COAL + ICE Podcast Asia Society

Who doesn't like a good story, especially one that sharpens your thinking about the future? Science fiction has been doing that for generations, and now, a growing number of sci fi and speculative fiction writers around the world are imaging what a future with climate change will look like, and how we might respond to it. Listen in to this thought-provoking final episode of the COAL+ICE Podcast with guests:Chen Qiufan: Chinese speculative fiction writer, author of "The Waste Tide," AI 2...

Most of us on earth now live in cities. By 2050, more than two-thirds of us will. And by the end of this century, demographers predict, 85% of the world’s population will live in cities. By then, demographers estimate, cities like Lagos in Nigeria and Mumbai in India will have 60 million or more inhabitants, and much of the world's urban growth will be in Africa. What will this mean for climate change, and how will climate change affect growing urban populations? Much depends on whether ...

We've all got to eat. And climate change is throwing us new challenges as to how to feed a global population that's getting bigger, more urban, and more affluent -- and make sure the world's poorest have enough nutritious food too.This would have been a challenge without climate change. With it, farmers need to adapt to wilder weather, less predictable rainfall, and shifting growing zones that sometimes mean they can't plant what they long did, and have to find new crops that are ...

Enjoy nature? Well, do it while you can. We’re losing as many as 200 species a day, scientists say – plants, animals, birds, bugs – with cascading effects for all other species, including humans. And it's humans – our factories, cars, planes and power plants, our sprawling cities and mono-culture farms – who have disrupted complex ecosystems and are speeding climate change. Dr. Gretta Pecl and Sakhile Koketso join this episode to discuss the many...

Himalayan glaciers have long served as a frozen water tower, releasing water on which billions of Asians rely — into ten of Asia's mighty rivers, into agricultural and food systems, and into ground water. Climate change is now rapidly melting those glaciers — up to two-thirds of them may be gone by the end of this century — throwing ecosystems throughout the region off-balance.Anjal Prakash has been studying all of this for more than two decades, helping both rural and urban communities...

Polar ice has a story to tell. Trapped in it are clues to the past -- dirt and dust, and air -- going back a million years . From this, climate scientists can figure out what was happening during past ice ages and warm periods. In each case, it all came down to carbon -- how much carbon dioxide was in the air. And we're now at CO2 levels last seen in the Pliocene Epoch -- 2.5 to 5 million years ago, long before modern humans walked the earth. Sure, we call ourselves homo sapiens,...