in mechanical engineering and plasma physics. In other words, he was a big thinker. More than that. He was an amazing communicator of all that complexity. 

“He trained a whole generation of climate communicators,” says Climate One Founder Greg Dalton. 

This year’s winner is Executive Director of Project Drawdown, Jonathan Foley. Project Drawdown is the world’s leading science-based guide to climate solutions. According to Foley, they aim to be the Consumer Reports for climate change,  “We synthesize every paper ever written in science, engineering, technical, economic literature, all the data, and bring it together and say, ‘Hey, does this actually work? And if so, how much would it cost? And how long would we have to wait for it?’” Their research helps governments, businesses, and communities invest in what works best.

At the same time, Foley is not afraid to call out  proposals he feels are mostly hype, like carbon capture and blue hydrogen, “ These are the low-tar cigarette kind of climate solutions. They're still really bad for you, but just a little less bad for you.” 

Foley argues that resources are finite, so we shouldn’t be pouring time and money into questionable fixes, when we already have so many proven solutions. “It's important to call out stuff that doesn't work because there's billions of dollars going into it.” 

All of Project Drawdown’s research and resources are available to the public for free.

“We don't have the time to charge for stuff or ask for subscriptions. We are a public good nonprofit,” says Foley. And the world needs free access to good data because, “We live in an era right now, sadly, where, you know, dividing people, scaring people and misinforming people is a multi-trillion dollar business. It fuels our politics, it fuels our social media.”

It will be difficult to make the necessary changes to address the climate crisis without creating a much broader consensus.. Despite the fact that the majority of the US population believes in climate change and want action taken, climate is very rarely at the top of their priority list. Foley feels climate communicators need to frame the discussion around affordability, job security, health and safety — reas that consistently rank high on people’s minds. “That's where you meet people. That's what you talk about.” 

“I am actually hopeful at the end of the day, because I think there are other people choosing the path of hope that the world can be better. It's not guaranteed, but there are a lot of people raising their hands that say, "I want to work on that,” says Foley

We don't all need to be scientists to have an impact. One resource many of us overlook is our own time. When it’s directed strategically, it can be a major climate lever.  Eliza Nemser leads Climate Changemakers, a group that helps ordinary people become powerful advocates for civic action and climate policies.

“Volunteer an hour a week to push your school board to procure electric school buses and urge your county to electrify municipal fleets. Let your state legislator know that you're counting on them for climate leadership,” says Nemser. “We need more leadership on climate. We need community leaders. We need our elected officials leading. And so learning how to be an effective advocate is your path to being a climate leader.” 

Highlights:

02:11 - Jonathan Foley on Stephen Schneider

06:33 - Jonathan Foley on balancing science and communication

13:09 - Jonathan Foley on Project Drawdown

20:08 - Jonathan Foley on less effective climate solutions

23:27 - Jonathan Foley on the food industries effect on climate

26:22 - Jonathan Foley on being attacked for speaking out about beef

34:20 - Jonathan Foley on the need to stop doing “stupid” stuff

40:31 - Greg Dalton on meeting Stephen Schneider

41:25 - Greg Dalton on creating the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Science Communication

45:52 - Greg Dalton on Stephen Schneider’s legacy

47:14 - Eliza Nemser on her journey to climate activism

49:12 - Eliza Nemser on effective volunteerism 

53:23 - Eliza Nemser on finding your place in climate action

Note: Transcripts are generated using a combination of automated software and human transcribers and may contain errors. Please check the actual audio before quoting it.

Music: In

Ariana Brocious: I’m Ariana Brocious.

Kousha Navidar: I’m Kousha Navidar.

Ariana Brocious:  And this is Climate One.

[music change]

Kousha Navidar:  So, I’m super excited about today’s show. Every year Climate One grants the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Climate Science Communication to one scientist who is doing great work in – you might guess – climate communication. 

Ariana Brocious:And this year’s winner is Jonathan Foley, the executive director of Project Drawdown. 

Kousha Navidar: If you’re asking, “what’s project drawdown?”  They’re one of the world’s leading guides to climate solutions. They show how actions we take today, across energy, food, health, and even land use, can meaningfully address global warming. 

Ariana Brocious: Yeah, they like to call themselves the Consumer Reports of climate research. And their research helps governments, businesses, and communities invest in what works most.

Kousha Navidar: Besides talking about what works, Foley isn’t afraid to call out over-hyped solutions that don’t have good potential.

Ariana Brocious: Yeah, I think at one point he talks about strategies like carbon capture and blue hydrogen as “low-tar-cigarette” kinds of solutions. They might make climate disruption a little less bad — but they’re not going to make the problem go away.

Kousha Navidar: Exactly. Resources are finite, so Foley argues we shouldn’t be pouring time and money into questionable fixes, when we already have so many proven solutions. So let's hear from Foley himself. I spoke with him on the Climate One stage in San Francisco.

Kousha Navidar: Good evening. And Jon, congratulations.

Jon Foley: Oh, thank you so much. It's really a pleasure to be here 

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. I'm so excited to get to just talk to you more. 'cause we talked before in April and you've won the award since then. Yeah. And there's just so much to dive into and I, I, I'd love to start with Steven Schneider because you knew him. Mm-hmm. He was a trailblazer in climate science communication. Incisive, you were saying courageous before we came up here. And he was a mentor of yours, right?

Jon Foley: Yeah. Steve Schneider. Uh, if, if you don't know who Steve Schneider was, he was the Carl Sagan of climate Science, uh, in the 1970s as a young scientist from Columbia University, then moving to NCAR, the National Center for Atmospheric Research. He was one of the brightest climate scientists of that generation for sure. But he also made the conscious choice to serve the world, not just to just write papers and do his narrow academic work. He spoke to the media, he wrote books, and he spoke eloquently about the problem of climate change. And, um, I remember reading in high school, I had to go back and think about it and like, when did I first read about Steve Schneider? I was a high school student in 19. God, eighties.

Kousha Navidar: You don’t need to answer that. That's fine.

Jon Foley: Let's say the

Kousha Navidar: 95. Yeah.

Jon Foley: no, a little earlier than that. But, um, he wrote a book called The Genesis Strategy in 1976, talking about CO2 and aerosols and how they're affecting the planet. And he was a young scientist at the time and he boldly kinda wrote a popular book. It was actually  well written too.

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. So let me ask you this then. Clearly made a huge in influence in you

Jon Foley: Yeah.

Kousha Navidar: What are lessons that you've learned from him that you hold close to your heart and mind right now in terms of communication? 

