45 episodes

Zero is about the tactics and technologies taking us to a world of zero emissions. Each week Bloomberg’s award-winning reporter Akshat Rathi talks to the people tackling climate change – a venture capitalist hunting for the best cleantech investment, scientists starting companies, politicians who have successfully created climate laws, and CEOs who have completely transformed their businesses. The road to zero emissions has many paths and everyone’s got an opinion about the best route. Listen in.

Zero iHeartPodcasts and Bloomberg

    • Business
    • 4.8 • 82 Ratings

Zero is about the tactics and technologies taking us to a world of zero emissions. Each week Bloomberg’s award-winning reporter Akshat Rathi talks to the people tackling climate change – a venture capitalist hunting for the best cleantech investment, scientists starting companies, politicians who have successfully created climate laws, and CEOs who have completely transformed their businesses. The road to zero emissions has many paths and everyone’s got an opinion about the best route. Listen in.

    The writer behind Love Actually wants to green your retirement fund

    The writer behind Love Actually wants to green your retirement fund

    How often do you think about how much your pension or 401(k) is contributing to climate change? Chances are not much, but a growing movement wants you to do just that. 

    Richard Curtis is the writer behind Love Actually, Mr. Bean, Blackadder and Four Weddings and a Funeral. His latest project is not a movie, but a campaign group called Make My Money Matter, which wants to make British retirement plans and banks greener by raising awareness that the trillions of dollars in pensions that are invested in fossil fuel companies.

    This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi asks Richard about how he went from writing for the screen to making your retirement money green, what can be done to stop greenwashing in the financial sector, and whether he'll ever write a climate romcom.

    Read more: 


    Make My Money Matter’s film with Rose Leslie and Kit Harrington
    Natasha White’s article on Gabon’s carbon credits
    A transcript of this episode. 

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Alastair Marsh, Natasha White and Kira Bindrim. Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.
    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 35 min
    The biggest opportunity in the history of the world

    The biggest opportunity in the history of the world

    Dipender Saluja is the Managing Director of Capricorn Investment Group, a venture capital firm with $9B under management. He was an early investor in Tesla. Today Dipender leads Capricorn’s clean tech investments effort and is betting on nuclear fusion, next gen batteries and electric aviation as the next moneymakers in decarbonizing the economy. Dipender has worked in Silicon Valley for 35 years. This week, Akshat talks with him about why he got interested in venture capital, climate tech, and how his start in the semiconductor industry informs his investment strategy.

    Listen to the interview with Rebecca Shirley of World Resources Institute and Makthar Diop of International Finance Corporation to learn more about clean energy financing in developing nations here. 

    Read more: 


    Leslie Kaufman’s story about TerraCycle here.
    A transcript of the episode

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Kira Bindrim, Venkat Viswanathan, and Dashiell Bennett. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.
    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 29 min
    Does it matter if the world breaches 1.5C for a single year?

    Does it matter if the world breaches 1.5C for a single year?

    This week a new report was released by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) that says we are likely to exceed 1.5C of warming for a single year at some point in the next five years. It’s a big deal for many reasons, especially because limiting global warming to within 1.5C of pre-industrial temperatures is a key goal of the Paris Agreement.

    In this bonus episode of Zero, Akshat Rathi and Oscar Boyd talk about what the WMO report says and why it matters.

    Read more about the WMO report: 


    Breaching 1.5C threshold temporarily in next five years ‘more likely than not’
    Climate pledges reach threshold to keep warming below 2C
    Read a transcript of this episode

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Zahra Hirji, Olivia Rudgard and Kira Bindrim. Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.


    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 9 min
    Redesigning cities for a future of extreme heat

    Redesigning cities for a future of extreme heat

    At their best, cities can be a climate solution: densely packed places with good public transport, effective health care, and plenty for everyone to do. Combined with clean energy, they become carbon-efficient centers. But cities can also be a climate disaster: Low levels of vegetation, big concrete buildings, high traffic and poor airflow create the perfect conditions for extreme heat waves. As cities grow and an ever greater percentage of the population become urban dwellers, the impacts of these heat events will be felt by more and more people. 

    This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi talks with Global Chief Heat Officer Eleni Myrivili, about how cities can be made more resilient to heat, and why aircon is not a solution we can rely on.

    Read more: 


    A profile of Eugenia Kargbo, Chief Heat Officer in Sierra Leone.
    Olivia Rudgard’s article on Happisburgh’s disappearing coastline. 
    A full transcript of this episode.

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Kira Bindrim and Laura Millan. Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.


    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 34 min
    Biden’s climate bill is changing climate tech, and our daily lives

    Biden’s climate bill is changing climate tech, and our daily lives

    It’s been eight months since President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act. Already the hundreds of billions of dollars it contains for clean energy and slowing climate change —alongside private venture capital investments — are funding a wide array of climate technology projects, from decarbonizing infrastructure to rust-based battery storage.

    This week we are sharing an episode of the Bloomberg podcast The Big Take that looks at where all the money in U.S. President Biden's signature climate bill has gone. Bloomberg climate reporter Eric Roston and senior reporter Akshat Rathi talk with Big Take host Wes Kosova about how climate tech is no longer a corner of the economy–it’s fast becoming the economy. And reporter Zahra Hirji joins to talk about some of the ways the IRA’s spending is starting to show up in our everyday lives.

    Read the story by Akshat Rathi and Eric Roston here. Find more from The Big Take, here. And help out Zero by taking our listener survey, here. 

    Read a transcript of this episode, here.

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Kira Bindrim and The Big Take team. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.
    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 29 min
    How the Bezos Earth Fund spends its billions

    How the Bezos Earth Fund spends its billions

    Amazon made Jeff Bezos very rich. In 2020, he decided to pledge a portion of that wealth — $10 billion — to launch the Bezos Earth Fund. It is the largest commitment to climate philanthropy ever made and, by most measures, a vast amount of money. But it is also a small fraction of the $3.5 trillion that is needed annually to hit net zero by 2050. To make an impact, it has to be spent strategically and attract a lot more money from governments and corporations. 

    This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi asks Bezos Earth Fund CEO Andrew Steer how the fund spends its billions, what counts as success, and how competition between billionaires is shaping climate philanthropy.

    Read a transcript of this episode, here.

    Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd and our senior producer is Christine Driscoll. Special thanks to Kira Bindrim, as well as Robin Pomeroy at the World Economic Forum for arranging studio space. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at zeropod@bloomberg.net. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.
    See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    • 31 min

Customer Reviews

4.8 out of 5
82 Ratings

82 Ratings

Zorroke ,

Inspiring!

Relevant, credible, honest.

CobaltJackson ,

Probably the best climate podcast

I especially loved the Curb Your Enthusiasm-esque music that played when Akshat, Venkat and Chamath got in the weeds.

artichoke82 ,

Add this one to your feed

I pressed play on “high octane capitalism meets climate change” with great skepticism. There’s so much media out there meant to pacify us. I knew Rathi was a good reporter and wanted to see what he would bring to the table, and he brought a quiet fire that held power to account. I listen to a lot of podcasts and I always pay close attention to how reporters do their job, so often they leave out important context or create a false equivalence. Akshat and his team put together a good episode with great editing pulled sound bites together with snappy flair. But more than that every time I started to give the guest “the side eye” the host would ask the right question give the right context and leave it up to the listener to pay attention. Looking forward to seeing where this pod goes.

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