The Land & Climate Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Will fossil fuels ever be history? Mar 31, 2023

Show notes

In this next installment in our oil series, we have Professor Paul Stevens, Emeritus Professor at the University of Dundee and senior research fellow at Chatham House. Professor Stevens is a world leading expert on global petroleum policy. We spoke about the history of energy transitions and the fallacy of ‘peak oil’. Covered in this episode are: the current “energy establishment”, forecasts of the speed of the energy transition, and oil exporter’s dominance at climate talks.
Recommended reading:
Handbook on Oil and International Relations. (2022). eds. R. Dannreuther, W. Ostrowski. United Kingdom: Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd.
Gustafson, T. (2012). Wheel of Fortune: The Battle for Oil and Power in Russia. United Kingdom: Harvard University Press.

Blas, J., Farchy, J. (2021). The World for Sale: Money, Power, and the Traders Who Barter the Earth's Resources. United States: Oxford University Press.

Helm, D. (2017). Burn Out: The Endgame for Fossil Fuels. United Kingdom: Yale University Press.

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What would truly sustainable fashion look like? Mar 17, 2023

Show notes

Bertie speaks to fashion journalist and sustainability consultant Lucianne Tonti about her new book Sundressed: Natural Fabrics and the Future of Clothing.
They discuss issues with sustainability indexes and modern fibres created from crude oil and trees, vs the benefits of clothes made from natural materials produced through regenerative agriculture.
Podcast editing by Vasko Kostovski.
Futher reading:

Buy Sundressedfrom Island Press.
Read Lucianne's column in The Guardian.
Preorder To Dye For from Penguin.
'There is so much to say about plastic pollution. Why are we not talking about it?' on Land and Climate Review.

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Why has EU law not stopped pesticides from harming ecosystems? Mar 03, 2023

Show notes

Alasdair speaks to Professor Mike Norton, Environment Programme Director at the European Academies Science Advisory Council, about newly published research on neonicotinoid pesticides.
In 2013, the European Commission severely restricted the use of several 'neonics' due to emerging research showing they had wide ranging harfmul environmental impacts on insect populations and ecosystems. But last month, the European Court of Justice ruled that Belgium had abused emergency authorisations to continue using them. Many Member States have similiarly authorised their continued usage since 2013, and the EU is now considering stricter legislation to prohibit the substances.
Further reading:
- Read the full EASAC report here, or the press release here.
- 'EU Court puts end to emergency use of bee-toxic pesticides', EURACTIV, Jan '23
- 'Commission’s verdict still out on EU court ruling on bee-toxic pesticides', EURACTIV, Feb '23
- 'Neonicotinoids in Africa' - a 2020 article by Mike for Chemistry World

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Does Russia have its head in the sand about the future of fossil fuels? Feb 17, 2023

Show notes

In this episode, Lauren Sneade speaks to Professor Thane Gustafson for a second instalment on how the Russian oil industry affects the country's attitudes towards climate change, given the country's distinguished history of climate science. They cover how climate change has affected the country so far, and how Russian policymaking has responded, raising questions around the political will of Russian political figures to tackle the crisis.
Further reading:
Igor Makarov, Henry Chen & Sergey Paltsev (2020) Impacts of climate change policies worldwide on the Russian economy
Thane Gustafson, Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate Change. Harvard University Press

Tynkkynen, V. (2019). The Energy of Russia: Hydrocarbon Culture and Climate Change. United Kingdom: Edward Elgar Publishing.

Gordon, D. (2021). No Standard Oil: Managing Abundant Petroleum in a Warming World. United States: Oxford University Press.

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What are the risks with wood burning in Japan? Feb 03, 2023

Show notes

Alasdair talks to Roger Smith, Japan Director for Mighty Earth, about Japanese biomass imports and the risks of the country's coal power stations switching to wood-burning.
Further reading:

SMOKESCREEN: SUMITOMO’S “CARBON NEUTRAL” FAILURES
SUMITOMO CORPORATION’S DIRTY ENERGY TRADE: Biomass, Coal and Japan’s Energy Future
Biomass cofiring loopholes put coal on open-ended life support in Asia, Mongabay
As biomass burning surges in Japan and South Korea, where will Asia get its wood?, Mongabay
Fossil Free Japan
Biomass Info, a resource library (Japanese)

