Zero: The Climate Race

The 21st century will be shaped by fire

13 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The 2016 fire that encircled the oil-producing town of Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada, forced more than 80,000 people to evacuate and left billions ...

Big Take Asia: Will the world's biggest nuclear power plant get a restart?

10 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

All of Japan's 54 nuclear reactors were shut down after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. As the country's energy needs soar, debate is heating up over...

Is Tesla on the road to irrelevance?

06 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Over the past 18 months, Tesla has missed its sales goals, seen its share price fall and waded through a series of dramatic decisions from Chief Execu...

Searching for climate solutions amid the AI hype

30 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Depending on who you ask, AI is either going to save the world or end it. The technology’s capacity for data-crunching and problem-saving can help p...

Microsoft wanted to be carbon negative. Then it went big on AI

23 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Microsoft’s recent push to capitalize on artificial intelligence has made it the world’s most valuable company. But according to new figures, that...

Why the UK’s Conservatives have given up on climate

16 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

After 14 years as a member of Parliament for the UK’s Conservative Party, Chris Skidmore quit the government in January — an act of protest over P...

Europe’s answer to the green backlash

09 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Five years ago, the Green Party celebrated its best-ever results in European elections, ushering in a new era of legislative progress But Covid-19, in...

This bank is turning Africa into a climate investment opportunity

02 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Africa currently loses between $7 billion and $15 billion a year because of climate change. If that trend continues, the sum could reach $50 billion b...

The slow and painful recovery of the wind industry

25 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Denmark’s Vestas has been making wind turbines exclusively since 1989 — well before the notion of an energy transition was commonplace. But that f...

How ‘energy islands’ can supercharge offshore wind

18 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

If you've paid much attention to the wind industry lately, the news isn’t great. Building new projects is getting more expensive and getting governm...

How to cut industrial emissions and dodge the valley of death

11 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Clean energy technologies saw a record influx of investment last year: $1.7 trillion in total. But that still falls short of what’s needed to meet c...

The climate watchdog holding the UK government to account

04 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When the UK’s Climate Change Committee was formed in 2008, it both signaled the country’s seriousness about its environmental goals and gave other...

A legally binding treaty to fight the plastic problem

28 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The plastic problem is everywhere: in our oceans, communities, even inside our bodies. Plastic is abundant and very cheap, and the amount we produce i...

Listen Now: The Big Take

26 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The Big Take from Bloomberg News brings you inside what’s shaping the world's economies with the smartest and most informed business reporters aroun...

Making renewables a profitable bet… everywhere

21 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

When Brookfield Asset Management launched a $15 billion fund to expand clean energy in 2021, it was the largest private fund of its kind in the world....

Climate change can't overcome capitalism, and that's OK

12 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It is now cheaper to save the world than destroy it. But is capitalism up to the challenge of preventing the climate crisis?  In his new book Climate...

John Kerry, the Forrest Gump of climate, bows out

04 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

John Kerry is the Forrest Gump of climate. The guy you’ll find at every important turn in history doing something impactful. For the last three year...

Introducing: The Deal with Alex Rodriguez and Jason Kelly

29 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The Deal, hosted by Alex Rodriguez and Jason Kelly, features intimate conversations with business titans, sports champions and game-changing entrepren...

What Donald Trump’s return means for US climate ambition

18 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Tom Steyer is a hedge-fund billionaire who made his money investing in distressed assets, including fossil fuel projects. He’s also an avowed clima...

Best of: How climate reached the world's elite in Davos

11 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This January, Davos will once again host the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting and bring together the world's business and political elite. In r...

Our favorite climate numbers #3

28 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Are fossil fuel companies needed in a clean energy future? Is the UK really backsliding on climate progress? And how can you find out more about solar...

Check out: Drilled

26 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today we're sharing an episode from another climate podcast that you might like, Drilled. Zero’s host Akshat Rathi was a guest on Drilled earlier th...

Check out: The Anti-Dread Climate Podcast

19 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today we’re sharing an episode from another climate podcast that you might like. It’s The Anti-Dread Climate Podcast from KCRW. If you like what y...

Introducing: Bloomberg News Now

18 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Bloomberg News Now is a comprehensive audio report on today's top stories. Listen for the latest news, whenever you want it, covering global business ...

Is COP28 the beginning of the end for the fossil fuel era?

13 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

COP28 comes to a close. 200 countries came together, 100,000 people flew in, and what did they produce? A piece of text. But sometimes that piece of t...