Jon Foley: Well, I mean, Steve is, uh, somebody who, if you got to know him, and I, I was one of the many who was privileged to do so. He was very good friends with my PhD advisor. So I got to know him through my graduate work. And then I later, when I was establishing myself as kind of a, as a scientist, as an academic, I went to a leadership training program, uh, run by Jane Lubchenko, who was a former winner of this award as well called the Aldo Leopold Award.And Steve Schneider and Paul Erlich, if you know his name too, were some of the, the coaches of this leadership training program. And they were, they were tough. They were like actually kind of brutal. It was really hard. Yeah. I remember they did this thing, so you have to be ready for anything. If you're a public face in a controversial issue, you will be attacked. And so they did this thing during the training session. They called it the ambush interview.

Kousha Navidar: That sounds intense.

Jon Foley: Yep. And I was the one they chose to do it at.

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. 

Jon Foley: So I walked out of a bathroom in a, like a conference center somewhere in Oregon, you know, like drawing my hands. And all of a sudden there's a TV camera, a microphone shot in my face. And Paul Erlich and Steve Schneider pretending they were from like 60 Minutes, like, well here, that your research is entirely fraudulent and you're trying to rip off the American taxpayer perpetuating this fraud about climate change and its connection to food or what? I'm like, oh my God, I almost wet myself. You know what I mean? Like, you know, like, thank God

Kousha Navidar: after you got outta the bathroom

Jon Foley: Yeah, thank God I just gone to the bathroom. Otherwise it might have been a mess. Uh, and I'm like, oh my God. But he said, look, you really do kind of have to be ready for anything. You will be attacked. people are not gonna like what you say, and uh, you have to be ready for that, but know that it's right and it's true. And he said one thing that was really powerful to scientists in particular said, if you wanna be effective in the public arena, there are three things you have to do. One is, you know, know thy audience.Who are you talking to? What are you saying? How do you connect to your audience? Okay, good communication one-on-one, and second was, know thyself. Who are you and what is your moral compass? What are you trying to say? Who are you? Pretty important? And third was: know thy stuff. And he said, I think he'd be really horrified by Instagram influencers and people like that, trying to take over climate communication instead of people who've devoted their lives to studying it. I think he was really a passionate, you know, we had to stick to the facts into knowledge and hard won research as a real scientist, but also be in the public arena.

Kousha Navidar: So I find it so interesting that you bring that up, because that to me is so much about being a scientist, but also being a leader in general. Yeah. Like you're talking about being visible in your community, talking about knowing audience, self and stuff. 

Jon Foley: right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Things that you

Kousha Navidar: Those are three things that you mentioned. And I imagine, I mean, I guess I'm asking you how you balance all of that when you are so visible. I mean, you brought up social media, so I wanna talk about that for a second. There was a time where you put a lot of your personal life. On social media, how do you, how do you navigate that? How do you think of yourself? John Foley, the scientist, John Foley, leader of Project Drawdown, John Foley, the person who cares about the world and sharing of yourself in, in social media and in general for the community.

Jon Foley: Well, I, that's a really difficult balancing act. I think there's a, a need to be genuine in communication and to be, you know, the whole person. You know, we are in fact whole people, right? People wanna rely on expertise in people who study science and as if they're just a, um, a walking bottle of facts and are divorced from their humanity. And that's not really true. But at the same time, people can be a whole person and be, um. Devoted to clarity and transparency and to, I mean, facts matter. They really do matter. I'm, I'm gonna die on that hill if I have to. I hope you will join me there. Uh, you

Kousha Navidar: I'll, I'll hang out there with, I'll see how it is. But yeah,

Jon Foley: live in an era where like, you know, facts don't seem to matter and disinformation is the currency of the realm right now. And, and we live in an era right now, sadly, where, you know, dividing people, scaring people and misinforming people is a multi-trillion dollar business. It fuels our politics, it fuels our social media. It took over tech. It's become a pretty terrible force, I think, in the world. And I think it's important for us to regain, uh, to facts and knowledge and what is true, what is really true. Not what we believe is true, but what is actually true, what is verifiable, uh, and to reclaim our humanity. I think that's important to keep those in balance. Um, you know, my, my childhood heroes were, were Carl Sagan and people like Steve Schneider, people who said no. Um, evidence and facts matter, but so do people. So does being genuine and so does being human. Yeah. And they can keep those two things in balance.

Kousha Navidar: Well, also as being a leader, it is a, these platforms are tools to send messages as well about the current state of what you represent. I mean, we came across a tweet of yours from June, 2015 and it really stood out to me. So I wanted to get your take on it. We did our research. You wrote. This is from you, dear male scientist colleagues. Stop being an a**hole.

Jon Foley: Did I say that?

Kousha Navidar: Thanks, John. 

Jon Foley: from? Uh, well, I don't remember. I'm, uh. Well,

Kousha Navidar: 10 years ago. Let's go, go back on the spot

Jon Foley: Yeah, like I'm, I'm blessed with a short memory, I guess. Um, well, I don't remember, so I can't speak to that specific tweet or whatever it was. Uh, back when there used to be a Twitter, um, I. But I think it's important for people to be, you know, authentic and stay what it's on their mind. And, uh, I think at the time I, I'm just guessing, is probably seeing a lot of really pretty reprehensible behavior of folks who were just like, you know, Hey, wait a minute. Like, let's, let's chill out. Let's give an equal voice to other people, especially women in science. Um, in climate science is a terrible history of this, of being very, you know, look, you know, two dudes on a stage here, you know, whoops. Uh, but we we're in a field that came out of physics originally is still pretty male dominated. The energy sector is pretty male dominated. So I think there's a, we owe a, a real obligation to hear, make sure we're providing space and, um, a willingness to hear other voices and kind of a deliberate attempt to do that. I can't remember. I think that's what I was speaking to.Although I was being a little bit, um,

Kousha Navidar: flippant.

Jon Foley: or maybe just real.

Kousha Navidar: Was there ever a time where you feel like you were an a**hole?

Jon Foley: Yeah, sure. Plenty. Yeah. Um. Yeah, I mean, I've been, this is something that, um, I, I don't like to talk about, but I think it's important for people to say things like this once in a while. Like I, years ago, a long time ago now, thank God, but it was a while back where, um, I was going through a really difficult time. I had kind of lost everything that anchored me in the world. I was a, I was in a job that I didn't realize it at the time, but it was slowly killing me at the time, and it was just eating away at my soul. I was, I, I've learned that lesson very hard way, but I took myself away from being a scientist and a science communicator into being more like an administrator. And I was more focused on like, raising money and politics and the business side of doing what we do in our world. and that was hard enough and I was slowly kinda losing who I was and I didn't see it. At the same time I went through a very, very painful divorce and was losing, you know, family at the time. It was really hard and a lot of people in this audience and listening later can relate to that too, I'm sure. And those two were colliding at the same time. and I, I think I became a really difficult person to be around probably at the time. 'cause I kinda lost a grip of who was, you know, who I really am. Who's actually, I think a pretty good guy most of the time.And it took me a few years, but I've learned there are three things I had to come back to once was a sense of purpose. In the world. And for me, that is doing good science, but making sure science does good. That's my life's purpose, period. And I lost that, and now I'm back. I, it took me a few years to come back to that, but I finally got back to that and found that, you know, running a bigger organization with more responsibility, it wasn't the key to that. It was actually getting more in the trenches. The other was being with the right people. Um, I've now remarried. I found the love of my life and really, uh, Andy who's here tonight, who's anchored my life in so many beautiful ways and changed so much of my life for the better. But also just, uh, reconnecting to like former students and colleagues and people. I owe so much to, and they owe much to me. And kind of a Yeah, a real community. I lost that. And then finally, uh, kind of a sense of place in the universe of like, why are we here? What are we here for? Whether you call it spirituality or a sense of moral duty or something, but I think we're all here for some reason, and it's up to us at some point to figure out what that is. And once I did, I like, felt myself again.  

