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Program Overview
- Hosts: Deborah Amos
- Length: 51 minutes
- Original Airdate: Feb 2010
"What we're trying to do is get carbon out of our emissions so we can keep the worst impact of climate change from happening."
Professor Dan Schrag, Director of the Harvard University Center for the Environment
But, even with an atmosphere of agreement that capping carbon is good for the planet, world leaders are still generating a lot of hot air arguing how to do it. And, the inconvenient truth is that this isn’t just an international political problem – the actual process of greening cars, cows, and coal-fired power plants will be even more exhausting than getting 190 countries to sign a treaty. Growing new wind farms, saving the rainforest, and scrubbing smokestacks will take time, and a whole lot of money. And in the current economic climate, that’s a tall order.
Segment 1: Sean Carberry travels to Peru to explore efforts to prevent deforestation, the second leading contributor to carbon dioxide emissions, and the competing economic incentives for felling rainforest. Listen to this segment.
Guests include Antonio Brack, Peru’s Environment Minister; Bruce Carabali, Director of the Global Forest Program at the World Wildlife Fund; Kurt Holle, Founder of Rainforest Expeditions; Steve Olive, Chief of the Economic Growth and Environment Office for USAID Peru; and Paul Weisenfeld, USAID Director in Peru.
MULTIMEDIA: Peru is one of the world's leading exporters of gold. It's estimated that 30-40% of the gold leaving the country is mined illegally.
Watch >
Read Sean Carberry's blog posts from Peru on the Dispatch: Promise and Pitfalls in Peru and Alpaca: It's not just for sweaters anymore.
Segment 2: Deborah Amos looks back at the cap and trade system implemented in the US in the early 1990s to mitigate the problem of acid rain and asks whether a similar program would help to reduce carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to climate change. Listen to this segment.
Guests include Ambassador C. Boyden Gray, former White House Counsel during the first Bush Administration; William K. Reilly, EPA Administrator in the first Bush Administration; Robert Stavins, Professor of Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School and Director of the Harvard Environmental Economic Program; John Stowell, former Director of Federal Affairs at PSI Energy; and former Senator Tim Wirth.
Segment 3: Matt Ozug examines the ten-year battle over Cape Wind, the proposed offshore wind farm in Nantucket Bay of Massachusetts, and what it may indicate for the nation’s ability to transfer to greener energy. Listen to this segment.
Guests include Reverend William Eddy; Jim Gordon, Cape Wind President; Dick Miller, Operations Manager at Hull Municipal Light Plant; Barbara Hill, Executive Director of Clean Power Now; Audra Parker, President of the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound; Professor Dan Schrag, Director of the Harvard University Center for the Environment; and Greg Watson, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick’s Advisor for Renewable Energy.
MULTIMEDIA: At the tip of the peninsula in Hull, MA is “Hull Wind One,” the first commercial-scale wind turbine to go online anywhere on the eastern U.S. coastline. Watch >
Segment 4: Deborah Amos discusses some of the challenges of reducing global carbon emissions with Dr. Bjorn Lomborg, Director of The Copenhagen Consensus Center and Adjunct Professor at the Copenhagen Business School. Listen to this segment.
The Carbon Conundrum / Executive Producer: Aaron Lobel / AAM Producers: Monica Bushman, Sean Carberry, Matt Ozug and Chris Williams.
What People are Saying
To make a significant dent in the US electrical energy supply, we need something like 1 million megawatts of name-plate wind-turbine power. We currently have 3.5% of this installed. Note that, because of varying windspeeds, the output averaged over a year will be something like 300,000 megawatts. US electric use is over 1 million megawatts, and under 2 million megawatts. Wind farms & scenic qualities: Generation of Electric Power tends to come with large scenic impacts. The mountain-top removal coal mining in West Virginia is really ugly, but most electricity users don't see it. I find wind turbines ugly but necessary. My niece, an artist, finds them beautiful. For me, it helps to think of them as modern equivalents of old Dutch Windmills.
, about 1 month ago