'Hey, nice sea wall': Finding trillions for adaptation

11 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Four billion people live in countries where climate change-related disasters are becoming more severe and frequent. Spending money to adapt, known as ...

Al Gore plans to break the petrostate stranglehold on climate progress

06 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Former US Vice President Al Gore has been going to COP summits since the beginning. But he’s much more than a COP-goer. Many of today’s climate ac...

How to triple renewables by 2030

04 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Tripling renewables is one of the goals the COP28 discussions are circling around. It sounds good, but what will meeting it actually entail? Jenny Cha...

Outrage and optimism in oil country

29 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Today is the start of COP28. And for the next two weeks, Zero will be in the United Arab Emirates, along with more than 70,000 people who will come fo...

Best of: We need trillions to fix the climate. Finally there’s a serious plan.

27 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Trillions of dollars are needed to shift the world to a low-carbon future, but where will all that money come from? While momentum is growing in rich ...

Can an oil exec successfully lead COP28?

23 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The UN Climate Conference COP28 starts next week. Before Akshat heads to the conference he’s joined by Aaron Rutkoff, the editor of Bloomberg Green,...

How China left the world far behind in the battery race

20 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

By 2025, China’s battery production capacity will be three times as much as the rest of the world combined. Why was it able to take such a commandin...

Carbon removal’s magic number

16 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

If reducing emissions from industry is the first step for carbon capture, then drawing down excess CO2 to reverse climate change is the next. This wee...

Europe’s top industrialist takes on green batteries

14 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

You may not know Jim Hagemann Snabe by name, but he has been called Europe’s top industrialist. Snabe has held leadership positions at some of the w...

Introducing: Elon, Inc.

10 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

At Bloomberg, we’re always talking about the biggest business stories, and no one is bigger than Elon Musk. In this new chat weekly show, host David...

Big promise, little success: The state of carbon capture

09 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The U.S. is spending billions on carbon capture as a climate solution, but is it realistic? The method has been around for 50 years and used primarily...

The loudest champion of the climate vulnerable

02 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Saleemul Huq was a pre-eminent climate scientist and champion for developing countries. For many years, he was a lone warrior trying to bring the issu...

Best of: How the ‘rich man’s energy club’ became a climate champion

26 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, the International Energy Agency published its flagship report: The World Energy Outlook. It's hundreds of pages long and makes some bold cl...

The EV revolution isn’t just on four wheels

22 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Cars are only half the electric vehicle story. There are also billions of two and three wheelers that need to be electrified, as well as bigger vehicl...

Peak oil is here. Well, maybe.

19 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Peak oil is here, or is it? Depends on how you measure, but at least one person is sure crude isn’t coming back. This week Akshat speaks with Bloomb...

Can climate capitalism work?

12 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It is now cheaper to save the world than destroy it. But is capitalism up to the challenge of preventing the climate crisis?  In his new book Climate...

It's done. The future is electric cars.

05 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The rise of electric cars is staggering. In 2016, just 700,000 electric cars were sold worldwide, this year it’ll be over 14 million. However, we ar...

How to keep fossil fuels in the ground, from the boardroom

28 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Brynn O’Brien not only reads corporate climate plans, she crunches the numbers. When they don’t add up, she calls her friends who manage trillions...

Our favorite climate numbers #2

25 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Are two wheels better than four? Can cutting commuting cap carbon consumption? And where’s all the clean energy coming from? There are many climate ...

The godfather of solar predicts its future

21 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Setting world records. Combing through warehouses of old electronics. Seeding the Chinese solar industry from afar. This is the life of Martin Green, ...

Perfume? Yes. Potatoes? No. Vertical farming tries to grow up

14 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Cleantech is hard. Farming is harder. This week, Akshat Rathi visits entrepreneurs doing both.  GroGrace in Singapore and Jungle in Paris are two ver...

How the world’s biggest green bank is electrifying Australia

07 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Trillions of dollars are needed to fund the climate transition, with both the private sector and governments required to contribute. Australia’s ans...

Your carbon footprint should bring you joy

31 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The concept of a “carbon footprint” began as a distraction from Big Oil: get people to focus on their own actions rather than the impact of large...

Best of: How to build a battery that replaces a coal plant

24 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, a visit to the energy startup trying to replace coal with a very cheap battery. Form Energy has attracted nearly $900 million in investment...

