Warm Regards

What caused the end of the Ice Age? It’s a 20,000-year old mystery that’s being tackled by climate scientists across the county. Answering this question is not just about understanding the past -- it’s about developing a unified theory of the atmospheric system. And it can help refine climate models that project current and future rates of warming.   Aaron Putnam and his research team from the University of Maine are searching for clues as to what caused this rapid melting of glaciers and ice sheets. To find answers, Putnam's team traveled to a remote ice field in the Mongolian Altai, a vast range of mountains that touch Russia, Mongolia, China and Kazakstan. This story is brought to us by Kevin Stark. He’s an environmental journalist who lives in Chicago. He embedded with Putnam’s team for the entire 6-week journey, a part his work as a Comer journalism fellow at Northwestern University. Make sure to read Kevin’s companion piece at Pacific Standard Magazine: http://bit.ly/2eJbZ4T Thanks to our sponsor, Wunder Capital. Create an account for free and invest directly in U.S. solar projects: Wundercapital.com/warm

This week, we have a special interview with Kerry Emanuel, a meteorologist and climate scientist who specializes in hurricane physics. We’re talking to him today about Hurricane Matthew, which is threatening to be one of the most destructive hurricanes in U.S. history.

Is 2016 the warmest year in all of history? We’re going to tackle a bold and controversial statement this week: that 2016 is likely the single warmest year in the history of human civilization. We’re joined by Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, to talk through it. Is it fair to say this year is the warmest one we’ve ever experienced? We’d like to thank Wunder Capital for their support. Invest directly in solar projects here: WunderCapital.com/warm. Links: Kxcd climate comic: http://xkcd.com/1732/ A new article from Gavin Schmidt at FiveThirtyEight: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-we-dont-know-if-it-will-be-sunny-next-month-but-we-know-itll-be-hot-all-year/

This week, we're joined by Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist at Texas Tech University. Katharine talks about how she discusses climate change with her friends, family and skeptics. She'll also provide advice for young parents who are concerned about our kids' futures. Below are some resources mentioned by Katharine in this week's show. Berkeley carbon calculator: http://coolclimate.berkeley.edu/calculator Bruce Anderson's study: http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00645.1

This week, we wrap up our three-part series on the past, present and future of climate science. We’re going to do our best to envision how today’s emissions will impact tomorrow’s planet. Eric, Jacquelyn and Andy will unpack the uncertainties about what we know and don’t know about the future – and lay out where we’re headed together. There’s one thing we know for sure: The more carbon dioxide we emit as a species, the hotter our planet will get. Make sure to listen to part one and two for additional context. Part one: https://soundcloud.com/warmregardspodcast/climate-forensics-how-scientists-reconstruct-the-past-to-understand-todays-climate Part two: https://soundcloud.com/warmregardspodcast/how-do-you-take-the-planets-temperature

This week, we’re talking about the ongoing flooding in Louisiana, which the Red Cross now says is likely America’s worst disaster since Hurricane Sandy. Early last week, the National Hurricane Center began tracking a slow moving low pressure system over the Gulf of Mexico, and projected a foot or two of rain to hit the Gulf Coast over the following week or so. Gradually, that storm creeped westward and tapped into a moisture source that was among the most saturated that’s ever been measured, according to NWS weather balloon data—boosted by record warm, 90-degree water temperatures in the Gulf. We’ll talk about the impact of the flood, the (lack of) media coverage, and how to think about flooding events like this in a climate change context. Find out how to help flooding victims through the Red Cross: http://rdcrss.org/2b04d0E

For this week’s show, we’re going to continue what we started last week: A brief interlude into the science of climate change. We’re right in the middle of what’s very likely to be the hottest year on record, and we’ve just passed what is historically the planet’s warmest week of the year. This week’s show will examine how we know what we know about our current climate. And to do that, we’ll rely on the reporting expertise of veteran environmental journalist, Andy Revkin.

For the next three weeks, we’ll bring you bite-sized chunks of science that’ll hone in on how we got to where we are right now -- in the middle of the warmest year that humanity has likely ever experienced -- and where science says we’re headed if we don’t get our act together. This week’s show will focus on the past. And our all-star expert on paleoclimate, Jacquelyn Gill, will help us navigate backwards to place today’s planetary-scale changes in context.

This week, we present a bonus episode of Warm Regards. Forty years ago, on April 28th, 1975, Newsweek magazine published an article that created one of the most pervasive scientific myths in modern history. It was a one-page story, buried in the middle of the magazine. But it became the most widely cited article in Newsweek’s history. The piece, called “A Cooling World," raised concerns about a global cooling trend. It was published on page 64. But it became front page news for climate skeptics, who point to it as proof that scientists were confused, or even deliberately misleading, about global warming. In this episode, producer Stephen Lacey revisits the myth 40 years later.

