TRACK CHANGES - chats with climate change and sustainability experts

Net zero or real zero? Which climate pollution target is best? An open mic episode!

Net zero or real zero? This 'open mic' episode features short audio clips from a range of people, giving their views. Then podcast hosts Dr Franziska Curran and Murray Griffin weigh in with their views. Is one concept a misguided fantasy, and the other our best hope? Or are both concepts useful? Tune in to find out!  If you like this episode, don't forget to rate it on your favourite pod platform and share it with friends/colleagues! 

What we got from the COP30 climate summit, what we need from COP31

Featuring a chat with Carbon Pulse North America editor Allison Gacad, and Carbon Pulse Asia Pacific editor Mark Tilly. Allison and Mark discuss the highs and lows of the COP30 climate summit in Brazil, and chat about what they'd like to see from the Turkiye-Australia-Pacific COP31. Can next year's TAPCOP stare down the fossil fuel interests that managed to keep a fossil phasedown out of the COP30 formal outcomes document?  Allison also talks about the billions of dollars raised for the Tropical Forests Forever Facility, and Mark chats about one of the best acronyms to come out of the UNFCCC in quite a while - BAM - the Belem Action Mechanism. Enjoy!

The world's newest (and prize-winning) environmental treaty - protecting our high seas

The world's newest environmental treaty will protect the high seas - those parts of the ocean that belong to no nation. These marine waters extend over about half the planet. This ambitious treaty recently won the world's most prestigious environmental prize - the Earthshot prize for reviving our oceans. The prize was accepted on behalf of the treaty by the director of the High Seas Alliance - Rebecca Hubbard.  In this episode, Track Changes hosts Franziska and Murray do a virtual 'trip' to Rio to recreate that well-deserved prize-winning moment at the 2025 Earthshot prizes. And then we chat with Rebecca, who explains how the treaty was developed and what it will do.  It's an inspiring episode - enjoy! 

Ralph Regenvanu: Protecting an Amazon-sized ocean expanse

The proposed Melanesian Ocean Reserve is an ambitious proposal to protect more than six million square kilometres of incredibly biodiverse ocean, centred on the waters of Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and New Caledonia. In this episode, we talk to globally renowned politician Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu's Climate Change and Environment Minister, who is playing a leading role in bringing the Reserve into being. Ralph was a leading figure in securing UN General Assembly support to seek an International Court of Justice advisory opinion on the climate change obligations of nation states. And he is now spearheading efforts to make that landmark ICJ opinion the baseline for policy-making and decision-making on climate change. Enjoy the episode!

What to expect from the COP30 climate summit

Will the UN COP30 climate summit in Belem, Brazil, be a success? Will it be a COP that explicitly aims for 'Tropical Forests Forever' and tacitly leaves the world in a 'fossil fuels forever' mindset? Or will it be a COP where there is action across the board? And what is likely to happen on the crucial issue of providing finance to developing countries to help them reduce emissions and adapt to climate change and disruption? In this episode, two senior journalists from the Carbon Pulse news service - Allison Gacad and Mark Tilly - share their insights about this make-or-break COP.