Methane leaks are the low-hanging fruit of the climate crisis

21 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, with 80 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide over a 25-year period. However, it also degrades much more q...

Why Hollywood A-listers are rushing to star in climate shows

17 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How do you turn climate change into compelling TV? What scenarios do you draw on? And how do you make sure a call for climate action isn’t lost to a...

Inside the industry that made climate denial work

10 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

True crime is one of the most popular genres in every form of storytelling. But can that pull be used to tell stories about the environment? This week...

A sci-fi writer’s guide to a low-carbon future

03 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

To tackle climate change, we need good stories and we need good storytellers. Kim Stanley Robinson is a climate fiction author who has written more th...

Best of: The world’s food system needs a radical rethink

27 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What’s worse for the planet than Big Oil? The world’s food system, argues environmental journalist and campaigner George Monbiot in his new book R...

How solar’s explosive growth is starting to make electricity free

19 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In the next three years, 1TW of solar power will be added to the global grid and competition is driving solar prices even lower. And after years of in...

Our favorite climate numbers

17 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Where’s all the oil money going? What’s happening with cycling in France? And how far behind China is the US on solar? There are many climate numb...

How Canada figured out a carbon tax and gave the money back

13 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Canada is a leading producer of oil and gas. It’s also one of the few G7 members with a carbon tax. As Minister of Environment and Climate Change in...

The Chinese activist who mapped the country's pollution problem

06 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

China is the world’s factory, and has the emissions to match. But in a planned economy, with weak environmental regulation, can anyone take on this ...

Three US Governors, Republican and Democrat, pitch green spending

29 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Policy can make or break climate action. Usually, national policy gets the most attention, but what local and regional governments do can make a bigge...

World leaders met in Paris to unlock trillions in climate finance. What did they achieve?

26 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Last week, 50 world leaders met in Paris with the goal of moving trillions in climate finance to developing countries. What was achieved, and what is ...

Meet the man with $400 billion to supercharge climate tech

22 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Tesla is a household name, but few people have heard of the Loan Programs Office (LPO), one of Tesla’s crucial early backers. Part of the US Departm...

We need trillions to fix the climate. Finally there’s a serious plan.

15 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Trillions of dollars are needed to shift the world to a low-carbon future, but where will all that money come from? While momentum is growing in rich ...

How wildfire smoke and air pollution affect your health

08 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A hotter planet is also a smokier one, as residents of New York City are finding out this week. As the intensity and size of wildfires grows, more and...

How to stop your retirement money funding climate change

01 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

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...

The biggest opportunity in the history of the world

25 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dipender Saluja is the Managing Director of Capricorn Investment Group, a venture capital firm with $9B under management. He was an early investor in ...

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

18 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

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...

Redesigning cities for a future of extreme heat

18 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

At their best, cities can be a climate solution: densely packed places with good public transport, effective health care, and plenty for everyone to d...

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

11 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It’s been eight months since President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act. Already the hundreds of billions of dollars it contains for clean e...

How the Bezos Earth Fund spends its billions

04 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

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...

High hopes for biodiversity, but who will pay?

27 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The world is in the middle of the sixth mass extinction and this time it's being driven by human activity. Slowing it down will provide benefits for t...

Best of: Inside the stealth startup making zero-emission steel

20 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Steel is the backbone of modern society, and it’s also responsible for 7% of global greenhouse-gas emissions. Last summer, Bloomberg Green reporter ...

The climate case for flying cars

13 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Electric aviation fulfills two futuristic promises – flying cars and emissions-free air travel. This week, meet the professor who is working to make...

A kingdom built on oil now controls the world’s climate progress

05 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

When Sultan Al Jaber was made president of COP28, the year’s biggest climate summit, there was outrage. How can the head of a giant oil company Abu ...

How to build a battery that replaces a coal plant

30 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This week, a visit to the energy startup trying to replace coal with a very cheap battery. Form Energy has attracted nearly $900 million in investment...

How the ‘rich man’s energy club’ became a climate champion

23 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How do you rebuild an international organization for the climate era? That’s what the Paris-based International Energy Agency has done over the past...

Why the new IPCC report is so important

21 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s latest report is out and it makes for sober reading. Published roughly every seven years, IPCC repor...

What the Silicon Valley Bank collapse means for climate tech

16 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when a "climate bank" goes under? This week, Bloomberg Green reporter Akshat Rathi interviews the CEO of an AI battery startup that had j...

