Threshold

Humans are born into a wondrous planetary chorus. But today, many of us rarely hear anything other than ourselves. In this season of Threshold, we explore a world teeming with sound and ask what happ…

In June 2024, the planet hit a terrifying milestone: 12 straight months of global temperatures at or above 1.5 degrees over pre-industrial levels. But even as the impact of climate change becomes mor…

In Season 1 of Threshold, we reported on the decades-long fight to get the federal government to transfer the National Bison Range, and the bison, back to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes.…

A few weeks ago, Yellowstone National Park released a draft plan for managing bison in the park. In this dispatch, we answer your questions about the plan and what it means for the future of the herd…

Yellowstone National Park recently released a new plan for managing the bison herd. It’s in draft form, and maps out three alternatives for how to manage the herd in the future. Before it gets finali…

A lyrical ode to our atmosphere: the invisible, underappreciated substance that makes all life on Earth possible. 

There are quite a few things working against us when it comes to acting on climate ch…

A few weeks ago, the Biden administration approved the Willow project. It’s a plan to extract 600 million barrels of oil from northern Alaska. There’s a lot of history and politics behind this story,…

Representatives from nearly every country in the world are in Egypt right now for COP27, the annual climate conference hosted by the United Nations. The overall goal of each COP is to make progress o…

In many ways, the climate crisis is an identity crisis. As we reckon with the damage we’ve done, we’re being forced into a massive confrontation with the powers, limitations, and essential nature of …

The climate crisis is not just a problem of carbon emissions: it's one of inequality. In fact, global warming and global inequality are the same problem manifesting in different ways. And one of the …

The UN climate talks, or COPs, are attempting the biggest, most complicated, highest-stakes group project humanity has ever known. They are, in a sense, an attempt to design a revolution—to help guid…

The UN climate talks, or COPs, are a lot of different things: they're confusing, bureaucratic, inspiring, boring, infuriating, and exhilarating. They are also the only thing we’ve got to deal with cl…

If the steel industry were a country, it would be the world's third-largest emitter. So to prevent a climate catastrophe, this industry has to change. And not just a little bit: we have to fundamenta…

Listening to Threshold is free, but creating it is not.

We have always been committed to making the best show we can—and making it available for free.

But that's not possible without financial support.

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For centuries, we have been willing to sacrifice places, ecosystems, and entire species for industries like steel. While steel is one of the most useful materials humans have ever created, it’s also …

Steel is the signature material of the Industrial Revolution. It’s also an essential component of the wind turbines, electric cars, and climate-friendly buildings we’ll need in a decarbonized world. …

One of the most challenging aspects of the climate crisis is that we have to do everything at once - transition the entire global economy away from fossil fuels AND deal with the warming that’s alrea…

A lot of the changes needed to keep global heating below 1.5 degrees have to occur at a huge, international level. But nearly a fifth of carbon emissions in the U.S. come from our homes. Are there th…

We keep hearing (and saying) that solving climate change is really hard. But we actually know what we need to do - and have the technology to do it - right now. It’s more a question of what happens i…

The number of things at stake in the climate crisis do not fit inside one episode. It's hard to even fit them inside your mind. Part of what makes the potential losses so hard to grasp is that they'r…