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Is Antarctic governance still working? Jan 20, 2023

Show notes

The Antarctic Treaty System (ATS) was signed in 1959, and will not be modified until 2048. Climate diplomacy expert Dhanasree Jayaram tells Bertie about the environmental risks that could threaten Antarctica before then, including illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, militarisation, bioprospecting, increased tourism, and resource extraction.
Dr. Jayaram is Assistant Professor at the Department of Geopolitics and International Relations, and Co-Coordinator of the Centre for Climate Studies, in Manipal Academy of Higher Education, and an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation International Climate Protection Fellow.
Further reading:

In 30 years the Antarctic Treaty becomes modifiable, and the fate of a continent could hang in the balance, The Conversation

By Dr. Jayaram:

'Geopolitics, Environmental Change and Antarctic Governance: A Region in Need of a Transformative Approach to Science Diplomacy', Assessing the Antarctic Environment from a Climate Change Perspective
'Geopolitical and geoeconomic implications of climate change in the Arctic region: the future of contestation and cooperation', Understanding Present and Past Arctic Environments
'Geopolitics, Science and Climate Diplomacy in the Indo-Pacific: An Assessment', Science Diplomacy Review
Climate Diplomacy and Emerging Economies: India as a Case Study

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Why is climate scepticism growing on Twitter? Jan 06, 2023

Show notes

Long before Elon Musk's takeover drew accusations of increased disinformation on the platform, there was already a rapid growth of climate scepticism and denial on Twitter, according to research by The IRIS Academic Research Group.
Their analysis studied climate discourse during the annual UN Climate Change Conferences (COPs), and found that criticism of climate action had grown from 1% of influential accounts during COP20 in 2014, to 16% of accounts during COP26.
Bertie spoke to two of the researchers, Professor Andrea Baronchelli and Dr. Max Falkenberg, to discuss this trend, and what might be driving it.
Futher reading:

Read the paper in Nature Climate Change
Read Andrea and Max's commentary about the research on the LSE blog
Read the IRIS blog about misinformation
'Climate-sceptic tweets surge after Musk’s Twitter takeover', The Times, 2/12/22

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What happened at COP27 with removal offsets? Dec 16, 2022

Show notes

Alasdair speaks to Kelly Stone, Senior Policy Analyst at ActionAid, about her time at COP27 and where international diplomacy is taking offset markets and their governance.
Further reading:

CLARA's resources on 'net zero', including info on Article 6.
Read Kelly's articles on the ActionAid blog
'Silicon Valley's non existent offsets', in Land and Climate Review
Visit our new collection, The Negative Emissions Gamble

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Why can't we 'just plant trees'? Dec 09, 2022

Show notes

Afforestation projects are being used worldwide as a nature-based solution to climate change. Afforestry is the practice of planting trees on otherwise arid, barren land. Harvard scholar Rosetta Elkin explains how large-scale tree planting in otherwise treeless environments rarely makes ecological sense. In many instances throughout history, these projects have also been used as instruments of colonial forestry, used by the coloniser as a way of staking claim to the land. Elkin argues for a better understanding of our ecosystem on the scale of one single tree rather than whole forests.
Further Reading

Buy "Plant Life: The Entangled Politics of Afforestation" from Minnesota Press
"The Long Shadow of Colonial Forestry is a threat to savannas and grasslands"
"Hygienic Nature: Afforestation and the greening of colonial Hong Kong"

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Will the Russian economy survive fossil phase-out? Nov 25, 2022

Show notes

Lauren Sneade talks to Thane Gustafson about the future of Russian oil through the climate crisis and the context of the ongoing war in Ukraine. Gustafson is a professor of political science at Georgetown University, and an author of numerous books about Russia's fossil fuel dependence, the most recent being 2021's Klimat: Russia in the Age of Climate Change.
Lauren and Professor Gustafson discuss the question: is Putin promoting a geopolitical narrative of Russian supremacy over the country’s national economic future?
Further reading

Buy Klimat: Russian in the Age of Climate Change from Havard University Press.
Professor Gustafson's Substack.
'Russia can no longer ignore the threat posed by climate change', LSE Blog, January 2022
Part 1 and Part 2 of a Washington Post interview with Professor Gustafson in September 2022.

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