Music: In

Ariana Brocious: Coming up, are we focused enough on addressing the right problems?

Jonathan Foley: A third of the climate problem, a full third of it, is related to food. And we don't talk about it. In fact, food only gets 4% of global climate media coverage. It only gets 3% of global climate funding, but it's 34% of the problem. 

Ariana Brocious: That’s up next, when Climate One continues.

Ariana Brocious: Help others find our show by leaving us a review or rating. Thanks for your support!  

Music: Out

Kousha Navidar:  This is Climate One. I’m Kousha Navidar.

Let’s get back to my conversation with this year’s Schneider Award Winner Jonathan Foley. 

Kousha Navidar: I wanna give a quick plug if I could, 'cause this is a tool that I've really enjoyed. on your website you have this tool called Drawdown Explorer, which I'm looking at right now. Basically, it identifies and characterizes climate solutions and it says these are, these are ones that we recommend the most, that could make the most difference on a certain timescale. These are the ones that we think are, are, are least effective. And folks, it has stuff like breaking down how much of the problem could be solved by each action. It has things from heat pumps to improving centralized composting. I found it very interesting. That's the end of my plug. I just wanted context for that for this question. 'cause folks need to know what I'm gonna ask about, but here's what I wanted to ask you. I sorted by CO2 equivalent prevented. So how much CO2 can a certain climate action prevent in the world? Sure. And something that surprised me was that the number one and two solutions were deploy onshore and offshore wind. But what I did not see on there were solar and batteries. If they weren't

Jon Foley: Uh, they're not there

Kousha Navidar: found quite surprising. Can you talk about that a little

Jon Foley: Well, it's still a work in progress, uh, so stay tuned. Uh, the solar solutions are still coming. Um, yeah, so we've launched, well, big picture, at Project Drawdown, I like to say we're like the consumer reports for saving the planet. We're the trusted, independent third party that doesn't have a financial interest or a political interest, and all those different climate solutions, Hey, climate change is a big thing now, right? People are paying attention, maybe not in Washington, but the rest of the world are paying attention to this, and trillions of dollars are now starting to flow into climate solutions. So naturally there are people taking advantage of that, trying to sell their favorite climate solution, the one that makes them money or fame or power or whatever. So how do you know what's good? When people are trying to pitch you stuff that might be in their interests, but maybe not the planet’s, that's where we come in. So Project Drawdown is the world's independent guide that's in science-based truthful third party guide to climate action. So we launched this thing about a year ago. Um, we started it and we launched the public version in September. So it's brand new? Mm-hmm. Called the Draw Down Explorer. We started it a year ago and less than a year we published it, but we decided to publish it early when it's not even finished 

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. Tell me about that, because

Jon Foley: Well, the world can't wait. We we're, we're saying, Hey, look, why do we open it up while we're doing it so we can get feedback? People can get information even when it's half done and you know, when the world's on fire, you don't wait for the fire department to perfect the engine. You just use it.

Kousha Navidar: Fair enough. Yeah.

Jon Foley: Yeah. You know, you just use what you got. Yeah. And so, um, at the moment we just decided like, well we could, it's gonna take about two to three years to complete the project, just given the, you know, we're a small organization with limited funding and limited people. We decided early on, like, yeah, we're gonna open it up a year in instead of two to three years in. And it's not all done yet. So the solar solutions are actually being worked on right now. So they'll be done in like March, but they're not ready yet. Sorry. Um, but right at the moment of the ones that are completed, wind are top of the list because they're, they're pretty powerful. But already, um, we also, one of the things we did in this Drawdown Explorer is what we did is we really tried to bring climate solutions to the here and now because too many descriptions of climate solutions were kind of theoretical. They were talking about, uh, a global average. How would wind work on earth? Between now and 2050 as kind of an abstraction, kind of a mathematical abstraction.

Kousha Navidar: You're saying like versus Minneapolis? Yeah. Or like versus your

Jon Foley: Yeah, exactly. And now in the drawdown explorer, we're using the power of big data and analytical models and such to kind of bring climate solutions down to the local level. So we can describe how would wind work off the coast of San Francisco versus inside Lake Superior or off the coast of Newfoundland or Scotland or whatever. Bring it down to the local, where people actually build stuff, not at some abstract global average number, but make it local.

Kousha Navidar: So it's the equivalent of like consumer reports, not just saying, Hey, this is the best car, but like this is the best car for your neighborhood.

Jon Foley: Yeah, exactly. Um, I like to say that you know what the drawdown explorer is, is China taking like the old draw down or an old IPCC report and marrying it to a Bloomberg terminal and Google Maps at the same time. They all had a love baby. So you get the latest information, not just from like five years ago, but this quarter, like we're constantly updating it. So it's the most recent numbers on cost, on effectiveness deployment, but also like, hey, how would that work where I live? Because climate action it, even though people get enamored with the COP meetings, these conference of parties, international UN meetings, we get enamored with what happens in Washington DC. Climate action is local. You know, like they used to say what all politics is local. All climate action is local too. Solar panels don't live at the UN, they're here in your neighborhood. So are wind turbines, so are EVs, they're local, so why don't we bring them down to the local level, but everywhere on the planet. And nobody figured out how to do that before. But we kind of did the big science breakthrough of figuring out how can we use the power of big data to come model how climate solutions work on every pixel on the planet. And it's, you know, trillions and trillions of data points we're working with every day, but we're able to kind of, you know, map down climate solutions to the level of a city or a county everywhere in the world for hundreds of different climate solutions. And you know what we're doing too is you're just crazy. We're giving it away. So many people told me, Jon, you're nuts. You can't do that. You should charge for it. You should make money off of this. I'm like, Hey look, if you're having a heart attack, the defibrillator on the wall, better not have a credit card versus, you know, thing on it. Or, you know, you don't put it behind a paywall, you just give it away because the world's on fire. We don't have the time to charge for stuff or ask for subscriptions. We are a public good nonprofit. also my staff said, we'll quit if you make us charge for this.

