Earth911.com's Sustainability In Your Ear

By: Mitch Ratcliffe
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  • Summary

  • Earth911's Mitch Ratcliffe interviews activists, authors, entrepreneurs and changemakers working to accelerate the transition to a sustainable, post-carbon society. You have more power to improve the world than you know! Listen in to get started saving the planet!
    Copyright 2023 Earth Media Partners
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Earth Sciences
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Episodes
  • Earth911 Podcast: Meet Carbon Capture Innovator Varin Sikka, Barron Prize Young Hero Prize Winner

    Earth911 Podcast: Meet Carbon Capture Innovator Varin Sikka, Barron Prize Young Hero Prize Winner
    Feb 3 2025
    Climate Change has terrible impacts today, and youth coming of age face depressing prospects. However, they are stepping up to the challenge and could see the fruits of their efforts in a restored climate during their lifetime. Climate restoration requires extraordinary efforts of young people, who are already leading the charge. On this episode, Sustainability In Your Ear introduces another winner of the Gloria Barron Prize for Young Heroes, which recognizes each year a dozen youth for their innovation and action. The program considers kids between 8 and 18. In 2024, one of the remarkable individuals awarded $10,000 by the program is Varin Sikka, a 16-year-old innovator from California. Varin has invented AirCat, a groundbreaking Direct Air Capture (DAC) system designed to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere on a large scale. He's doing more than imagining the technology. Varin has a 3D-printed home version and is working with Siemens Energy after taking AirCat to the COP28 meeting in Dubai held in 2023.Varin was motivated to develop the AirCat by the apocalyptic wildfires that brought red skies to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2020. On today's show, he shares how he came to be a 16-year-old inventor, the feelings his friends have about climate change, and the advice he would give youth who feel climate anxiety: Get involved. This year's awards will be announced in the fall. Fiction writer T.A. Barron created the prize and named the program after his mother to help inspire kids to make a positive difference in the world. You can learn more about the Gloria Barron Prize, and if you are between 8 and 18 years old, consider entering to be considered for the 2025 awards at https://barronprize.org/ Subscribe to Sustainability in Your Ear on iTunes and Apple Podcasts.Follow Sustainability in Your Ear on Spreaker, iHeartRadio, or YouTubeCheck out previous Earth911 interviews about carbon capture technologiesBest of Earth911 Podcast: Nikki Batchelor and Mike Leitch Share XPRIZE Carbon Removal ProgressEarth911 Podcast: Talking Carbon Capture Investments with Rick ParnellEarth911 Podcast: Talking Eco-Anxiety and Carbon Capture With the Foundation for Climate Restoration’s Dr. Erica DoddsEarth911 Podcast: Global Thermostat’s Graciela Chichilnisky on Distributed Carbon Capture EconomiesBest of Earth911 Podcast: Nikki Batchelor and Mike Leitch Share XPRIZE Carbon Removal ProgressBest of Earth911 Podcast: Author Peter Fiekowsky on Climate RestorationTalking Direct Air Capture of Atmospheric CO2 with Peter FiekowskyBest of Earth911 Podcast: How To Build a Just & Equitable Carbon Removal IndustryBest of Earth911 Podcast: Dr. Marcius Extavour on the $100M XPRIZE Circular Carbon Network Competition
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    32 mins
  • Earth911 Podcast: Eco-Stylist Garik Himebaugh On Creating Your Sustainable Style

