Issue

Environment and Climate Change

Earth's average temperature has risen approximately one degree Fahrenheit in the last 50 years. By the end of this century, it will be several degrees higher, according to the latest climate research.

But global warming is doing more than simply making things a little warmer. It's changing rainfall, causing heat waves, and making sea level rise, all of which create human suffering.

Environment and Climate Change brings together reporting from Pulitzer Center grantees on the abilities of communities in diverse regions to bounce back and adapt to the impacts of climate change: One highlight includes in-depth reporting by Nathaniel Rich on the response to global warming during the 1979-1989 decade—an article that takes up the entire issue of The New York Times Magazine. Our journalists investigate climate change in the Arctic—the effects on indigenous communities, the destruction of the fragile natural environment, and the conflict between humans and polar bears. One interactive, award-winning multimedia project, "Sea Change," looks at ocean acidification, its impact on fishing, people's livelihoods, and food security. The documentary "Easy Like Water" features a solar-powered school boat in Bangladesh, where flooding may create 20 million "climate refugees" by mid-century.

Other stories covered here range from the future of the residents of Kiribati, a low-lying island nation in the Pacific, to the biological diversity of the rainforest in Peru, and the psychological effects of climate change on the inhabitants of Australia and Fiji. How does the melting Arctic ice cap affect our lives? How do overfishing and exploitation of mineral resources beneath the ocean’s surface jeopardize food sources need to sustain the planet’s ever-expanding population?

As part of the Pulitzer Center's long-term support for climate change reporting, the Rainforest Journalism Fund was established to provide capacity for local journalists operating in the rainforest regions of Latin America, Africa, and Asia, as well as international journalists reporting from those regions. The Fund represents a major investment in global environmental and climate reporting, with plans to support nearly 200 original reporting projects along with annual regional conferences designed to raise the level of reporting on global rainforest issues such as deforestation and climate change.

 

Environment and Climate Change

Big Problems for Smallest Great Lake: More Precipitation, Warmer Temperatures and Controversial Regulation Plan Upend Life Along Lake Ontario

Tom Frank was at his restaurant when a brimming Lake Ontario surged onto the back patio. Frank’s restaurant was one of many businesses and homes affected in an upstate New York town, where flooding is the most conspicuous example of how a changing climate is having a profound effect on Lake Ontario.

Reclaiming Land for Survival

Gamella Indians of Maranhão reclaim their ancestral lands from the hands of landowners and regenerate Amazonian flora and fauna.

Burning Forest for the Trees

In the name of renewable energy, the British government is subsidizing the clear-cutting of the American Southeast.

India's Depleting Rainforests

Overshadowed by the Rohingya crisis, another event is unfolding along the Indo-Myanmar border. This is the story of fast-depleting rainforests in the world's second most populous country.

Pulitzer Group Reports Dangers of Climate Change

Three journalists from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting shared their experiences with climate control and the effects humans have on it Thursday at the Student Center.

Lesson Plans: Heat of the Moment

These curricular ideas guide students to think critically about the Pulitzer Center's environmental reporting, to consider the cross-disciplinary implications of climate change, and to report on climate change themselves.

Meet Dan Grossman

Daniel Grossman is a radio and web producer, and a print journalist. In his 20 years of experience, he has reported stories from all 7 continents and has been featured on NPR, PRI, BBC, New York Times, The Boston Globe and many other world renown news outlets.
 

Lesson Plans: Water Wars

With this lesson plan, students explore Pulitzer Center reporting on water shortage and access in East Africa and gain perspective by participating in related activities.