Kousha Navidar: Oh, there, there's your answer right there.

Jon Foley: Yeah, that was the other answer. It's like a very practical one. Like the team would quit in, um, in a, uh, in, you know, protest because they are also devoted to like, no, this is a public emergency. We are scientists. We serve the public good.

Kousha Navidar: The one thing that that brought to my mind was my experience going on, working with the tool. And you can rank based on, uh, most recommended to least recommended. And the first thing that I did was go to least recommended.

Jon Foley: Yeah. Yeah.

Kousha Navidar: And what I found interesting was that when you sort by solutions that aren't recommended, and this relates to the, the communications piece of this, of how you, how you get it down to the local level and make it relatable. The number one is carbon capture and storage on fossil fuel plants, and the second least recommended solution is producing blue hydrogen. And what I hear you talk about and what I, I hear so many people talk about, about, and we're talking about climate, is, uh, here are the solutions. Let's talk about why they matter, how to get it done. I think there's this other side that the tool brought up in my mind that I wanna get your, your, your perspective on, which is how about for the solutions that you don't necessarily think are as effective, why is communicating on those important 

Jon Foley: Yeah. So, you know, imagine like all the things people propose as climate solutions and there's money on the table. Some people are gonna propose some stuff that doesn't really work very well because they can make money off of it. Or if you're maybe a fossil fuel company and you don't really want to talk about climate solutions, you wanna distract us for a while. You'll talk about clean coal, you'll talk about carbon capture, you'll talk about something called blue hydrogen, which is making hydrogen out of natural gas, but then capturing the carbon out of it. Uh, these are the low tar cigarette  kind of climate solutions. They're still really bad for you, but just a little less bad for you. And, uh, we never actually called them out before. In our previous work at Drawdown, we would just write about the good climate solutions and we would just not write anything about the bad ones. 'cause we're trying to be polite or not invite, you know, invite a lot of the, you know, the, you can imagine the pushback you get from

Kousha Navidar: Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

Jon Foley: You wouldn't believe the kind of hate mail and attacks we get for this

Kousha Navidar: because there is serious money in those.

Jon Foley: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And um, but we're just saying, um, no, at the end of the day, we have to call bulls**t. And I think, as you found out from my tweet from 10 years ago, I'm a pretty direct guy. And we, but I, we pulled our team said, Hey, isn't it worth it to the world to just say, Hey look, from a scientific and engineering point of view, and by the way we show our work, this isn't just an opinion of some cranky person on Twitter. It's like these are serious scientists and engineers. I'm so lucky to work with about two dozen PhDs at Drawdown who will work tirelessly on evaluating the world's climate solutions. These are the best and brightest people in the world who are working for peanuts to do this kind of work and will get attacked for it, and we all owe them a big thanks.

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. It really does take a village.

Jon Foley: Oh yeah. And then some. Um, but we decided, no, it's important to call out stuff that doesn't work because there's billions of dollars going into it. There's politicians saying, this is the solution, this is the big idea. And we just have to like, Hey, wait a minute. This is nonsense. But we show our work. We actually say, for every climate solution, there are seven major criteria that we evaluate them against, against the data. And we show you the data yourself. If you don't agree with our conclusion, then you do it. You can look at the numbers, you can evaluate it yourself. We open it up completely.  And the other weird thing we did, and especially here in San Francisco, we forbid our staff to use AI. They're not allowed to use it. In fact, you'll be fired if you do. Uh, they all sign a contract saying, we'll, not use generative AI to do our research, analyze our data, or write our results. We have to stand behind it, and we make everyone sign that contract. And every solution shows who worked on it, who reviewed it, and every single solution is reviewed by two other independent institutions before we publish it. So it's about as rigorous as the world gets nowadays, especially a world where people lie for a living, um, in politics and tech and business. So it's really important, I think to kind of like, show your work, show the numbers, and show how you did. And AI is a plagiarism engine. It doesn't show how it does anything. It's just a mystery black box that spits out a number.

Kousha Navidar: a recursive engine too, which I think is, is an

Jon Foley: very dangerous. Yeah. I mean, again, you know, there are certain AI type things that are very helpful, uh, like, you know, little algorithms that adjust the thermostat of a building to regulate, you know, more energy efficiency. That's great. But writing a term paper for you, writing a research article, that's terrible.

Kousha Navidar: Then let's get to one topic that I wanted to be sure that we touched on because it's your expertise as well, which is food systems. 

Jon Foley: Oh, man. Right? 

Kousha Navidar: there's so many intractable problems. Food systems is one of 'em. I'd just like to get your take on how you balance feeding a population while also preventing overuse and emissions. Like what is your current thinking on that intractable problem or not intractable forever. But very thorny. 

Jon Foley: Yeah. I mean, uh, so just to ground people here, um, so when we think about climate change, you usually think about like smoke stacks and tailpipes, right? We talk about fossil fuels and energy and stuff. We can, you know, coming out of the bad, dirty fossil fuel industry, well, you're two-thirds right. But a third of the climate problem, a full third of it, is related to food. And we don't talk about it. In fact, food only gets 4% of global climate, media coverage. It only gets 3% of global climate funding, but it's 34% of the problem. So it's a 10-to-1 gap between the size of the problem of climate change and food, and the attention and money it receives to solve So it's the, it's the orphaned part of climate change. You can't solve climate change without thinking about food. The biggest problems with food are deforestation. That's number one on the list. Uh, deforestation now emits about 12% of the world's greenhouse gases. To put it in comparison, the United States emits 8% of the world's greenhouse gases. So this is like one and a half times the size of the entire US economy is rainforest burning down around the world mostly for agriculture. That alone is horrific and we don't talk about it enough. We don't spend nearly as much time, money, and attention on deforestation. That to me is the number one environmental problem on the planet. 'cause it's a big contributor to climate change and number one contributor to biodiversity loss. And it tears apart whole communities and livelihoods of people who live there, mostly indigenous communities.

Kousha Navidar: Why are we ignoring that, uh, inequity and attention versus,

Jon Foley: uh, one It's far away, it's hard to talk about. And three, there's a lot of money spent to make us not talk about it. You think big oil has a big megaphone to distort the landscape of, or public discourse? Wait till you meet big food. Big food spends more money on public, uh, perception and marketing and lobbying than big oil or even the defense industry. You think? Yeah, big oil is minuscule compared to big food in terms of shaping our politics and our public

Kousha Navidar: So for you, what do you do about it?

Jon Foley: You stick your neck out and say those things and then you get attacked Uh, you wouldn't believe the kind of hate mail and death threats and stuff that you get when you talk about this stuff. It's every day.

