Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and
Speaker 2: there's Charles w Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there,
Speaker 2: and this is stuff you should know. The is it
Speaker 2: getting hot in here? Is it just me?
Speaker 3: Edition? Uh? Yeah, that's right. Well, you know what we
Speaker 3: can do. We can just migrate to another part of
Speaker 3: the iHeart offices here.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Nice, a nice school studio.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they really do keep them cool, frankly cold.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And that's the last fun we're going to have
Speaker 3: on this episode because this is not so fun.
Speaker 2: That is not true. There's plenty of places for jokes. Okay,
Speaker 2: all right, good do you remember we did one on
Speaker 2: comas and we had jokes, So come on, right, we
Speaker 2: can do this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 2: So we're talking climate migration and it's a really interesting topic.
Speaker 2: This was your idea, actually, and I tip my hat
Speaker 2: to you than you and uh, I'm just joking. I'm
Speaker 2: not I'm not wearing a hat.
Speaker 3: See another joke.
Speaker 2: So the thing that surprised me, So we're climate migration,
Speaker 2: we should just tell people off the bat is where
Speaker 2: people have to move somewhere else because extreme weather, droughts,
Speaker 2: basically anything extreme temperatures, anything that has to do with
Speaker 2: climate change based ruining where they live. That's climate migration
Speaker 2: human wise.
Speaker 3: Yes, like there's an animal climate migration we're not even
Speaker 3: going to talk about.
Speaker 2: No, we did a whole episode on plant migration that
Speaker 2: was due to climate too, So this is yes, that
Speaker 2: was a good catch. This is human specific. And one
Speaker 2: of the things that struck me about this is there's
Speaker 2: a there's not a lot of like solid agreement on
Speaker 2: exactly how bad things are going to be and exactly
Speaker 2: how far people are going to have to move, and
Speaker 2: even a moong the people who do agree, the experts
Speaker 2: who do generally agree on some stuff, there's still like,
Speaker 2: I don't know that this is going to be as
Speaker 2: bad as it's being portrayed, like say in the media.
Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. And you know, we'll get to some
Speaker 3: studies and stats and things. But the stats you got
Speaker 3: to keep in mindor kind of a guess because as
Speaker 3: Libya points out, or maybe we'll just talk about that
Speaker 3: when we get to the stats part.
Speaker 2: Okay, but I just wanted to put I wanted to
Speaker 2: put a lid on the hysteria because, like you said,
Speaker 2: we just don't know yet, and it might not be
Speaker 2: as bad as we think. There might be some pluses.
Speaker 2: There are definitely going to be some minuses, but it's
Speaker 2: something that we're talking about now, and it's decades enough
Speaker 2: into the future that we have time to prepare for it.
Speaker 2: It's kind of like we went from Okay, let's stop
Speaker 2: emitting greenhouse gases to Okay, it's too late for that.
Speaker 2: Now we have to figure out how to deal with
Speaker 2: the repercussions of that. That's where we're at. But we
Speaker 2: have a little bit of time, and if we start
Speaker 2: thinking about and talking about how to do this smartly
Speaker 2: and responsibly without again becoming hysterical and overplanning and overdoing it,
Speaker 2: we could do this right and make it as comfortable
Speaker 2: as possible.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we being specifically the United States because there are
Speaker 3: other parts of the world that are already sort of
Speaker 3: proactive rather than kind of, like you said, being reactive
Speaker 3: and waiting when potential refugees are just sort of at
Speaker 3: the border saying like we have no place to go
Speaker 3: because our have our place almost said habitat. I guess
Speaker 3: humans have a habitat, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, is that true? Yeah, every animal has a habitat.
Speaker 3: Okay, I didn't know if I was being callous by
Speaker 3: considering us all just animals.
Speaker 2: Were you being a speciest?
Speaker 3: Maybe so? But if speaking of the US, you know,
Speaker 3: you do hear a lot of talk about that kind
Speaker 3: of thing, like, oh, people are going to be coming
Speaker 3: into our country. You know, depending on who you talk
Speaker 3: to in this country, some people might welcome them, some
Speaker 3: people might not. But as Livia is very as student
Speaker 3: to point out, generally what we're talking about nowadays, the
Speaker 3: more common thing that you're seeing is people people don't
Speaker 3: want to leave their home, you know, so they'll move
Speaker 3: as kind of close as they can to where they're from,
Speaker 3: rather than say, hey, let's just pick up and go
Speaker 3: to a completely different country where I know nothing about
Speaker 3: it and I don't speak the language. Like what's generally
Speaker 3: happening is if there's a climate issue, like let's say,
Speaker 3: which could look like a lot of things, so we're
Speaker 3: going to talk about a lot of them. It could
Speaker 3: mean I just can't farm here anymore because it's so
Speaker 3: drought prone, or there was a my coastline is disappearing,
Speaker 3: or there was a natural disaster here so I have
Speaker 3: to leave. People want to move close to where they are,
Speaker 3: so they're generally saying, like, all right, I can't be
Speaker 3: out here in the farm area anymore, so let's move
Speaker 3: toward the urban centers. And that's why a lot of
Speaker 3: these urban centers in the global South are popping at
Speaker 3: the seams.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's gonna definitely get more poppy for sure
Speaker 2: as we go. Yeah, but as it stands right now,
Speaker 2: especially say like you can take California for an example,
Speaker 2: they deal with wildfires like that's just a fact of life,
Speaker 2: and it's getting to be a much more frequent fact
Speaker 2: of life. So if you leave your house because there's
Speaker 2: a wildfire in your backyard, you are technically a climate
Speaker 2: migrant right then. But if you go back and rebuild
Speaker 2: or your house didn't end up burning down, you're basically
Speaker 2: following the current pattern of climate migration. You're leaving long
Speaker 2: enough for you to take yourself out of harm's way
Speaker 2: during the disaster the extreme weather event, and then going back.
