How should we navigate a world in which anxieties about AI, climate change and capitalism collide? This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi speaks with Helen Phillips, author of Hum and the second-ever winner of the Climate Fiction Prize. Rathi asks Phillips how she’s transformed her anxieties into captivating prose, how her relationship to technology has changed through writing and what humanity loses out on if we rely on AI too much.

Past episodes of Zero’s Imagine series:

• Abi Dare on finding the best climate stories 
• Julia Wolfe on How Music can Inspire Climate Action
• George Saunders on Climate Guilt, AI and Critical Thinking
• Kim Stanley Robison on Abundance, Adequacy and Better Climate Futures
• Artist Monira Al Qadiri on the End of Oil

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Summer Maxwell, Sommer Saadi, Alyssa McDonald and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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On a windswept cliff at the edge of Tasmania, scientists are quietly tracking the future of our planet. This week, host Rebecca Jones speaks with David Stringer, managing editor of climate and ESG news in Asia, about Kennaook/Cape Grim — home to some of the cleanest air on Earth and one of the world’s most important climate monitoring stations.

Learn how decades of data are reshaping our understanding of climate change, why the site matters to governments and investors, and what Australia’s role could be in the global climate fight.

Read more:

• Listen to our episode with Dale Vince about how the UK can lower energy bills
• Sign up to the Bloomberg Australia podcast

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Andy Burnham has become the UK’s sixth prime minister in just 10 years. When it comes to energy and climate, Labour Party’s Burnham will inherit many of the same challenges of his predecessors: high energy prices, security of supply and an increasingly polarized debate over the UK’s ambitions to reach net zero. This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi sits down with Dale Vince, founder of Ecotricity and major donor to Labour, to ask can a new UK government make energy cheap?

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Summer Maxwell, Sommer Saadi, Alyssa McDonald and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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Hundreds of millions of people around the world have no access to reliable electricity, a problem that doesn’t seem to be going away. Since US President Donald Trump started his second term, Western countries have cut development funding, including for climate projects. This week on Zero, Bloomberg’s Akshat Rathi asks Philippe Valahu, chief executive officer of Private Infrastructure Development Group, why it is still so hard to secure climate finance for developing countries.

Explore further:

• Zero: How the Financial System Can Work for Climate - Bloomberg
• Zero: Ethiopia's Extraordinary Electric Car Boom - Bloomberg
• Bloomberg Green’s extreme heat series

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Summer Maxwell, Sommer Saadi, Alyssa McDonald and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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The great famine of the 1870s killed 50 million people – and El Niño was a key driver. Another El Niño phase has just begun and it’s expected to be among the strongest. There are five times as many people in 2026 as there were in the 1870s and the planet is 1.4C hotter. So are we better prepared? Bloomberg’s Akshat Rathi speaks with Mingfang Ting, professor of climate at Columbia University, about the natural phenomenon and its interaction with human-caused climate change.

Read more:

• Bloomberg Green's deep dive on extreme heat

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Alyssa MacDonald and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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From hydration breaks at this year’s FIFA World Cup to the Tokyo Olympics moving its marathon 1,000km northward, climate change is affecting sport. And sport is affecting climate, as events grow in size and carbon emissions. To talk about the future of sport on an overheating planet, this week on Zero, Akshat Rathi is joined by Jessica Murfree, professor at the University of North Carolina, who studies the intersection of sport and climate change.

Read more:

• David Pocock on Zero: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/zero-the-climate-race/id1621556928?i=1000582465514
• Climate Activists Say Big Oil Is Taking Cycling Fans for a Ride - Bloomberg

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Alyssa MacDonald, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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The common narrative is that the US renewables industry is struggling. But that’s not the case for the whole sector. This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi talks with Kevin Smith, chief executive officer of Cypress Creek Energy, which recently secured $3.5 billion in financing to build one of the biggest solar and battery projects in the US. Even as the current American administration dismantles clean-energy policies, Smith sees a bright future for solar and batteries.

Explore further:

• Big US Solar and Battery Project Lines Up $3.5 Billion Financing - Bloomberg
• Biggest US Wind Project Nears Completion With SunZia Wind Farm in New Mexico - Bloomberg
• Trump Erases Another $765 Million in Offshore Wind Leases - Bloomberg

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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The key to tackling climate change is moving away from burning fossil fuels to using renewable energy. But in his book More and More and More, French historian Jean-Baptiste Fressoz argues that the world has never actually managed a successful energy transition before and current plans are unrealistic. Many have taken his writing to mean that stopping global warming is impossible, however, he tells Akshat Rathi this week on Zero, his view is actually quite different.

Explore further:

• Jean-Baptiste’s book, More and More and More: https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/306358/jean-baptiste-fressoz

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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Ben & Jerry’s isn’t just known for ice cream, but also its support for social causes. With over $1 billion in sales last year, it’s an asset for its owner Magnum. So why has one of its founders quit, and the other launched a campaign to make Ben & Jerry's independent? Bloomberg’s Akshat Rathi sits down with co-founder Ben Cohen to ask about the Free Ben & Jerry’s campaign, why businesses should pursue social causes, and the future of ice cream on a warming planet.

Explore further:

• The Free Ben & Jerry’s campaign website: https://freebenandjerrys.com/
• Watch this video on YouTube 

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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It's been more than three months since the US attacked Iran, leading to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz that carries 20% of the world's oil and gas. The shock to energy markets has been so intense that some countries are taking longer-term measures to cope. This week on Zero, Akshat Rathi and Peter Guest explore the history of policy responses to energy shocks and what’s different in the 2020s.

• Read Akshat's feature article here: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2026-energy-transition-iran-war

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Mohsis Andam, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

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At COP28 in December 2023, the world committed to transitioning away from fossil fuels. Yet in the years since, there’s been little progress. A meeting in Colombia last month hoped to change that, gathering ministers and climate envoys from 57 countries to try and chart a path to end the use of fossil fuels. This week on Zero, Tzeporah Berman, chair of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, tells Akshat Rathi what the conference achieved and where it goes next. 

Explore further:

• Fossil Fuel Treaty Initiative website
• First Conference on the Transition Away from Fossil Fuels
• Countries Draw Up Next Steps to Decarbonize at Colombia Fossil-Fuel Summit
• Climate Negotiators Meet in Santa Marta to Discuss Fossil Fuel Transition - Bloomberg

Zero is a production of Bloomberg Green. Our producer is Oscar Boyd. Special thanks to Sommer Saadi, Sharon Chen and Laura Millan. Thoughts or suggestions? Email us at [email protected]. For more coverage of climate change and solutions, visit https://www.bloomberg.com/green.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.