Kousha Navidar: Death threats.

Jon Foley: Um, death wishes. Death threats are

Kousha Navidar: I feel like we're, we're talking about differences of, of gray to light gray there.

Jon Foley: Yeah. So, so, hey, do you want to work on climate change? This is what it, yeah. Uh, death threats are like where I know where you live. And the FBI, I will say a death threat is like, you know, I know where you live and here's a photo of you with your children and you know, I'm coming for you. You know, like that's a specific threat. Death wishes are like, you and your family should be lined up and shot. The death wishes I get daily. Death threats. Very rarely. Thank 

Kousha Navidar: And on food more than

Jon Foley: Yeah. Talking about food, talking about beef, it turns out beef is the biggest polluter in climate change you will ever encounter. When you burn a pound of coal, we're told coal is the dirtiest thing when it comes to climate change. If I, if I take a pound of coal and I burn it, I'll make about two pounds of CO2 outta burning that pound of coal 'cause it mixed it with oxygen in the If I take into account all the mining coal and the methane related to coal, maybe it grows up to four pounds of greenhouse gases from one pound of coal. But if I eat one pound of beef, uh, it turns out that produces about a hundred pounds of greenhouse gases in the production of beef. So it's between 25 and 50 times more potent a climate polluter than coal. It's, other than weird, esoteric chemicals like in your air conditioning unit or something, it's the most polluting climate substance on earth is beef. And it's one of the biggest industries in the world, and they don't play nice. And they greenwash like crazy. They'll make whole entire movies and documentary films about how they're solving the problem and everything. But it's all greenwash and it's nonsense. And when you point that out, you get attacked.

Kousha Navidar: Yeah. You're sticking your neck out. You are getting attacked. What are you saying? Like, can you give us the one minute? 

Jon Foley: Don't eat beef. 

Kousha Navidar: Don't eat don't eat beef, 

Jon Foley: Or eat less. Oh, again, I'm not, I, I still eat a little bit of beef. You know why I do that? To be relatable. If I try to become a vegan from a San Francisco and talk about, uh, oh, let's all eat tofu. Like nobody's gonna fricking listen to you. Come on.

Kousha Navidar: Rule one. Know thy audience.

Jon Foley: Yeah. Know the audience. People like meat. It tastes good. I like it too, but I'm like, Hey, maybe I don't have to eat very much. I, I'm not gonna waste my beef budget for the year on greasy hamburgers and crap at a fast food restaurant. No way. If I'm eating eat beef, it better be really freaking good. Maybe a little filet mignon and I'm gonna gonna waste an even a gram of it and I'm gonna really enjoy it and I'm gonna really treasure that. And I find that message really like folks who are kind of on the political spectrum, maybe a little bit more conservative who love beef and whatever. I'm like, Hey. I like beef too. I'll eat it occasionally, maybe on my birthday or a special occasion. Or I go to somebody's home and they're serving beef. I'll definitely eat it, but I'm not gonna waste an ounce because it's precious. It took a lot to grow it. And people nod like, yeah, yeah, that's fair. And like, and my doctors are saying too, like, I probably shouldn't eat too much of this stuff for my heart and my cholesterol and blood pressure. So there's a win. And boy, it takes a lot of land and a lot of water. I don't even mention climate change 'cause that's not what my audience is gonna be thinking about. And what's interesting is beef is a, is for a climate point of view, a big lever in the climate problem. It's too much beef, but it turns out there are only some people who eat a lot of it. You know what, one of the most horrifying things I've learned in the last couple years is that half of the beef consumed in America is consumed by 12% of the American population. Yeah. There was a study out of Tulane that showed that I'm like, first of all, I wanna meet that 12%. I'm like, Hey, are you okay? How? Like, and also how are you doing this? I kind of tried to do the math on that. Like you'd have to be eating a Big Mac for breakfast, lunch and dinner basically, or the equivalent of that to even master that kind of, you're eating half of the beef consumed by one of the biggest beef consuming countries in the world, and you're only 12% of the country. How are you doing that? And then they're like, how are you feeling? You know, how's your cholesterol these days? How's your, can we take your blood pressure for a moment? Maybe you should sit down. You know?  And we're a little bit worried about you and don't talk about climate change or environmental justice issues. They weren't gonna hear that, And so like, Hey, let's talk to you about health. Let's talk to you about like, Hey, maybe those greasy hamburgers aren't the way to go, but if you still love beef, go nuts. Have it once in a while on the 4th of July or on a birthday, but not every day.

Kousha Navidar: What I hear you saying is meeting people where they are.

Jon Foley: Yeah. Yeah, 

Kousha Navidar: and connecting  in ways that make sense and are tangible and not up here, but like

Jon Foley: Well this is the biggest thing the environmental community keeps on blowing year after year, after year. So we're convinced in the environmental community, like those of us who are in the climate movement or whatever, sometimes debate this stuff. But I mean, here are the data. Uh, if you think that half of the country doesn't believe in climate change, you're wrong. It's not true. It turns out about 90% of, 92% of Americans to some degree or another, according to the Yale Six Americas report, kind of believe that climate change is probably real. Yeah. There's a stubborn 8% who wear the tinfoil hats and think the, the earth is flat and don't believe in climate change. I don't care about 8% of the country. Forget it. That's fine. Uh, you got 92%. Take the win. And move on. You know, you, you've already won that argument instead, like, what do we do about it? And the problem is that, yeah, people accept climate change as real. They're kind of worried about it. but it's not their number one issue.  Every Gallup poll ever taken, ever in America shows that never more than about 2% of Americans say an environmental issue, like climate change, is the top issue facing them or the nation. Everybody else puts normal stuff at the top of the list. Like, do I have a job? Yeah. What's the cost of living? What's the safety and health and security of my hometown? Just normal kitchen table stuff. That's where you meet people. That's what you talk about.

Kousha Navidar: Well, you know, it, it's what I find interesting there, and I can relate to it, is that there is so much more that we have in common that a lot of people realize. At the same time, you talk about solutions, you talk about all this untapped potential ways that you can manage and connect with an audience. It might make you sound like an optimist, but I know from talking to you, that is not the phrase that you would use to describe What would you use to describe 

Jon Foley: Um, you know, uh, those of you live in San Francisco in this live audience here. You, you have a jewel. Of a human being who lives here too, named Rebecca Solnit. If you don't know her, get to know her. Read everything she's ever written. She's a bloody genius. She wrote a book once called Hope in the Dark, and it wrote it. It very correctly, I think, differentiates the word optimism, which is a noun, something you have. Are you optimistic or not? It's a property of you. Are you optimistic or not about climate I am not optimistic about climate change, but I am hopeful. That may sound like a contradiction, but it's not. Hope is a verb. It's something you have to do, not something you have. You have to hope. It's like love. It's something you do and you practice and you cherish. To be hopeful in this era in human history means that you are willing to gamble everything. You're willing to give your life to it. You're willing to risk everything, knowing that you may well indeed fail, but it's worth trying anyway. It's the cause that matters. It's the outcome that matters. Not a blind. Optimism is like believing the invisible hand will solve everything of the markets or technology will just fix it automatically. I can sit back and relax. The tech bros are on it. Wall Street's on it. How's that working out for you all folks?