Speaker 2: But if you do that enough times, some people are
Speaker 2: going to just get tired of that and they're eventually
Speaker 2: not going to go back. And that's kind of like
Speaker 2: how climate migration, at least say in the United States
Speaker 2: right now, is starting to look or starting to starting
Speaker 2: to establish itself, right.
Speaker 3: But the idea is that I guess, if you're moving
Speaker 3: away from where wildfires are more rampant, you're going to
Speaker 3: move to a place probably as close as you can,
Speaker 3: unless you know, in America, if you have like family
Speaker 3: on the other side of the country or something where
Speaker 3: those wildfires generally don't happy, maybe you'll do that. But
Speaker 3: if we're talking about countries, you're probably moving within your country.
Speaker 3: And within your country there is not like, oh, well,
Speaker 3: you know, I'm at a place where the climate problem
Speaker 3: isn't a problem, so it's not solving a bigger problem,
Speaker 3: you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and even more so, like if you're a migrant,
Speaker 2: even within your own country, like you said, say like
Speaker 2: to an urban center or something like that, a lot
Speaker 2: of times when you show up, you might show up
Speaker 2: with all of your neighbors, your entire community, maybe your
Speaker 2: entire region. If the say, like the drought is bad
Speaker 2: enough and the city's not like, hey, we just happen
Speaker 2: to have all this extra free housing for you guys,
Speaker 2: so come on in. Very frequently you'll end up in
Speaker 2: what amounts to a refugee camp. It's a climate refugee cam,
Speaker 2: but it's essentially the same thing as any other refugee camp.
Speaker 2: There's usually not running water, there's not good infrastructure. And
Speaker 2: this is a point that I hadn't thought of, but
Speaker 2: Lvia pointed out, you're maybe even more vulnerable to natural
Speaker 2: disasters now because you live in a tent. No, if
Speaker 2: a sandstorm comes along, you're in trouble because you just
Speaker 2: are in a tent rather than say the house that
Speaker 2: you had to leave because your farm was no longer
Speaker 2: producing crops.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and also you're you're living like perhaps in like
Speaker 3: a shanty town on the outskirts of town, and you're
Speaker 3: going to see increased poverty. That's going to be an
Speaker 3: unstable situation, and then violence comes along oftentimes in these places.
Speaker 3: She found one study from twenty twenty two of Central
Speaker 3: African migrants, five percent reported that they moved specifically for
Speaker 3: environmental reasons, but fifty percent said yeah, but that played
Speaker 3: a part in the decision to leave, Like whether or
Speaker 3: not they're saying, like, no, the drought's too bad here,
Speaker 3: I'm leaving, or some places are just the extreme heat
Speaker 3: is becoming so bad as people just can't live there anymore.
Speaker 3: They're not saying I'm moving just because of that, but
Speaker 3: half of them were saying, like, yeah, that was a
Speaker 3: factor that led to this whole mess.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah. And there's probably the most famous, most well studied,
Speaker 2: recent example of climate migration leading to violent conflict was
Speaker 2: the Syrian Civil War. Yeah, between two thousand and six
Speaker 2: and twenty ten, there was a really really bad drought
Speaker 2: in Syria and the surrounding region and a lot of
Speaker 2: people had to move to the city or cities, and
Speaker 2: they were like a lot of people were displaced and
Speaker 2: they joined people who had already arrived as refugees before
Speaker 2: from Iraq and from Palestine, and so all these people
Speaker 2: are there, the government is basically ignoring them, tending like
Speaker 2: they're not there. Their farms are being lost, they're getting
Speaker 2: zero help from the government, which has become a neoliberal
Speaker 2: under Bashar al Assad, who took over from his father,
Speaker 2: and they start the UNRESK. It's bad enough that a
Speaker 2: civil war starts, like there's a rebel insurgency to topple Asad.
Speaker 2: And it actually ended up working. It didn't at first
Speaker 2: because a sod famously used chemical weapons on his own
Speaker 2: people and he got everything under control, but then they
Speaker 2: made a second push this past I think December, and
Speaker 2: ran them out of the country and actually took over.
Speaker 2: And you could trace that ultimately back to that drought
Speaker 2: that was created largely by climate change. And that's that's nuts.
Speaker 2: Like if you think about it, if that drought had
Speaker 2: never happened, there wouldn't have been a Syrian civil war.
Speaker 2: And that's probably the most extreme version example of climate
Speaker 2: a climate crisis leading to violence, armed conflict. But it's
Speaker 2: not like it doesn't exist, it's not like it doesn't
Speaker 2: happen like that happened.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, over an eight year period from two
Speaker 3: thousand and two to twenty ten, the urban population in
Speaker 3: Syria went from just under nine million people to almost
Speaker 3: fourteen millions. That is a lot of people to add.
Speaker 3: But and this isn't like in full agreement, so this
Speaker 3: is at a counterpoint. But Syria mishandled that. And there
Speaker 3: are other countries in the region that suffered through the
Speaker 3: same drought, specifically Jordan and Lebanon, that had a government
Speaker 3: that was more proactive and responsive, and they had policies
Speaker 3: that were put in place that they didn't have the
Speaker 3: same kind of you know, destructive outcomes that Syria had.