If you’re listening to this from a post-apocalyptic Pokemon-dominated global-warming ravaged future –- welcome! We’re getting to crunch time in the election, and a whole suite of new climate-related polls have been released in just the last few days. Is this finally the election in which climate change is going to play a big role? When you look at America as a whole, climate change still ranks relatively near the bottom in terms of voters’ priorities. Last week, a Pew survey ranked the environment as 12th out of 14 major issues, just below trade policy. But if you burrow in to the large and growing section of America that’s deeply concerned about climate change, you’ll find there are a lot of single-issue voters that are very engaged. We have a lot in store for today’s show: Pokemon is making people go outside for the first time; Bernie has endorsed Hillary; Trump is still Trump. Sheer craziness. Check out the recommended reading list below. Eric’s links: Hillary’s climate plan: http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2016/06/hillary_s_climate_change_plan_isn_t_as_good_as_bernie_s_revolution_might.html A Green Party comeback: http://www.vice.com/read/can-the-green-party-make-a-comeback-in-2016-209 Trump supporters and climate: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/03/what_do_trump_supporters_think_about_climate_change_i_went_to_a_rally_and.html Jacquelyn’s links: Pokemon Go gets people outside: http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-pokemon-go-real-animals-20160711-20160711-snap-story.html Jet Stream mania: http://www.forbes.com/sites/marshallshepherd/2016/07/02/lessons-from-jet-stream-crossing-the-equator-mania/#5f3756d05a8c 2008 DNC platform: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=78283 Hillary's climate plank: https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/climate/ AR4 vs AR5: http://treealerts.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/AR4-AR5-comparison.pdf Stephanie Svan on "voting green on principle": http://the-orbit.net/almostdiamonds/2016/06/20/voting-green-principle/ Andy’s links: Video summarizing the politics of climate: https://www.facebook.com/andrew.revkin.5/videos/vb.631851039/10155022172286040/?type=2&theater Sri Lanka mangroves. https://www.seacology.org/project/sri-lanka-mangrove-conservation-project/

Snow and ice are disappearing from the Arctic region at unprecedented rates, leaving behind open water that’s much less reflective to incoming sunlight than ice. That, among other factors, is causing the northern polar region of our planet to warm at a faster rate than the rest of the northern hemisphere—a phenomenon called Arctic Amplification. And over the past several months, it’s become increasingly obvious that big changes are happening now. Right now, not 5 or 10 or 20 years from now, Now. In this week’s episode, we’ll talk about all those changes -– and what they say about what we do and don’t know about the melting Arctic. Oh, and we’ll also talk about how Game of Thrones relates to climate change. Check out the recommended reading list below. Eric’s links: Arctic melting: http://www.climatecentral.org/news/arctic-sea-ice-breaks-may-record-20415 https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/02/18/scientists-are-floored-by-whats-happening-in-the-arctic-right-now/ Arctic greening: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/06/27/its-official-humans-are-making-the-earth-much-greener/ Jacquelyn’s links: Twinkies: https://www.boston.com/culture/lifestyle/2016/06/27/heres-twinkie-maine-school-kept-40-years-counting Cloning mammoths:  http://reviverestore.org/projects/woolly-mammoth/ Science group’s letter to Congress: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2016/06/28/top-science-groups-tell-climate-change-doubters-in-congress-to-knock-it-off/ Andy’s links: Pop-up forests: http://j.mp/popupforests North pole sounds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GqjvjiXp4E

For those of us who think about climate change often -- like unhealthily often -- there's sometimes a sense that you're missing the story. Climate change is quite possibly the biggest story of all time. But it can feel remote, abstract, and lost in a sea of statistics. There's no way to do this story justice in just a few hundred words on a blog post. That's why we made Warm Regards. In this inaugural episode of Warm Regards, we'll tackle what it means to talk about climate change at this unique moment in human history. Warm Regards is hosted by Slate Magazine's Eric Holthaus, a self-professed weather and climate geek who Rolling Stone once called "the rebel nerd of meteorology." Co-hosting is Andy Revkin, veteran environment reporter for the New York Times who has covered climate change from all angles for 30 years, and Jacquelyn Gill, a paleoecologist at the University of Maine who is an actual, real-life climate scientist who flawlessly navigates social media. Together, they're opening a window into the world of people devoted to finding out what matters most about climate change.