Are you concerned about the Earth's future? Are you interested in what is being done in Northern California and the world to address environmental issues? Do you want to act? Then tune in every other Sunday to Sustainability Now! on KSQD.org. SN!! was launched on KSQD in 2019 by Ronnie Lipschutz. The show features interviews with activists, scholars, scientists, authors, philosophers, and others on a range of topics and issues that address the relationships among humans and nature, including life, death, taxes, biodiversity, energy, electricity, climate change, nuclear matters, animal rights, environmental activism, books, articles and many others. If you have a question, we have a podcast for you! SN! is broadcast on KSQD every two weeks, on Sundays, from 5-6 PM. Archives for shows beginning in 2019 are here and other podcast sites. Sustainability Now! is underwritten by the Sustainable Systems Research Foundation in Santa Cruz, California.
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Sustainability Now! on KSQD.org is a science podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 25 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.
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Unknown Host hosts Sustainability Now! on KSQD.org, a science show with 25 episodes published.
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Episode #174
Plutonium Pit Production--The Risks and Costs of US Plans to Build New Nuclear Weapons with Dr. Dylan K. Spaulding of the Union of Concerned Scientists
Aug 16, 202654 min
Nuclear weapons have been with us for 80 years . There are fewer today than was the case at the height of the Cold War, but there are more countries with nukes than ever before. Some heads of state have been, of late, threatening to use them . If you’ve seen Kathryn Bigelow’s recent film, “House of Dynamite,” you’ll know that human psychology is the linchpin on which the entire system of nuclear deterrence rests: would the President (or Premier or whatever) exchange their capitals for others? Trade Washington, DC for Moscow or Beijing? There is reason to be concerned about this question: The United States is planning a $1.7 trillion overhaul of its entire nuclear arsenal, designing new warheads and investing in new bombers, missiles, and submarines to carry them, all in the name of “modernization.” It’s not that the current generations of platforms and warheads won’t work; it’s more that Admirals, Generals and Presidents don’t trust devices put into operation when they were very young and that there is a lot of money and prestige in having the latest generation of gadgets and lording that over the competing services. Oh, and new weapons are “manlier” than the old ones. Join host Ronnie Lipschutz for a conversation with Dr. Dylan K. Spaulding a senior scientist in the Global Security Program of the Union of Concerned Scientists . His work focuses on technical issues related to nuclear stockpile stewardship and policies that can reduce the threat posed by nuclear weapons. He recently authored a UCS report entitled “Plutonium Pit Production--The Risks and Costs of US Plans to Build New Nuclear Weapons.” Its focus is on the stuff that makes warheads go “boom” but along the way, Spaulding covers a lot of other ground and the report is a good primer on nuclear weapons.
Trump’s War on California’s Environment, with Jason Rylander and Hollin Kretzmann from the Center for Biological Diversity
Aug 2, 202654 min
The Trump Administration has declared war on California and is hell-bent on eliminating any and all of the state’s environmental protections. As part of its “drill baby, drill” strategy, it is moving to open the California Coast to oil drilling and to increase exploration and extraction on BLM lands across the state . And not wanting to stay out of the action, the Supreme Court recently ruled that the makers of the herbicide Roundup do not have to warn users of cancer risks associated with its use. But wait, there’s more! The bad news just keeps on coming! Join host Ronnie Lipschutz for conversations on these issues with Jason Rylander and Hollin Kretzmann from the Climate Law Institute at the Center for Biological Diversity.
The San Francisco Bay Area—An Environmental History With David D. Schmidt
Jul 5, 202654 min
Over the past four centuries, the transformation of the Greater San Francisco Bay Region has been extraordinary. What was once a near paradise for a few hundred thousand indigenous First Peoples is now home to nearly 8 million whose accumulated activities since the arrival of Europeans have created an industrialized landscape interspersed with large areas of open space where nature is in recovery. How did this happen? Join host Ronnie Lipschutz for a conversation with David D. Schmidt , who spent two decades writing San Francisco Bay Area—An Environmental History , published by Back Country Press in 2025, and which is this year's winner of the California Book Awards Gold Medal for Contributions to Publishing. The book is a magisterial tome addressing virtually every aspect of SF Bay and its environmental transformation over the past 400 years. And learn how Alfred Hitchcock got the idea for his classic film “The Birds.”
Secret Sounds of Ponds and Other Animal Music with Professor David Rothenberg, NJ Institute of Technology
Jun 21, 20261h 1m
Who knew that ponds make music ? To the eye and ears, they seem silent and tranquil—except at night when, maybe, choruses of frogs serenade listeners. But ponds are much noisier than that: you have to be very quiet and have the right equipment to really hear what’s going on. And there is a lot going on: both the critters and the plants speak out. Indeed, nature is full of sounds, many of them musical and, quite possible, the forerunners of human music. Join host Ronnie Lipschutz for a conversation with Dr. David Rothenberg , scholar, author, musician and composer and Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Music at the New Jersey Institute of Technology whose focus is on animal sounds as music. We talk about his most recent book, Secret Sounds of Ponds , for which Rothenberg tossed a microphone into ponds and heard “an entirely new world, a realm of the unexpected and stirring rhythms and tones of some of the smallest and loudest creatures on Earth.”
Extractive Frontiers: Critical Minerals and Green Capitalism, with Professor Thea Riofrancos, Providence College
May 24, 202654 minS0
<p>The attack on Iran by the United States and Israel demonstrated, among other things, the necessity of a rapid transition to renewable fuels, like solar and wind. The technologies for capturing and converting them into usable form are heavily dependent on critical minerals, such as lithium, cobalt and others. Indeed, critical minerals are driving a new wave of resource nationalism and extraction around the globe, many of them being eyed by President Trump as potential regions of intervention and conquest. What does the gold rush for these minerals portend for world politics and economics? Are we on the brink of...
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