Speaker 3: So it's you know, it all depends on how you're
Speaker 3: handling this situation. We're going to talk a lot about countries,
Speaker 3: you know, people leaving countries, and then especially the receiving countries,
Speaker 3: because that's really where the rubber meets the road.
Speaker 2: For sure. If the rubber hasn't melted by then that's right.
Speaker 3: And if the road is still intact and not cracked
Speaker 3: to pieces, it hasn't buckled.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are actually some estimates all over the place
Speaker 2: about how many climate migrants they're going to be, And
Speaker 2: there was something called the ground Swell Report that the
Speaker 2: World Bank put out in twenty twenty one, and they
Speaker 2: are saying by twenty fifty, two hundred and sixteen million
Speaker 2: people will have moved either to another country or within
Speaker 2: their own country because climate conditions have made where they
Speaker 2: used to live untenable. So we're talking twenty five years,
Speaker 2: not even thirty years anymore, Chuck, We're in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: If my math holds up, that's just twenty five years
Speaker 2: from now. That is a tremendous amount of migration. Some
Speaker 2: people say, no, that's probably going to be more like
Speaker 2: fifty million. But it seems like that World Bank analysis
Speaker 2: is the most commonly cited, although you could also suggest
Speaker 2: it's the most commonly sighted because it's such an eye
Speaker 2: popping number.
Speaker 3: Yeah. True, Well, this is probably a good place since
Speaker 3: I promised to talk about something stat related. One of
Speaker 3: the reasons it's hard or one of the reasons you
Speaker 3: get something like anywhere from fifty to two hundred and
Speaker 3: fifty million people this pretty big swing is because we
Speaker 3: don't know how effective our efforts are going to be
Speaker 3: to curb emissions and to get things, you know, sort
Speaker 3: of on the right track again, how successful we're going
Speaker 3: to be at you know, some wealthier countries doing things
Speaker 3: like sea walls and redistributing water resources and things like that,
Speaker 3: because as you'll see a lot of and we've talked
Speaker 3: about before that you know, the most precious resource in
Speaker 3: the future is love. Is it is love? Oh man,
Speaker 3: I needed that water unfortunately, so you know, there have
Speaker 3: been people that talk about, you know, the wars of
Speaker 3: the future will be fought over water. And as we'll
Speaker 3: see a lot of climate migration happens either because of
Speaker 3: a lack of water or a lack of water that's
Speaker 3: you know, useful for humans, or to too much water,
Speaker 3: and other parts like rising sea waters and such.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. So the World Bank broke it down
Speaker 2: that Sub Saharan Africa is going to see by far
Speaker 2: the most eighty six million, followed by East Asia the
Speaker 2: Pacific at forty nine million, South South Asia forty million,
Speaker 2: North Africa nineteen million, although some people are like, it's
Speaker 2: going to be even more than that for North America
Speaker 2: and parts of the Middle East because it's going to
Speaker 2: get so hot that it will be uninhabitable by humans.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you you met in North Africa, not
Speaker 3: North America.
Speaker 2: That's right, Yes, North Africa in the Middle East, not
Speaker 2: North America in the Middle East.
Speaker 3: I think people who listen to the show know us
Speaker 3: enough now to where we're like old pals and they're like, oh, Josh, Chuck,
Speaker 3: you don't even need to point that out, we know
Speaker 3: what he meant.
Speaker 2: You know what, though, I think I think we should
Speaker 2: introduce a new device up here in the year seventeen.
Speaker 2: Uh huh, whenever I misspeak, just cut me off in
Speaker 2: the middle by doing your egg COLORSPT. Can we try that?
Speaker 2: You ready. Yeah, so it's going to get so hot
Speaker 2: in the Middle East and North America that what did
Speaker 2: I say wrong, Chuck?
Speaker 3: Nothing, I just like doing that.
Speaker 2: So I think we've come up with something new that
Speaker 2: we really need to do.
Speaker 3: All right, Well, how about this, Why don't we take
Speaker 3: a break. You said Latin America was seventeen.
Speaker 2: Million, right, No, I never got there.
Speaker 3: Latin America seventeen million.
Speaker 2: Don't forget Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
Speaker 3: Five million, so you know, not nearly as many as
Speaker 3: the others. But there are again water scarcity, yeah, in
Speaker 3: places like Mongolian Kazakhstan. So now can we take a break.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we can take a break. I think you should
Speaker 2: take us out on your eggs plait sound again?
Speaker 1: All right, we'll be right back sat All right.
Speaker 3: So I kind of teased out the importance of or
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, importanse I often tease here in the South everybody,
Speaker 3: if you haven't noticed by now and you're seventeen, receiving
Speaker 3: communities are very important. How safe these people are going
Speaker 3: to be when they move to this place? Is there?
Speaker 3: And again, A they're still going to be vulnerable to
Speaker 3: the impacts of climate where they go most likely or
Speaker 3: are almost you know, with one hundred percent certainty, but
Speaker 3: just how safe they're going to be period, because we
Speaker 3: talked about sometimes when they set up on the outskirts
Speaker 3: of towns and there's violence, and they're more susceptible by
Speaker 3: being in a shanty or a tent or something to
Speaker 3: just even a hard rain. So it's almost like this,
Speaker 3: it's a vicious cycle that's happening where people are being
Speaker 3: displaced to places that also aren't safe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and we should say that most of this migration,
Speaker 2: and most of the migrants are going to be coming
Speaker 2: from or going moving within what's called the global South.
