A few weeks ago, the Unit­ed Nations’ Inter­gov­ern­men­tal Pan­el on Cli­mate Change — also known by its acronym IPCC — issued their sixth assess­ment of the Earth’s cli­mate con­firm­ing, with sober­ing cer­tain­ty, what cli­mate experts have been warn­ing us about for decades: the Earth is warming.

And much more quick­ly than pre­vi­ous­ly thought.

Warn­ing of ris­ing sea lev­els, increas­ing glob­al tem­per­a­tures, extreme weath­er events, and strained tol­er­ance lev­els for glob­al agri­cul­ture and human health, cli­mate sci­en­tists char­ac­ter­ized the report as a “Code Red” for humanity.

Cli­mate sci­en­tists are urg­ing the world com­mu­ni­ty to act imme­di­ate­ly in order to mit­i­gate even worse ram­i­fi­ca­tions than what we’ve seen in recent months.

The Pacif­ic North­west has arguably nev­er felt the effects of cli­mate dam­age more keen­ly than this past sum­mer. Dan­ger­ous wild­fires raced across Cas­ca­dia, an unprece­dent­ed heat dome shat­tered tem­per­a­ture records across the region, result­ing in many lives lost, and farms and fish­eries strug­gled to cope with drought con­di­tions and low or ruined yields.

With the 26th UN Cli­mate Change Con­fer­ence of the Par­ties (COP26) about to begin in Glas­gow, Scot­land, we’re pleased to bring you an impacts-focused pan­el dis­cus­sion with three cli­mate sci­en­tists in this mon­th’s episode of PNWcur­rents, NPI’s unique­ly region­al pod­cast, which I am thrilled and hon­ored to host.

You can lis­ten to this episode on demand using the play­er below. You can also down­load it to lis­ten any­where using your favorite pod­cast­ing app or service.

Want to read the tran­script and get more details on the episode’s production?

Just launch the ded­i­cat­ed page for Episode V!

Episode V: Under­stand­ing The Impacts Of Cli­mate Damage

Pre­sent­ed in a pan­el for­mat, PNWcur­rents brings togeth­er thinkers, activists, elect­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tives, and top­i­cal experts to have con­struc­tive con­ver­sa­tions about local and region­al pol­i­tics, pol­i­cy, major issues, and ideas that impact the Pacif­ic North­west. It’s a forum for per­cep­tive dis­course like no other.

Join­ing me for Episode V are:

• Karin Bum­ba­co, Assis­tant State Cli­ma­tol­o­gist for Wash­ing­ton. An atmos­pher­ic sci­ence expert, Karin’s research has been focus­ing on heat­waves, droughts, sur­face tem­per­a­tures, and their effects on the sur­round­ing environments.
• Pro­fes­sor Lar­ry O’Neill, State Cli­ma­tol­o­gist for Ore­gon and Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor at Ore­gon State Uni­ver­si­ty. Larry’s research exam­ines the inter­ac­tions between the atmos­phere and the ocean, sea tem­per­a­tures, and North­ern Pacif­ic weath­er patterns.
• Dr. Jef­frey Hicke, Pro­fes­sor in the Depart­ment of Geog­ra­phy at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ida­ho. Jeffrey’s work inves­ti­gates the inter­ac­tion between of flo­ra, fau­na and var­i­ous glob­al cli­mate dis­tur­bances. He also con­tributed to the sec­tion on North Amer­i­ca in the IPCC’s sixth cli­mate assess­ment report.

Because PNWcur­rents is a pod­cast avail­able on demand, you can lis­ten to episodes any­time: while gar­den­ing, while jog­ging, while run­ning errands, while work­ing on a home improve­ment project, or draft­ing a let­ter to your local offi­cials request­ing they imple­ment poli­cies to cut emissions…the choice is yours!

Pro­duc­ing PNWcur­rents requires mon­ey as well as time and energy.

We think it’s worth it, and we hope you will, too.

We invite you to sup­port the pro­duc­tion of PNWcur­rents by becom­ing a mem­ber of the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute if you aren’t already!

You can donate month­ly as a Com­mon­wealth Bond­hold­er, or annually.

Thank you for lis­ten­ing, and I hope you enjoy Episode V!