    Earth911 Podcast: Eco-Stylist Garik Himebaugh On Creating Your Sustainable Style
    Jan 27 2025
    Meet Garik Himebaugh, the founder of Eco-Stylist.com, a site dedicated to promoting sustainable fashion choices. Garik's journey into the world of sustainable fashion began with a background in peace studies and an MBA, and he discovered social entrepreneurship as a grad student and launched Eco-Stylist in 2018. There, he helps consumers make informed, sustainable fashion choices with a directory of brands that meet his criteria for ethical production and environmental responsibility.encouraging individuals to "dress like you give a damn." He was kind enough to contribute a recent article on Earth911, How to Build the Sustainable Wardrobe of Your Dreams. He points to how the fast fashion crisis is burying some countries in the global south in synthetic trash that can take decades or centuries to breakdown into potentially toxic plastic byproducts. Garik joined the Sustainability In Your Ear conversation to discuss how to check the sustainability claims made by clothing companies, the power of reuse and upcycling as a way to reduce your personal environmental impact, and his favorite responsible fashion brands, including Adelante, Outerknown, Naadam, and Patagonia.Fast fashion is a plague on the planet and your wallet. Fast fashion is responsible for approximately 10% of global carbon emissions and nearly 20% of wastewater production, according to the World Economic Forum. The World Resources Institute reports that producing just one cotton shirt uses approximately 713 gallons of water — that’s enough water to meet one person's drinking needs for over two years. But, hey, you get a $10 shirt instead. The fast fashion industry is so destructive that the U.S. Government Accounting Office wrote in December 2024 that the nation needs a coordinated effort to reduce textile waste and promote recycling. But we can dress for success and the planet. Garik explains that the brands he admires “take responsibility for their clothes” by making them with organic and sustainable materials, providing repairs and take-back programs, as well as delivering durable products that can be made to last. You can learn more about sustainable fashion and shop Garik's curated selection of clothing at https://Eco-Stylist.com.Subscribe to Sustainability in Your Ear on iTunes and Apple Podcasts.Follow Sustainability in Your Ear on Spreaker, iHeartRadio, or YouTubeCheck out previous Earth911 interviews about sustainable fashionEarth911 Podcast: EVRNU’s Stacy Flynn On Creating Circular Fiber For Sustainable FashionBest of Earth911 Podcast: The Apparel Impact Institute’s Kurt Kipka Maps the Path to Sustainable FashionEarth911 Podcast: tentree CEO Derrick Emsley on Sustainable Fashion & ReforestationBest of Earth911 Podcast: Keel Labs’ Tessa Gallagher Introduces Kelsun Kelp-Based TextilesBest of Earth911 Podcast: Mike Baker’s ReCORK Recycling Puts The Circular Into FootwearBest of Earth911 Podcast: Cotapaxi Partners With Customers & Suppliers To Achieve Sustainability
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    38 mins
  • Earth911 Podcast: Thinking Zero Waste With Sarah Currie-Halpern

    Earth911 Podcast: Thinking Zero Waste With Sarah Currie-Halpern
    Jan 20 2025
    Practical progress toward a sustainable lifestyle, whether you are an individual or a business, will always be unique to your situation, but you can base your choices on lessons learned by others. Tune into a conversation with Sarah Currie-Halpern, Co-Founder of Think Zero LLC, a consultancy that helps businesses, institutions, and households reduce waste and embrace sustainable practices. With a focus on practical, actionable solutions, Sarah and her team work to make sustainability accessible to many clients. Sarah shares travel tips to keep in mind to reduce your impact on the ground in other cities and countries. Taking a water bottle, reusable utensils, and a coffee cup can eliminate the single-use stuff you’ll find at many hotels and resorts. Check out Ecohotels.com and the Global Sustainable Tourism Council’s guidance. You will discover insights that can pierce the veil of greenwashing by travel marketers with the information you find there.

    Sarah draws on her waste management work in the office of the Mayor of New York to discuss the potential for applications of artificial intelligence (AI) to reduce the flow of materials to landfill. According to several studies, AI could consume up to 10% of electricity generated by the end of the decade. AI can be a powerful tool, but many companies focus on delivering trivial consumer convenience using the technology. Finding your next favorite social video or saving the effort involved in changing the channel on your TV are not worthwhile applications of technology that could be applied to, for example, developing fire suppression materials that are free of the toxins and heavy metals dumped in waves of red on cities in the Los Angeles basin amid this year’s wildfires. We can and will use AI to invent new, sustainable materials, sort reusable materials out of the waste stream, and much more. Still, we should not see every question humans pose, like “What’s on TV tonight?” handed to AI to resolve. If information is the new oil, we can use AI more judiciously than we did with petroleum during the Industrial Age. You can learn more about Sarah and her work at Think Zero at https://www.thinkzerollc.com/
    • Subscribe to Sustainability in Your Ear on iTunes and Apple Podcasts.
    • Follow Sustainability in Your Ear on Spreaker, iHeartRadio, or YouTube
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    35 mins

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