Speaker 2: And you don't use the equator as the dividing line
Speaker 2: for the global South. For example, Australia and New Zealand
Speaker 2: squarely in the southern hemisphere, but they're not considered global South.
Speaker 2: It's a distinction between the developed and the developing world.
Speaker 2: So you have Latin America, Africa, India's usually included, China
Speaker 2: is included, and Southeast Asia and these countries ironically are
Speaker 2: if you accept China and India, most of these countries
Speaker 2: have put out the least amount of emissions that triggered
Speaker 2: climate change, and yet they're the most vulnerable to climate
Speaker 2: change in large part because they're develop And if you're
Speaker 2: a developing country, you're probably still really reliant on agriculture.
Speaker 2: You're reliant on things like timber and other natural resources,
Speaker 2: and those are the things that are getting impacted first
Speaker 2: right off the bat. And so if your economy is
Speaker 2: based on agriculture and there's a drought that covers your
Speaker 2: entire nation, your economy's in big trouble and your people
Speaker 2: are probably going to have to move.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Here's the thing though, and this isn't like a
Speaker 3: bright side sort of thing. It puts a strain on
Speaker 3: resources when a lot of new people come to a place,
Speaker 3: but they can also be an asset because most of
Speaker 3: those migrants are going to end up performing a lot
Speaker 3: of very important jobs in that area. A lot of
Speaker 3: them work in agriculture, some work in construction, some work
Speaker 3: in childcare. But those same people are also not necessarily
Speaker 3: It depends on the receiving community, even down to that
Speaker 3: community level, and how they're going to take care of
Speaker 3: those people. And what I mean by take care in
Speaker 3: this case is just see that they get a fair
Speaker 3: shot at like earning a wage by performing a job.
Speaker 3: If you face up a lot of potential workplace abuse
Speaker 3: if you're one of those migrants. In the United Arab Emirates,
Speaker 3: as a striking example, eighty eight percent of the population
Speaker 3: there is made up of migrants, mainly from Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh,
Speaker 3: and it's very hot there as well, and so they're
Speaker 3: not taking care of their migrant population of workers, and
Speaker 3: they can just sometimes some companies might be like, you
Speaker 3: know what, we're not going to pay you for that.
Speaker 3: What are you going to do about it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot of examples of modern slavery force
Speaker 2: the labor in the UAE and other countries, very wealthy
Speaker 2: Gulf states, and that is a good example of climate migrants,
Speaker 2: but really any kind of migrant being taken advantage of,
Speaker 2: and it's something that definitely has to be paid attention to.
Speaker 2: On the other hand, there are studies that say, okay,
Speaker 2: this actually might be good, like, yes, we need to
Speaker 2: make sure that the receiving countries are not exploiting the
Speaker 2: climate migrants or any migrants, but the pressure that could
Speaker 2: be relieved from their home country if they're moving to
Speaker 2: more developed or wealthier countries that are more set up
Speaker 2: with infrastructure and social structure to absorb them. That actually
Speaker 2: could be a plus, because all of a sudden, the
Speaker 2: population is not swollen in an urban center where it's
Speaker 2: really hot, and you're around people from an ethnic group
Speaker 2: that your ethnic group has hated for a thousand years.
Speaker 2: Like moving some of these people out to other countries
Speaker 2: could actually be a relief valve that could keep social
Speaker 2: upheaval from happening.
Speaker 3: Yeah, potentially so. Under the United Nations, they have a
Speaker 3: Refugee Convention from nineteen fifty one that specifically defines the
Speaker 3: good thing it does. It defines that refugees are entitled
Speaker 3: to legal rights, entitled to travel, some kinds of support, housing,
Speaker 3: that kind of thing. But the I guess kind of
Speaker 3: the downside of what it did is it very narrowly
Speaker 3: defined what a refugee was in the wake of World
Speaker 3: War Two, which was you have to be fleeing persecution
Speaker 3: on the basis of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or
Speaker 3: group membership, and only if you're fleeing from one border
Speaker 3: to the next. We already mentioned that a lot of
Speaker 3: this is happening within their home country, so they don't
Speaker 3: have any of those un guaranteed rights, but a lot
Speaker 3: of people legal scholars are saying, hey, we need to
Speaker 3: expand that definition to include maybe not necessarily only cross
Speaker 3: border and people who were climate refugees.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like, why not add the sun. You can be
Speaker 2: fleeing the sun and we'll consider you a refugee from
Speaker 2: now on.
Speaker 3: That's me every summer in Atlanta.
Speaker 2: Right, you just go down in your basement right in
Speaker 2: turns tasty. Yeah, so yes, there there are like I
Speaker 2: guess there's structure. There's like global structure that can be
Speaker 2: aplied to climate migrants and climate refugees. It's just that's
Speaker 2: not necessarily happening right now. But it wouldn't take much,
Speaker 2: I think, is what we're saying, right to just kind
Speaker 2: of expand the existing definitions.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, and that's just you know, that's the UN definition.
Speaker 3: There are other places in the world. The Organization of
Speaker 3: African Unity Convention in the Latin America, Cartagena. Is that Cartagena?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know that from Romancing the Stone.
Speaker 3: We just watched that with Ruby last weekend.
Speaker 2: It's such a good movie.
Speaker 3: It holds up and it is if you have a
Speaker 3: kid that's around that age that's into sort of like
Speaker 3: action adventure kind of movies which she is. It's a
Speaker 3: it's a great one. Man. She had a really good
Speaker 3: time and it's not like super inappropriate for an eighties movie.
