California Wildfires: The Devastating Impact of Climate Change
Release Date: 01/13/2025
Who Decides Offshore Drilling, And Why Coastal Communities Pay the Price
How To Protect The Ocean
Who Decides Offshore Drilling is the central question behind decisions that shape coastlines for decades, yet are often made by people who never have to live with the consequences. This episode breaks down how offshore drilling decisions are made far from the coast, why public input often feels symbolic, and how risk quietly shifts from decision-makers to coastal communities. Offshore oil and gas leasing sounds like a technical process, but the impact is deeply human. Through firsthand voices from across the US, this episode reveals a surprising truth: once an area is leased, the future of...
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Cook Inlet Offshore Oil Drilling: Why Alaskans Are Questioning Another Generation of Fossil Fuels
How To Protect The Ocean
Cook Inlet offshore oil drilling is being pushed forward through new federal lease plans, but the people who live closest to these waters are asking a hard question: who really benefits, and who takes the risk. In this episode, we unpack why Cook Inlet matters so deeply for salmon, beluga whales, and coastal communities, and why offshore drilling decisions made far from Alaska can have permanent local consequences. Alaska offshore oil and gas leasing has shaped the state’s economy, politics, and identity for decades, and that history still influences how people talk about jobs, revenue, and...
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Distant water fishing fleets are stripping the ocean bare and the new high seas treaty may be our last chance
How To Protect The Ocean
Distant water fishing fleets are operating just beyond national borders, pulling massive amounts of squid from the ocean with almost no rules, and this episode asks a simple but urgent question: can the new high seas treaty stop ecological collapse before it is too late? Off the coast of Argentina, hundreds of vessels gather in international waters to exploit a regulatory loophole, threatening a keystone species that supports whales, seabirds, and entire food webs. What happens here does not stay here, it affects global fisheries, biodiversity, and the seafood on our plates. High seas squid...
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Hidden costs of seafood: Why “Sustainable” Tuna Is Being Paid for by Taxpayers
How To Protect The Ocean
Hidden costs of seafood are shaping the global tuna industry in ways most people never see, and this episode asks why it matters for the ocean, workers, and anyone who buys seafood. Hidden costs of seafood raise a simple but uncomfortable question: if an industry cannot survive without public money, can it truly be sustainable, and who is paying the price behind the scenes? Tuna fishing subsidies are at the center of this story. Drawing from new peer-reviewed research, this episode breaks down how fuel tax exemptions and government support keep European tuna fleets operating, even when they...
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This ocean place will help protect the planet, but we need to do something to help it
How To Protect The Ocean
This ocean place will help protect the planet but it is disappearing faster than scientists can track it, and that puts climate goals, food security, and coastal protection at risk. In this episode, we explore why seagrass meadows are one of the most powerful and overlooked ecosystems on Earth, and why failing to measure them properly could undermine global conservation and climate efforts. Seagrass conservation and climate solutions are deeply connected, yet monitoring these underwater meadows has been inconsistent and fragmented around the world. We break down why scientists have struggled...
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Ocean carbon sequestration: The climate solution hiding in seaweed forests
How To Protect The Ocean
Ocean carbon sequestration is failing because we are ignoring one of the ocean’s most powerful climate allies, seaweed forests, and that blind spot could cost us precious time in the fight against climate change. This episode asks a simple but urgent question: how can one of the fastest-growing, most productive ecosystems on Earth still be missing from climate policy? Seaweed blue carbon challenges everything we think we know about how the ocean stores carbon, because kelp forests do not lock carbon in place, they move it. Scientists are now tracking how seaweed captures carbon near the...
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How Scientists Detect Ocean Life From a Single Bottle of Seawater and Why It Could Change Ocean Protection Forever
How To Protect The Ocean
How Scientists Detect Ocean Life is one of the biggest challenges in ocean conservation, because we cannot protect what we cannot see, measure, or even prove exists. How Scientists Detect Ocean Life using environmental DNA asks a powerful question: what if a simple bottle of seawater could reveal more species than divers, cameras, and nets combined, and what does that mean for how we protect the ocean? Environmental DNA ocean monitoring is changing how scientists understand marine biodiversity, especially for rare, shy, or hard-to-detect species. In this episode, you will learn how tiny...
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Human Relationship with the Ocean: Why Losing This Connection Could Cost Us Everything
How To Protect The Ocean
Human Relationship with the Ocean begins with a simple but uncomfortable question: how did humanity become so disconnected from the very system that makes life on Earth possible, and why does that disconnection matter right now? This episode explores how the ocean is treated as a distant resource rather than a living, planetary force, and how that mindset shapes policy, economics, and everyday decisions that quietly accelerate ocean decline. Ocean Literacy is more than knowing facts about marine life, it is about understanding how deeply human survival, culture, and identity are tied to the...
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Gulf Coast communities and oil drilling: Who really pays the price for new offshore leases?
How To Protect The Ocean
Gulf Coast communities and oil drilling are once again at the center of a national decision, and the stakes could not be higher. A new US offshore oil drilling plan proposes expanded lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico, including areas close to Florida that many thought were protected. This episode asks a simple but urgent question: who benefits from these decisions, and who bears the long-term cost when something goes wrong? Gulf of Mexico offshore drilling has a long history of environmental damage, economic disruption, and broken promises. Scott Eustis from Healthy Gulf explains how drilling...
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Should We Be Mining the Ocean Floor, The Hidden Costs No One Is Talking About
How To Protect The Ocean
Should We Be Mining the Ocean Floor is a question that sounds futuristic, but the decisions are being made right now, quietly, and with consequences that could last for centuries. Governments and corporations are moving closer to extracting minerals from the deepest parts of the ocean, even though we barely understand the ecosystems that exist there or how damage might ripple through the planet. Deep-sea mining risks go far beyond technology and minerals. This episode breaks down what deep-sea mining actually is, who is pushing it forward, and why international and US processes are advancing...
info_outlineIn this episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast, host Andrew Lewin discusses the devastating wildfires in Los Angeles, emphasizing the significant role climate change plays in their occurrence and intensity.
Lewin highlights that the wildfires are exacerbated by a phenomenon known as "hydroclimate whiplash," where California experiences extreme fluctuations between wet and dry conditions. In 2023, the state saw record precipitation and lush vegetation growth, but by 2024, drought conditions led to that vegetation drying out, creating ample fuel for wildfires. The situation was further intensified by the Santa Ana winds, which reached speeds of up to 90 miles per hour, allowing fires to spread rapidly and uncontrollably.
The episode underscores that these abrupt climate variations, intensified by global climate change, contribute to the increasing frequency and severity of wildfires. Lewin stresses that ignoring the science behind climate change and the resulting environmental conditions will only lead to more disasters, as seen in both California and Hawaii. He calls for urgent action and the election of decision-makers who acknowledge and are willing to address climate change effectively.
Overall, the episode serves as a somber reminder of the real and devastating impacts of climate change on communities, urging listeners to recognize the urgency of the situation and take action.
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