Kousha Navidar: A white guy named Adam Smith told me

Jon Foley: Yeah, yeah. Adam Smith. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. A tech bro on Twitter told me and Adam Smith, you know, the invisible hands. Like no. The hands that change the world are yours and your neighbors and everyone else's are the hands that change the world, not the invisible hands.  No, I, I'm not naive. It's a pretty big mess out there, but I'm hopeful, I'm willing to give my life for this and devote my life to this. I think a lot of your audience is too, because it is right. It is what we should do. That's hope. That's different than optimism.

Kousha Navidar: Okay, so let's make it pragmatic then. One of the things that I love that I've heard you say in an earlier conversation we had is that, and this is a quote from you, stopping climate change is at least one third stop doing stupid stuff. What do you find particularly stupid then that gets in the way of you feeling hope?

Jon Foley: Yeah. Yeah. I, I do say that a lot. I sometimes say another word says stuff. Um, but, but yeah. So a lot of climate stopping climate change, just like we're doing stupid stuff, our civiliz and if, if aliens beam down to earth today and ask you how do you get around as people on this planet, you tell them about, we invented this thing called the internal combustion engine, where we explode little bits of dinosaur poop into a gasoline engine and create these pistons that go up and down and make wheels spin. Or we could have just used a battery in an electric motor that's like, you know, 50 times more efficient that uses any form of energy you want. I'm like. Are you outta your minds? This is clearly the better technology. Why are you doing this stupid thing? Or like growing food? Why are you tearing down the Amazon rainforest to grow beef that could have been grown anywhere else? And then you waste 40% of all the food grown on the planet is never even eaten, and yet it dominates most of the land, water, and even climate emissions of your planet. That's pretty idiotic. So if you, if you were to give the, you know, our human civilization an audit right now, I think you'd get an F or at least a D minus. I'm like, are you being efficient? Are you being wise with your use of resources? Are you thinking about the future? And if you ask yourself like, you know, how could we do things better? Climate solutions aren't about left versus right, or environment or not, or green versus dirty or whatever. It's about bette.r climate solutions are about doing something better, like providing energy better, cheaper, more reliable. Hell yeah. Uh, let's make food that's delicious, nutritious, safer, and better.

Kousha Navidar: You're also talking about these big systemic problems, like the food industry is built upon millions of people with jobs. It, the, the, the system is stupid, but individuals are just trying to make a living. Right. Like, how do you, how do you, how do you sort through that?

Jon Foley: Some individuals have a little more power than others in that system. Same in the fossil fuel. You know, have few small numbers of people that really control, like how that system really works, sadly. Um, and that, that's getting outta my realm as a scientist. I know, but I think it's fair to say the way the game is rigged right now, definitely. Whether it's tech, whether it's, you know, media, whether it's oil or energy systems or the food system, a very small, small number of people love the system we have that benefits them enormously. Making them incredibly powerful, incredibly wealthy. And if I were one of them, I'd probably hold on for dear life too, right? And lie and cheat and steal my way to keeping that system. It's probably human nature, greed. Uh, I don't think it's capitalism the problem. I think it's greed is the And if we, you know, markets can solve problems pretty well if they're fair and have societal input and we would organize them a little bit better, I think we could solve a lot of these problems. And the other thing to the climate movement and all of us need to do is put these  things away for a little while. for the radio. I'm pointing to a smartphone. Uh, um, so, you know, there's a trillion dollar industry built on these things in our pockets that's designed to scare us, divide us, to make us angry. And telling half the country that the problem is the other half of the country. That's a lie. It's just not true. So put away the two dimensional version of the world and talk about the three dimensional version. Talk to real people who disagree with you, you think, but then at the end of the day you're like, wait a minute, I love my kids. You love your kids. We both love this town. We both want to thrive. We both want the future to be better for our world, our country, our neighbors. And you find common ground. And we have to fight against this tendency in our politics, our media, our technology, our social media that inherently is trying to divide us as a business model. I mean, let's remember that people are making trillions of dollars of scaring people and dividing people. We have to be the cure. We can't win on climate change or anything else if we think the other half of the world is evil, we can't do it.  And that brings me back to why I am actually hopeful at the end of the day, because I think there are other people choosing the path of hope that the world can be better. It's not guaranteed, but there are a lot of people raising their hands that say, I wanna work on that too.

Kousha Navidar: Jonathan Foley's, executive Director of Project Drawdown and winner of the 2025 Stephen H. Schneider Award for outstanding Climate Science Communication. John, thank you so much for joining us on Climate One. 

Jon Foley: Thank you so much.

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Ariana Brocious: Coming up, how Stephen Schneider inspired the award named in his honor.

Greg Dalton: I think he would say: we have the solutions. We have what we need. To get things done. We lack political will. And you know, it's really hard when there's really, as he would say, well-funded deception and opposition from fossil fuel interests.

Ariana Brocious: That’s up next, when Climate One continues.

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Ariana Brocious:  This is Climate One. I’m Ariana Brocious. Stephen H. Schneider was a professor of interdisciplinary environmental studies at Stanford. He was also a professor of biological sciences with a PhD in mechanical engineering and plasma physics. In other words, he was a big thinker. More than that. He was an amazing communicator of all that complexity.

Steve Schneider: What are we playing with? The planetary life support system. This is not just an academic exercise. This is something we've got to have people deeply engaged in because we're talking about the sustainability for their children, the grandchildren, and the rest of nature.

Ariana Brocious: Climate One founder Greg Dalton created the Steven Schneider Award for outstanding climate Science Communication. Greg, how did you first meet Steve Schneider?

Greg Dalton: Well, in 2006 I went to the Arctic and had a life changing epiphany on a Russian icebreaker. And when I returned I went to Steve Schneider at Stanford and said, uh, explain this climate change thing to me. And he kind of gave me a 101 and laid it out for me. It was my kind of intro to climate science.

Ariana Brocious: And what was your impression of him when you first met?

Greg Dalton: He was definitely a big thinker, big brain, and, uh, he thought in an interdisciplinary way, uh, that few people did at that time. He thought about the science, the economics, the communication. 

Ariana Brocious: So he kind of inspired you to start Climate One, right? 

Greg Dalton: Right. He was the first member of the Climate One advisory committee when I was just this guy talking about climate and he really helped lend credibility to climate one at a time when we were just, um, getting started.