Speaker 2: That's really surprising. Did you follow up with Jewel of
Speaker 2: the Nile?
Speaker 3: Not yet, but yeah, that'll be coming. It's just Danny DeVito. Man,
Speaker 3: what a national treasure that guy is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he really is a jewel.
Speaker 3: So great, ira Ah, I forgot how much I love
Speaker 3: remains in this done all right? So back to Cartagenia Declaration.
Speaker 3: They have an expanded definition of refugee that is more
Speaker 3: broad than the UN where they say events that are
Speaker 3: seriously disturbing public order, which obviously could include climate events.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the sun can do that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So one of the things that a lot of these
Speaker 2: nations that are going to be most affected are saying
Speaker 2: is like, hey, we appreciate you guys thinking about this,
Speaker 2: but we don't really want to move. So is there
Speaker 2: like a version of this where we can stay and
Speaker 2: you wealthy countries who kind of got us into this
Speaker 2: mess in the first place, can maybe help fund some
Speaker 2: of the mitigation efforts that we're trying to put in place.
Speaker 2: And so far the wealthy countries are like well, I
Speaker 2: can't hear you the connections breaking up, but that may
Speaker 2: change as we get a little further down the road.
Speaker 2: Who knows. But there are some govern ver Mints that
Speaker 2: are like kind of starting to plant because they're like,
Speaker 2: this is not this is not twenty fifty for us.
Speaker 2: This is like twenty thirty that we're having to worry about.
Speaker 2: And in some places it's already started happening. Like Kirabody
Speaker 2: is a Pacific island nations. Yeah, it's thirty two nations,
Speaker 2: about one hundred and thirty thousand people, and at best
Speaker 2: it's just about at sea level. Yeah, and when sea
Speaker 2: level is rising, Kirabody is going under the sea. And
Speaker 2: apparently sea level is rising about four times faster than
Speaker 2: other parts of the world.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the riding's on the wall. They are very sadly,
Speaker 3: for sure.
Speaker 2: So their their government was like, Okay, we have to
Speaker 2: figure out how to move people, and we have to
Speaker 2: figure out how to do it right, And they started
Speaker 2: looking at Fiji.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, and Fiji kind of stepped up and were like, hey,
Speaker 3: we have some underdeveloped plan I guess it was undeveloped
Speaker 3: planned that we can sell you. This is in twenty fourteen,
Speaker 3: and the president at the time of Kirabody was a
Speaker 3: no Tong, Yeah that's right, Yeah, all right, and Tong's
Speaker 3: you know, was all over this, like let's buy this land,
Speaker 3: let's move people like not just you know a few families,
Speaker 3: like let's start moving on mass over there, because you know,
Speaker 3: the writing is on the wall here and these islands
Speaker 3: just aren't going to be around. At some point he
Speaker 3: was calling it migration with dignity. And then in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 3: Tong lost the president to Tanetti Mamau, and this it
Speaker 3: was just you know, sometimes when a new administration comes in, Josh,
Speaker 3: things can shift in radical directions. I don't know if
Speaker 3: you knew that or not.
Speaker 2: I could see Mamau basically running on this platform because
Speaker 2: I'm guessing one hundred and thirty thousand people in a
Speaker 2: thirty two island spread is cure body, like I'm guessing
Speaker 2: moving the entire country to Fiji. It's probably top of
Speaker 2: the mind of the voters there. So I'm guessing that
Speaker 2: Mao Mao or ma Mao ran on a platform against
Speaker 2: moving and was like, no, we're going to figure out
Speaker 2: how to stay here. We're going to build sea walls.
Speaker 2: We're going to cross our fingers, We're going to use
Speaker 2: faerry dust. Who knows what they were running on, but
Speaker 2: they won because people don't want to move if they
Speaker 2: don't have to, If there's a chance of them staying
Speaker 2: where they lived, where their families have lived, they want
Speaker 2: to stay. Typically, that's what people are who study climate
Speaker 2: migrants are finding.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, in that case, it was you know, billions
Speaker 3: of dollars to like physically re engineer these islands and
Speaker 3: build those walls, and they didn't have that kind of dough.
Speaker 3: So China stepped up and said, hey, you got that
Speaker 3: marine protected zone where you don't allow fishing, give us
Speaker 3: those fishing rights. So this is just sort of another
Speaker 3: good example of the domino effect that can happen. All
Speaker 3: of a sudden, you're wrecking that part of the sea
Speaker 3: because it was a protected zone. This no longer protected
Speaker 3: because China said, hey, we'll help you have re engineer
Speaker 3: those islands if you let us fish there. But they
Speaker 3: only ended up giving a fraction of the cost of
Speaker 3: what's needed. I think New Zealand is also stepping up
Speaker 3: right well.
Speaker 2: They tried to. They created a new visa specifically for
Speaker 2: residents of places like Kirabodi who are like, we need
Speaker 2: to get out now. And New Zealand very kindly was like,
Speaker 2: you guys can come live here. We're going to make
Speaker 2: it as easy as possible on you. And the people
Speaker 2: of Kirabody just gave them crickets back. Yeah, in New
Speaker 2: Zealand within six months, like cancel the program because they
Speaker 2: had basically no takers. They did not need this special
Speaker 2: visa because people again don't want to move if there's
Speaker 2: any chance of them not having to move. I get it,
Speaker 2: you know, I totally get it as well for sure.
