183 episodes

A true-crime podcast about climate change, hosted and reported by award-winning investigative journalist Amy Westervelt.

Drilled Critical Frequency

    • Science
    • 4.6 • 2.1K Ratings

Listen on Apple Podcasts
Requires subscription and macOS 11.4 or higher

A true-crime podcast about climate change, hosted and reported by award-winning investigative journalist Amy Westervelt.

Listen on Apple Podcasts
Requires subscription and macOS 11.4 or higher

    S8 Ep1 | The Boom

    S8 Ep1 | The Boom

    Five years ago, Kiana Wilburg was a new reporter when ExxonMobil executives and Guyanese government officials announced they had found oil 40 miles offshore. Wilburg and her newsroom had to quickly learn about the industry and this company that was suddenly so influential in their country and were left with just one question: exactly what kind of a deal had the country signed onto?

    Visit https://brilliant.org/Drilled for 30 days free and 20% off a subscription.
    Subscribe to our newsletter for curated weekly climate news.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 31 min
    S8 Ep2 | The Contract

    S8 Ep2 | The Contract

    After a year’s worth of pressure from local press and civil society groups, the Guyanese government released its contract with ExxonMobil to the public in December 2017. The IMF calls it an unfair deal for Guyana. Some local leaders start calling on government officials to try to renegotiate the contract, but others say that’s a fool’s errand and the only place to fight the contract is in court.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 39 min
    S8 Ep3 | Unlimited Liability

    S8 Ep3 | Unlimited Liability

    One person in Guyana knows both the inner workings of oil companies and the intricacies of Guyanese environmental law better than most. Melinda Janki grew up in Guyana, but went to university at Oxford and then worked as in-house counsel for oil giant BP before returning home. Decades ago she started to help strengthen the country’s environmental laws. In 2018 she started filing suits against the government to block offshore drilling. Her latest suit demands that ExxonMobil be liable for any environmental damage caused to Guyana in case of an offshore catastrophe. 



    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 43 min
    New Season Coming Soon: Light, Sweet Crude

    New Season Coming Soon: Light, Sweet Crude

    On paper, the small South American country of Guyana is the fastest-growing economy in the world, thanks to its oil boom. The country started shipping barrels of oil in 2019. Hotels are popping up all over its capital city. Historic homes are being turned into condos for visiting oil execs. But average citizens say they aren’t benefiting from the boom like they thought they would. And one lawyer is trying everything she can to stop her homeland from being changed from a carbon sink into a carbon bomb. In this special crossover season of Drilled and Damages, a look at 21st century oil colonialism, amid the climate crisis.
    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    • 2 min
    The ABCs of Big Oil | Ep 1: First Day of School (Ad-free)

    The ABCs of Big Oil | Ep 1: First Day of School (Ad-free)

    Fossil fuel companies didn't start infiltrating schools when climate change appeared on the scene, they were there shaping the minds of future citizens for decades before then. The industry has been laying the groundwork for inaction on climate since long before this crisis reared its ugly head, limiting how Americans are allowed to think about the environment and the economy. In this first episode of our new miniseries with Earther, Dharna Noor and Amy Westervelt look at how Big Oil first got into the education game, and why it worked so well.

    The ABCs of Big Oil | Ep 2: Elementary School (Ad-free)

    The ABCs of Big Oil | Ep 2: Elementary School (Ad-free)

    Since the 1920s, oil companies have been creating music, activities, coloring books, comic books, movies and more to shape how American kids think about society, the economy, and the environment. Today, we look at their efforts in elementary school.

    Read more: www.earther.com

Customer Reviews

4.6 out of 5
2.1K Ratings

2.1K Ratings

Extinctbirds ,

The best true crime podcast that will leave you both enraged and enlightened.

Knowledge is power, the fossil fuel industry has for far too long had total control over the way they are portrayed. Drilled is a podcast which continues to remove the veil of misinformation and confusion oil & gas corporations have built around them to protect their ecocide & criminal activities around the world. Thank you Amy & team for the important work you do.

FBHO ,

Propaganda at its finest

This podcast is a biased view of Exxon’s involvement in Guyana. The narrator misleads the listener continuously while claiming that Exxon is doing the same. Only made it through two episodes but didn’t hear anything about the Chinese oil companies operating in Guyana. Also, the narrator made the choice to comment about Vice report that showed Chinese businessmen bribing Guyanese officials but failed to mention it outside of the context of Exxon’s oil deal. I wonder how many CCP donations this climate activist group receives?

Noe Valley listener ,

Best short-form docu-series I have ever heard

Many podcast episodes today are an hour and half, sometimes two hours long, saturated with jarring ads and poor editing. On top of this, the content is often emotionally draining to listen to, especially since host's sharing their subjective political opinions are the new social norm, existing in echo chambers with guests merely rephrasing their priors. Well here is the antidote. Rigged is like a documentary mini-series, continually exposing and educating the public in digestible but salient portions, with experts who bring technical rigor to storytelling. Thank you for terrific work, stellar reporting, and succinct short-form pacing. Truly love this podcast.

Top Podcasts In Science

Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam
Alie Ward
iHeartPodcasts
Neil deGrasse Tyson
Sam Harris
NPR

You Might Also Like

Climate One from The Commonwealth Club
Dr. Leah Stokes, Dr. Katharine Wilkinson
Post Script Media + Canary Media
The Climate Pod
David Roberts
New York Times Opinion

More by Critical Frequency

Critical Frequency
LG
YR and Critical Frequency
Critical Frequency
Critical Frequency
DAMEMagazine