The Adaptors

Grist reporter Amelia Urry visits an Australian lab, where scientists are trying to grow coral that can survive in the future. And a farewell from Flora and Katherine.  

Outside of Taos, NM, you'll find a community of people living in off-grid homes made of garbage. We visited them.

Michael Reynolds builds off-grid homes out of garbage. Meet the Earthship.

Wild yaks live on the roof of the world, a frosty high-elevation plateau north of the Himalayas. Conservation biologist Joel Berger, of the University of Montana and the Wildlife Conservation Society, wanted to find out how climate change might affect yaks, so he paid them a visit. 

Reporter Ryan Bradley follows up on his quest to buy water.

When you hear "renewable energy," you think solar and wind. But what about spores? Columbia University's Ozgur Sahin explains.

What do Algerian monks have to do with 400 parts per million? Reporter Jeff Delviscio investigates how we measure CO2 in the atmosphere.

Dogs evolved in response to environmental changes tens of millions of years ago. Can that tell us anything about how animals might adapt to climate change today?

Jeremy and Charlie, 11 year old students, are worried about climate change. They say it's because their generation will be the one to bear the brunt of its effects.

Historian James Fleming talks about the surprising history of weather control and what past failures can tell us about today's geoengineering proposals.

When exposed to high temperatures, Australian Central Bearded Dragons do something strange.

Ethicist Travis Rieder thinks that it's time we talked about population.

On the International Space Station, sewage, condensation and even sweat get recycled into potable water. We have the technology to recycle water on Earth, too, but we don't use it as often as we could -- mostly because we think it's gross.

Lichens are under threat from climate and habitat changes. Should we care?

We interviewed New York City rats to get their thoughts on climate change and whether humans will be able to adapt.

If humans were to go extinct, what would the planet look like? One paleobiologist says the creatures most likely to take our place are rats.

Reporter Ryan Bradley lives in California. Given the drought, he figured it'd be a good idea to buy some water rights. It was more complicated than he thought.

We asked for your stories of climate shame. You delivered.

Wild yaks live on the roof of the world, a frosty high-elevation plateau north of the Himalayas. Biologist Joel Berger wanted to find out how climate change might affect yaks, so he paid them a visit. 

Why did a young Romanian inventor build an eco-friendly car made out of half a million LEGO pieces that runs on compressed air? Well, why not?

We can imagine the deep past: full of mammoths and dinosaurs and climates very different from our own. But how are we supposed to imagine the future?

In a fusion world, we'd generate unlimited clean energy from mini suns that we build all over Earth. Sound like a fairytale? Scientists at Princeton Plasma Physics Lab say we can get there -- if we can pay for it.

How far would you go for climate change? NYU philosopher Matthew Liao has an outside-the-box proposal: Decrease energy use by engineering humans to have meat allergies, fur, and yes, cat eyes.

Is there something you feel like you should be doing, or not doing, for the environment? If so, you're not alone.

New York City is poised to become the country's largest producer of an unexpected type of green energy. This fuel source you can make yourself - and you certainly do. Anthony Fiore, director of the NYCDEP Office of Energy, explains how NYC's Newtown Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant is turning sewage and food scraps into "black gold."

What if you had an idea that you believed could change the world? What if that idea was a tornado machine?

Retired engineer Louis Michaud believes he has an idea that could solve the world's energy problems: A tornado machine. For 50 years, Michaud has been working on an "Atmospheric Vortex Engine" -- a device that he hopes someday will generate mile-high tornadoes from warm air heated by the sun or waste heat from power plants. The updraft would turn turbines and produce power. Lots of power, he believes. All he has to do is prove it.

Meet the adaptors: the visionaries, the scientists, the entrepreneurs, the backyard tinkerers who are responding to the challenges presented by climate change. We'll introduce to them, one story at a time. We'll bring you a new podcast every two weeks. We make videos, too. Host Flora Lichtman and producer Katherine Wells set the stage.