Speaker 2: And I mean if you if you put yourself in
Speaker 2: that mindset, it suddenly is like, Okay, I kind of
Speaker 2: get why people keep moving back after their house burns
Speaker 2: down from wildfire or it gets blown away by a
Speaker 2: hurricane or it gets like picked up by a tornado.
Speaker 2: That's where you live, and it just hasn't I feel
Speaker 2: like it just hasn't got quite frequent enough for people,
Speaker 2: at least, let's say in the United States. It's my
Speaker 2: frame of reference to just be like, Okay, this is
Speaker 2: not going to change. This it's going to keep getting worse.
Speaker 2: We need to we need to leave.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I think people are two minds here,
Speaker 3: and it seems like there are way more people that
Speaker 3: are are so attached to their home they don't want
Speaker 3: to leave it, but they're you know, I've heard just
Speaker 3: anecdotally stories of people They're like, I'm getting the heck
Speaker 3: out of California, or I'm getting the heck out of
Speaker 3: a hurricane you know, prone area like the you know,
Speaker 3: if you live around the Gulf of Mexico or something
Speaker 3: like that, in those panhandily areas, or in like Houston
Speaker 3: or Miami. You know, we're getting out of dodge. So
Speaker 3: some people are doing that, but it definitely doesn't seem like,
Speaker 3: you know, people are taking it seriously enough yet.
Speaker 2: What's nuts, though, is if you go to Miami today,
Speaker 2: their skyline is covered with construction cranes. They cannot build
Speaker 2: skyscrapers for housing fast enough because so many people are
Speaker 2: still moving to Miami. And I say we take a
Speaker 2: break and come back and talk about what's going to
Speaker 2: happen to cities in the US as far as climate
Speaker 2: migration is concerned. Okay, Chuck, So I name checked Miami
Speaker 2: before the break, and that is a really good example
Speaker 2: of a city that is kind of up in the
Speaker 2: air for how much climate migration is going to affect it.
Speaker 2: Is it going to get so bad there that they're
Speaker 2: just gonna have to abandon Miami and it'll look like
Speaker 2: a reverse the day after tomorrow, but with heat and
Speaker 2: seawater rather than everything being frozen, which, by.
Speaker 3: The way, I saw that the other day for the
Speaker 3: first time.
Speaker 2: No, it's actually one of my favorite movies, it turns out,
Speaker 2: because every single time it's on, I will just sit
Speaker 2: there and watch it.
Speaker 3: Oh did I see that? I think I might have
Speaker 3: seen that all the way through back when it came out,
Speaker 3: but that was it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I hesitate to use the word good because it's great,
Speaker 2: but it's yeah, I just like it. It's one of those. Really.
Speaker 2: It's like Zodiac. I can watch Zodiac anytime it comes on,
Speaker 2: Like I might not search it out, but I'll just
Speaker 2: sit there and watch it if it's you know, presented
Speaker 2: to me somehow.
Speaker 3: No, I'm the same way. There's something about Zodiac that
Speaker 3: is just endlessly watchable to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. But the day after tomorrow's like that
Speaker 2: for me.
Speaker 3: Okay, well you know what, I should check it out again. Oh,
Speaker 3: and I think I have a good reason to coming
Speaker 3: up canted.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's actually what triggered that idea. Yeah, okay, you
Speaker 2: and me just talking about something that only you and
Speaker 2: I know about.
Speaker 3: I know, you know. I have a couple of stats
Speaker 3: as far as the United States goes. This is at
Speaker 3: this point already here in twenty twenty five, two or
Speaker 3: three million Americans leave their homes every year, every single year,
Speaker 3: two to three million due to natural disasters that happened floods, earthquakes, fires, hurricanes,
Speaker 3: all the stuff that happens here. I don't you know
Speaker 3: the volcanoes.
Speaker 2: That's not the one, that's not the ones. Well there's
Speaker 2: Mount Saint Helens that was a big deal.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, true, But generally in the lower forty
Speaker 3: eight we don't have volcanoes.
Speaker 2: Right, So that two to three million number, those are
Speaker 2: people who move permanently, right. That's not just people who
Speaker 2: like leave and then come back.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, those are most of those people do return.
Speaker 3: But over the past couple of decades, about three million
Speaker 3: people have moved just to avoid flooding, which is a
Speaker 3: long period of time. But those are people that are
Speaker 3: just like, yeah, it just this place floods. I mean,
Speaker 3: I remember after Katrina. I feel like Atlanta got a
Speaker 3: pretty decent amount of displaced New Orleans residents that stayed here.
Speaker 3: I have evidence by going to Falcons.
Speaker 2: Games, right, So did Houston too.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's a great example of that kind of
Speaker 2: thing happening. And like, I'm sure a lot of them
Speaker 2: went back when it was clear that New Orleans was
Speaker 2: going to be rebuilt and revitalized and get back to normal,
Speaker 2: but a lot of them stayed. I'm sure a lot
Speaker 2: of them are, Like, things don't flood quite as much
Speaker 2: here in Atlanta, so I'm gonna just kind of stay here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in Atlanta. I mean, New Orleans is certainly such
Speaker 3: a singular unique city in America culturally, like maybe more
Speaker 3: so than almost any city I've been to. So Atlanta
Speaker 3: is not that, but it's another big city in the
Speaker 3: South that I think is at least relatable to somebody
Speaker 3: from New Orleans in some ways.