Ariana Brocious: So we've been giving out this award with his name for years. Why? What inspired you to create an award named after Steve Schneider?

Greg Dalton: Well, in the summer of 2010, uh, Steve wrote to me that he was in Europe and he was in ill health. He had been battling cancer and he said, I need to stop burning the candle on both ends and in the middle too. And he planned to fly back from Europe and come to a dinner at Climate One. And Steve died on the way back from Europe and we learned that evening that he had passed away tragically suddenly. And it hit me really hard and I went to some of Steve's friends and said, Hey, can we create this award and his legacy? And maybe it was kind of me honoring my dad in some, some way. Um, who also died quite young, and created this award in Steve's honor because he was such a singular, fearless communicator of climate science.

Ariana Brocious: Yeah, that must have been really hard to have that happen, period, to lose someone like him, but also around a Climate One event.

Greg Dalton: Yeah, it was quite, quite shocking that event turned into sort of a wake or remembrance that evening. Uh, took quite a dark turn. 'cause it was, uh, you know, a pivotal time in the climate fight. The big climate bill had just failed in Congress and, uh, things were quite dark and losing such a light was a, was a real hit.

Ariana Brocious: Yeah, ahead of this conversation. When we were planning to talk about Steve on the show, you mentioned that you really wanted to highlight how he talked about the false equivalency. This is an idea essentially when the news media gives equal weight to two sides of an argument, even if one side is clearly backed up by a preponderance of evidence and the other side isn't.

Steve Schneider: You take a 200 scientist report, like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, it goes through three years of writing, two rounds of reviews, a thousand review comments on every chapter, which the lead authors, I can tell you, because Terri and I have had to do this, and it's, I call IPCC my pro bono day job. It's half time for two years, and they don't pay you. And you have to justify to three independent review editors how you've dealt with every one of a thousand comments, and then two petroleum geologists, you know, who are of special interest in finding oil, paid by you know which oil company because they have PhDs that give an equal status in a story or on television. You see, we get a little mad about that. And we call that utter distortion. And they say, Oh no, that's balance. It is not balance. It is utter distortion. 

Ariana Brocious: So why does what he's saying there still resonate so strongly with you today?

Greg Dalton: Steve had a way to distill it down to its essence and say utter distortion. We're seeing that even more these days, uh, where there's so much pollution in our information streams about climate. Is it happening? Is it human cause? What can we do about it, et cetera. So Steve's words are more true today than ever.

Ariana Brocious: So if Steve were still alive, what do you think he would say about the progress that we have and haven't made on climate?

Greg Dalton: I think he would say, we have to remember that at the time of the Paris Climate Accord, we were on track for four degrees of post-industrial warming, and no one wants to live in a four degree hotter world. It is, yeah, awful. And now we're on track for what, two and a half? Two seven, somewhere in there. So we have made progress and bent the curves and the worst case scenarios are not as scary and bad as they used to be, and yet we also know we need to do more faster. But he would say, let's not forget the progress we've made. 'cause I think sometimes the conversation is like, oh, we're all doom and gloom and Eeyore, we've made progress. Bad things have happened, and they will continue to happen. And to try to hold that balance.

Ariana Brocious: Yeah, and I hear that. I also think that there's a tendency for people to think that climate change is sort of decided and that that can make them feel really defeated. Just people in, in general, like, you know, the, the public writ large. And so what would be Steve's advice for how to communicate specifically with people and give them the sort of detailed understanding of what they need to know?

Greg Dalton: Hmm. That's a big task. I mean, you know, um. Every action is significant and, you know, insufficient. We all need to do more. Policy's a big lever, uh, and we have the solutions and we need to implement what we already have. That's what I think he would say, and I'm reluctant to speak for such a great communicator. But we've, we have the solutions. We have what we need. We lack political will. And you know, it's really hard when there's really, as he would say, well-funded deception and opposition from fossil fuel interests.

Ariana Brocious: For the past 15 years, Climate One has awarded the Stephen Schneider Award for outstanding climate science communication in honor of his legacy. So how would you describe his legacy?

Greg Dalton: Uh, he trained a whole generation of, uh, climate communicators. They're out there today teaching in states like Utah and other universities around the country. His last book was Climate science is a Contact sport. You know, people who went to climate science were kind of nerds who wanted to be in their labs and look at, you know, lots of charts and data and models. Uh, they didn't necessarily want to, be involved in, in political debate. And they kind of got dragged into that. And I think people coming into the field now know that climate science is a political area. So you kind of know that going in. But back then climate got political. It was imposed on a lot of scientists, and Steve sort of showed the way for people how to navigate that.

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Kousha Navidar: We’ve heard today about the importance of communication, but we don’t all need to be scientists to have an impact. One resource many of us overlook is our own time. When it’s directed strategically, it can be a major climate lever.  Eliza Nemser leads Climate Changemakers, a group that helps ordinary people become powerful advocates for civic action and climate policies. Greg Dalton spoke with her last year about her own journey into climate activism.

Eliza Nemser: I knew very well we're at a stage where we need transformative systemic changes and progress hinges on our policymakers and their willingness and commitment to lead on climate. So I started looking for my climate job. and I started looking for grassroots volunteer opportunities and I signed up with a ton of organizations My my inbox was flooded with take action buttons and I would click and then I would feel the sense of disappointment like I was asked to sign a petition and then pitch in 10. I also learned about grass tops advocacy, um, people meeting with decision makers and their staff, writing op eds, that kind of thing. It's more time intensive, but very effective. And mostly left to the professional environmental advocates and business leaders and donors. So I became kind of fixated on how do we broaden participation in those strategies, like how do we democratize that.

Greg Dalton: And so just if I could jump in there, just if I could jump in there, grass tops and grass roots. What's the difference between grass tops and grass roots?

Eliza Nemser: It has to do with kind of proximity to power and the strategies themselves. And frankly, sure, business leaders and people for whom it's their day job, and donors have more proximity to power inherently, but we all can gain proximity to power. Anyone can reach out and schedule a constituent meeting and and meet with policymakers and their staff. Most people don't, but anyone can. And surely if we're all using, you know, our own spheres of influence, our own networks, we have more proximity to power than we think. So yes, there's very much ways to engage as a volunteer. I think it also has to do with how time intensive the strategies are, right? So again, these are taking the time to write letters to the editor, taking the time to have these meetings, taking the time to, to reach out in a personal way.

Greg Dalton: And I think that's key to the time intensity. A lot of, uh, volunteerism is sort of, you know, the annual beach cleanup or Earth Day. So talk about the time dimension here in terms of, is effective advocacy like weekly, monthly, or is it something I can check the box and feel good about and move on and kind of a contained period of time?