What it takes to become a climate tech CEO, with Katie Rae

09 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

If you’ve got the technology that can change the world, are you the best person to implement it? Investors pay careful attention to the CEO of any c...

Building a future where humanity will thrive, with Achim Steiner

02 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Since the Human Development Index was established in 1990, it has trended gradually upward, as people’s health, wealth and opportunities have improv...

How Europe ditched Russian fossil fuels with spectacular speed

23 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

When Russia attacked Ukraine last year, it expected to win in a three-day blitz. Instead, it’s become a protracted war with impacts felt far and wid...

The new climate race between EU and US, with Jennifer Morgan

16 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As Germany’s climate envoy, Jennifer Morgan stands alongside John Kerry and Xie Zhenhua of China as one of the world’s top climate negotiators. Bu...

Everybody wants a better battery, Christine Ho is printing one

09 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This summer, Bloomberg Green reporter Akshat Rathi visited Imprint Energy, a Silicon Valley startup that prints batteries. Using the same tools as scr...

Can Sweden’s 27-year-old climate minister match up to the far right? with Romina Pourmokhtari

02 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Sweden is known for its climate ambition, and was the first country to set a goal to reach net zero by 2045. Yet a new government aligned with the far...

High-octane capitalism meets climate change, with Chamath Palihapitiya

26 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In 2020, Silicon Valley investor Chamath Palihapitiya said he wanted to create a holding company for climate tech and asked for people to submit their...

How a fossil-fuel company became a wind giant, with Mads Nipper

19 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The wind industry is exploding, growing from just 2% of global electricity supply to 7% in a decade. But to achieve net zero by 2050, we're going to n...

How climate reached the world's elite in Davos, with Gail Whiteman

12 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This January, Davos will once again host the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting and bring together the world's business and political elite. In r...

How to quit your job for the climate

05 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What causes a restaurant critic to trade the gourmet for the green? Why does a Shell geophysicist leave their decade-long career working on oil and ga...

Should the climate movement embrace property destruction? with Andreas Malm

15 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Throughout history, no social movement has succeeded without utilizing property destruction as a tactic, and if the climate movement is to be effectiv...

Are democracies up to the climate challenge? with Daniel Fiorino

08 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The task of cutting emissions is becoming more urgent by the day. Are democracies up to the challenge? Do we have time to let the usual course of cons...

How did a good idea go so wrong? Carbon offsets with Mark Trexler

01 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Carbon offsets are everywhere – a $2 billion dollar industry that’s set to grow even more as the US is even incorporating them in its effort to fu...

The world’s food system needs a radical rethink, with George Monbiot

24 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What’s worse for the planet than Big Oil? The world’s food system, argues environmental journalist and campaigner George Monbiot in his new book R...

Why it’s so hard to invest in clean energy in Africa

22 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

COP27 ended with a historic agreement on loss and damage, but other major challenges remain — including the gap that has long existed between energy...

The lengths Lewis Pugh goes to save the oceans

17 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Lewis Pugh has swum across seas and in between melting sea ice, but the hardest part of his work is what comes after – contributing to negotiations ...

How climate activists adapted to a repressive regime at COP27

15 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Whether the so-called implementation COP will live up to its promise will be answered this week as negotiators begin to do the work of writing the fin...

Can climate change be solved without COP? with Patricia Espinosa

13 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

As week one wraps up at COP27 in Sharm El Sheik in Egypt, Bloomberg Green Reporter Akshat Rathi talks with Patricia Espinosa, who until August 2022 wa...

Biden Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi thinks Democrats have green momentum

11 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

We are rapidly approaching the end of week one at COP27 and all eyes are turning to the US, with President Biden to make a visit on Friday. Bloomberg ...

The Bahamas' Prime Minister Philip Davis wants money to protect his oceans

08 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

After a frenetic two days of discussions at COP27, with hundreds of leaders arriving in Egypt, the demands of vulnerable countries are clear: show us ...

At COP27, a breakthrough on loss and damage? with Saleemul Huq

07 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

COP27 has begun, with 45,000 delegates expected to attend the two-week conference in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt. One of the key discussion points is finan...

Will the US finally become a climate leader? with Leah Stokes

03 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

While the United States fancies itself a global climate leader, the country is coming off a decade of tumultuous policy: It signed the Paris Agreement...

Africa's climate reparations require data that doesn't exist

01 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Weather data is invaluable. It influences the decisions of governments and companies around the world. It’s used to predict energy consumption, harv...