Speaker 2: For sure. Yeah, there's like ninety eight percent less brass
Speaker 2: bands marching around, but you know, there's still a certain
Speaker 2: amount of like Southern affinity between the two cities.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, for like big cities.
Speaker 2: So sea level rise is going to affect the US,
Speaker 2: but I didn't know this. There's like, you know, they
Speaker 2: talk about sea level rise, you know, being zero point
Speaker 2: one millimeter a year or something like that, or they're
Speaker 2: predicting that's the global average. Sea level rises in different
Speaker 2: places at different rates, and it can be so local
Speaker 2: that apparently the eastern seaboard of the United States is
Speaker 2: that sea level is rising faster than the West coast.
Speaker 2: It can be that local. And the reason why is
Speaker 2: there's something called post glacial rebound where the top part
Speaker 2: of the Eastern Seaboard, like New York, all that area
Speaker 2: was pressed down by a glacier, and after the glacier
Speaker 2: retreated ten thousand or so years ago, that part of
Speaker 2: the land is still moving up. It's coming back, it's rebounding,
Speaker 2: but at the same time that's kind of pushing down
Speaker 2: like a seesaw the southern part of the Eastern seaboard.
Speaker 2: So that's actually the sea levels are rising faster there
Speaker 2: than even in the northern part of the Eastern Seaboard.
Speaker 3: It's crazy, yeah, and you know that's just sea level rise.
Speaker 3: And this isn't a AM reticent to do episodes sometimes
Speaker 3: where we're just like, you know, slinging fear and statistics, right,
Speaker 3: but it's sort of the reality right now. Wild fire
Speaker 3: threat has just gotten worse, especially if you're talking about
Speaker 3: Nevada and Oregon, places that maybe didn't see the most
Speaker 3: wildfire in the past. And it's not just Miami as
Speaker 3: far as sea level rise, like New York and Boston.
Speaker 3: I mean, New York has seen flooding in you know,
Speaker 3: the not too distant past, where we never used to
Speaker 3: see things like that happening there.
Speaker 2: I saw that some of the communities, the houses along
Speaker 2: Jamaica Bay, which I guess is Queens, right, Yeah, they
Speaker 2: flood every time there's a high tide, there's a full moon,
Speaker 2: like real blood. Their entire basement just totally flooded, and
Speaker 2: it's starting to happen every single time there's a full
Speaker 2: moon at high tide. So yeah, I was reading like
Speaker 2: they're on the forefront of talking about climate migration in
Speaker 2: the US.
Speaker 3: Well. The other thing too, that we've mentioned earlier, we
Speaker 3: haven't talked so much since then, is this not necessarily
Speaker 3: a climate event or some natural disaster either to cause
Speaker 3: climate migration. It's like farmers, if they can't farm there
Speaker 3: anymore and their livelihood is gone, they might move and
Speaker 3: across the south and Southwest, especially in Texas, the projections
Speaker 3: for corn and soy are just falling, falling, falling, So
Speaker 3: you're going to be able to grow that easier in
Speaker 3: other parts of the country. So that's a bit of
Speaker 3: a silver lining is things you know, change and shift,
Speaker 3: but those are going to eventually be climate migrants, those
Speaker 3: farmers there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so it seems like the projection that twenty
Speaker 2: fifty twenty seventy, the current climate that spreads across the
Speaker 2: United States is going to shift northward by a few states,
Speaker 2: and those states that are currently hot right now but
Speaker 2: still you know, kind of nice, like Florida coastal Georgia,
Speaker 2: they're going to potentially become uninhabitable just because it's going
Speaker 2: to be so hot. So it turns out I was
Speaker 2: right about the Middle East and North America becoming so
Speaker 2: hot that it can be uninhabitable. And apparently that's due
Speaker 2: to what's called the wet bulb temperature, which is a
Speaker 2: mind boggling formula that barely anyone on the Internet can explain.
Speaker 2: And I can't throw sling arrows because I can't really
Speaker 2: explain it either. But essentially it's the temperature where your
Speaker 2: body will no longer be able to cool itself, and
Speaker 2: so being outside in the sun just standing there is
Speaker 2: actually life threatening. They're saying that it's going to become
Speaker 2: the norm for say, like Florida and so in Georgia
Speaker 2: to hit those temperatures, and so the people are just
Speaker 2: gonna have to move because you wouldn't be able to
Speaker 2: leave your house and even go outside.
Speaker 3: Do you remember when we were tasked with doing a
Speaker 3: panel at a podcast movement that's the name of the
Speaker 3: industry conference, I guess, yeah con Yeah, but it's like
Speaker 3: an industry conference. And we were supposed to speak in
Speaker 3: like ten minutes on stage and someone and a fire
Speaker 3: alarm or something went out. Oh yeah, and they made
Speaker 3: us go outside. And it was two minutes in the
Speaker 3: Orlando summer heat after it had stopped raining when it
Speaker 3: was afternoon. Florida rains right everywhere on elsewhere on Earth.
Speaker 3: That cools things down, but it makes things hotter in
Speaker 3: central Florida. Yeah, and we went outside and had to
Speaker 3: stand out there for like twenty minutes before they let
Speaker 3: us back in. And dude, I'm a hot, sweaty person anyway,
Speaker 3: I have never sweated that much that fast in my life. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I was dying and they were like, all right, back
Speaker 3: in everybody and hop on stage right.
Speaker 2: I remember that I was pretty sweaty too.
Speaker 3: Oh man, I was in bad shape. It was not good.
Speaker 2: Just wait till twenty seventy pounds.