Eliza Nemser: I think both. It can definitely and needs to be time bound, right? We're talking about volunteerism. It also needs to be sustained and kind of habitual. So like the best use of volunteer time creates meaningful impact and has tangible outcomes and. fills us with a sense of purpose and reminds us of our agency, right? Planting trees, beach cleanup, it's great, but how can we as individuals create systemic change by working to shift priorities and influence policy at every level of government and every decision making table? We can help with that as volunteers. That's what advocacy is. To do it effectively, it is more time intensive, but it doesn't have to be your day job, right? It's, it can be time bound. So Climate Changemakers is a volunteer advocacy program, and we focus on meaningful civic engagement. So we equip our volunteers. nationwide to drive systems level change by advocating, uh, influencing policies at all levels of, of government. And you know, people can plug in as seasoned advocates or as first time advocates and, you know, go to, go from what we call zero to hero. I mean, we see it all the time. and oftentimes When you send a personalized outreach, you get a personal response back. , and then you learn that your outreach was not only well received, it landed and it was acted upon and making a difference. And that really helps you realize your own agency and inspires you to do more.

Greg Dalton:  Right, and your, your focus with, climate change makers is people have kids and jobs and full lives. So tell us how that process works through Naomi.

Eliza Nemser: we have these Hour of Action events. The idea is that Effective advocacy takes a little bit of time, carve out an hour. Naomi, at her first hour of action, scheduled a constituent meeting. She was just ready to go. After a successful constituent meeting, she was really fired up. She subsequently wrote a letter to the editor. It got published. She wrote her next letter to the editor, also got published, really felt emboldened. Yeah, was, was asked to join a climate advisory board and then started leading hours of action. And then, you know, after a year of doing this, she realized she had done like 70 some odd hours of action. So she created this infographic detailing. all of the impact she had made and shared it out around our community in Slack, inspiring other people. 

Greg Dalton: And that's the, the feeling is something I wanted to ask you about because, you know, I, you know, once of every couple months deliver food for the food bank in San Francisco and I feel good handing a bag of groceries to a senior person. To be honest, I don't often think about climate volunteerism as, as something that's gonna make me feel good, 'cause climate is often a scary, dark topic, and I wonder. How do you think about that as someone who is involved so actively in climate volunteerism? Is it a downer or can it make people feel good?

Eliza Nemser: I literally, we had a volunteer, Becca, report after an hour of action. This is like Tylenol for my climate anxiety. She said that. I don't know. I, I think, you know, you often hear action is the antidote to anxiety. I think self efficacy and the type of volunteerism where you recognize your own agency is the antidote to apathy. So I think it does both. And , it is very overwhelming, but when you do this kind of work in a community of people, it's really fortifying and actually, dare I say, fun. Every day. I'm so excited to do this. Like, it's really fulfilling.

Greg Dalton: And so what are some tips for someone who says, Okay, you know, I have a few hours. I want to do something on climate. Not sure where to look or where to plug in. And maybe I don't feel like an activist who wants to march in a street. Where can I find my place?

Eliza Nemser: I mean, I think the, the first one is commit. You know, it's time to grab an oar and row. We all need to be rowing in the same direction and be real with yourself about the time commitment. that you can make. I mean, will you volunteer an hour a week to push your school board to procure electric school buses and, urge your county to electrify municipal fleets to, you know, to let your state legislator know that you're counting on them for climate leadership. So be honest about how much time you have to commit and then find a group.  There's lots of climate organizations. Um, once you find a group, like, carve out the time, schedule it, and plan to make it a habit, because effective advocacy takes time, and we need sustained engagement. And then my other advice is to be courageous. You know, it takes you out of your comfort zone and be ready to level up and do more and grow into your leadership. We need people who are helping to normalize civic participation. So setting a very visible example and talking about why you advocate, what moves you, what are you trying to protect? So I think the main thing is show up.

Greg Dalton: Right. And they also, you touched on find a group, which means it's kind of relationship based. I think a lot of people often think about impact and less about who they'll be doing it with. So talk about the social component of lasting and meaningful climate change.

Eliza Nemser: Yes, pretty hard to stay motivated to do something over and over without a community to support you. I mean, the community component is huge. It's hugely important. because, yeah, without that, you're going to fizzle out. But when you realize you're not in this alone. a lot of us are going through this, and We can all be part of the solution together. And then there's this added bonus of, um, collective action. You have an outsized impact, right? We're greater than the sum of our parts, kind of thing. But it's, it's very important to feel that you're part of a community, which is why it makes sense to explore different groups and feel, find your action home. Frankly, we need more leadership on climate. We need community leaders. We need our elected officials leading. And so learning how to be an effective advocate is your, that's your path. That's your path to being a climate leader.

Greg Dalton: guess we can all be a leader in some way, both in our homes and our lives. And then some people will go into the, civic square public sphere. Eliza, thanks so much for sharing your examples of people going from zero to hero.

Eliza Nemser: Thanks for having me, Greg. 

Climate One More Thing

Kousha Navidar: Hey everyone, it's the end of our show and that means that it's time for Climate One more thing. Ariana, what do you got? 

Ariana Brocious: I read an interesting article this week in E&E News about how Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is wanting to put more restrictions on data centers in his state. And I found this surprising because there's a lot of discussion at the national level happening around where these data centers should go. A lot of concern about how much energy they use, um, water use, um, noise, other factors. And a lot of governors are welcoming these, or at least making things easier for them. And he's taking kind of a different position. He especially doesn't want to see utilities charge, residential rate payers higher rates to support data centers. And I think that's important because there are concerns across the country about rising energy prices, and this is one of the big reasons why that's happening. 

Kousha Navidar: And surprising that it's coming from DeSantis too, like of all people, right? 

Ariana Brocious: Yeah. I think given his position on other issues, I would've expected him to welcome data centers maybe, or at least not sort of stand in the way, but actually calling for state level restrictions and, you know, setback requirements and things like that surprised me. So, yeah. Interesting. 

Kousha Navidar: Totally. And I think this is gonna be a point of strange bedfellows and of a lot of tension over the next coming years when we see literally like man versus machine with where our energy goes, residential homes versus data centers. It's a, it's an ever evolving and intricate policy issue and, and uh, and yeah, I find that very interesting too.

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Kousha Navidar:  POD version: And that’s our show.  Thanks for listening. Talking about climate can be hard, and exciting and interesting -- AND it’s critical to address the transitions we need to make in all parts of society. Please help us get people talking more about climate by giving us a rating or review. You can do it right now on your device. Or consider joining us on Patreon and supporting the show that way. 

Ariana Brocious: Climate One is a production of the Commonwealth Club. Our team includes Greg Dalton, Brad Marshland, Jenny Park, Austin Colón, Megan Biscieglia, Kousha Navidar and Rachael Lacey. Our theme music is by George Young. I’m Ariana Brocious.

Music: Out