Speaker 3: I now you just melt podcast movement twenty seventy.
Speaker 2: Right right here we are. So the US is actually
Speaker 2: a good example of people not freaking out. Some people
Speaker 2: freaking out, but it seems mostly like it's the media
Speaker 2: just kind of poking and goosing everybody that Among scholars
Speaker 2: who study this, they're not particularly freaked out. They're like, yes,
Speaker 2: some people are going to have to move. Yes, it's
Speaker 2: going to really start to pick up eventually, but there
Speaker 2: will also be mitigation efforts that we can do. Like
Speaker 2: we're Miami's just too valuable to just go away, So
Speaker 2: they're going to figure out how to build sea walls,
Speaker 2: protect Miami and make sure that it's aquafer doesn't get
Speaker 2: salinated in ruin. Like the people will just pump money
Speaker 2: into Miami, the US government will, Florida will. But if
Speaker 2: you go like a little north, you know who's to
Speaker 2: say that Delray Beach or Vero Beach is going to
Speaker 2: be around still at that time. Right, cities will be protected,
Speaker 2: but the smaller towns in between the major cities on
Speaker 2: the coast, there's not going to be any money for them,
Speaker 2: So those people are going to have to move.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I mean that kind of puts things squarely
Speaker 3: in the middle of the policy debates we're hearing more
Speaker 3: and more, which is how much do we put into
Speaker 3: places that we think are increasingly unlivable in the future.
Speaker 3: This is something I did not know. I'm glad Livia
Speaker 3: dug this up. But FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency,
Speaker 3: has been buying up properties that are prone to this,
Speaker 3: that are just flooding time and time again, and they're
Speaker 3: turning this land into wetland and trying to do something
Speaker 3: about it. And you know, there are various states that
Speaker 3: are saying, like, hey, you know, it's getting harder and
Speaker 3: harder to get your house insured against fire. We used
Speaker 3: to subsidize these insurance companies. Now we're not doing that.
Speaker 3: I have friends in California, like, if you buy a
Speaker 3: house in certain parts of California, so sometimes you cannot
Speaker 3: even get insurance anymore.
Speaker 2: Right. The same is true in parts of Florida too.
Speaker 2: It's really becoming a big problem to even get insurance rather,
Speaker 2: let alone like being able to afford an insurance policy.
Speaker 2: And as that happens, as it becomes more and more
Speaker 2: apparent that if you move to Florida or you move
Speaker 2: to California, there's this huge additional expense or potentially you
Speaker 2: might not be able to have home insurance. Like that's
Speaker 2: going to affect those markets, and that in and of
Speaker 2: itself is going to keep people from migrating there. And
Speaker 2: it's going to also that's what will trigger mass migrations
Speaker 2: from Florida from California because people are going to start
Speaker 2: panicking about their real estate values just plummeting. Yeah, a
Speaker 2: lot of people will get out.
Speaker 3: People of me, we'll get out.
Speaker 2: Yes, And that's a really important point. It doesn't matter
Speaker 2: what country you're talking about, whether it's Global North, global South,
Speaker 2: doesn't matter. The ability to migrate is typically something reserved
Speaker 2: for the more well.
Speaker 3: Off groups or to migrate successfully.
Speaker 2: Right, Okay, great, The poorest, the most vulnerable people in
Speaker 2: no matter whatever country you're talking about, those are the
Speaker 2: ones who are at the greatest risk of just getting
Speaker 2: left behind. They don't have the money to move. They don't.
Speaker 2: They can't sell their house now because no one wants
Speaker 2: to buy it because it's basically valueless, and they're stuck
Speaker 2: in this place that everyone else who could migrated out of.
Speaker 2: That is going to be a really big thing to
Speaker 2: watch for. Those people are going to need help. They're
Speaker 2: human beings. They didn't ask for this, That's just how
Speaker 2: the dice landed. So they deserve to be helped again,
Speaker 2: just because they're humans, just because they're Americans, just because
Speaker 2: they're Zimbabweans, it doesn't matter. That's going to be something
Speaker 2: to really pay attention to down the road.
Speaker 3: Boy, what kind of world would we be in, my friend,
Speaker 3: if the qualification for aid to others was fellow human
Speaker 3: and not drawn by boundaries and ideologies.
Speaker 2: I hope that that's I mean, my hope is that
Speaker 2: someday we'll hit that point. I don't know if we'll
Speaker 2: still be alive or not, but I do hope that.
Speaker 2: I do think people will get there if we survive
Speaker 2: as species.
Speaker 3: I mean, plenty of great organizations have been doing that
Speaker 3: since the jump, but I'm talking about major governments in
Speaker 3: the world looking at other humans as you know, other humans.
Speaker 2: Or even societies too, you know, I mean, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean that's just everywhere in the world, there's so
Speaker 2: many pockets of just conflict and issues and hatred of
Speaker 2: people for ultimately like arbitrary reasons. The idea of yeah,
Speaker 2: getting to that point, Chuck, it's just it's titillating to me.
Speaker 2: I'm titillated right now. I think that's it for now. Huh,
Speaker 2: it's got to be Well, we'll revisit this in twenty fifty.
Speaker 2: All right, all right, Well, since Chuck agreed to revisiting
Speaker 2: this episode in twenty fifty, everybody, that means it's time
Speaker 2: for a listener mail.
Speaker 3: Follow up from a backyard chicken farmer or about egg colors. Hey,
Speaker 3: I've listened to you goofballs for years. So much love
Speaker 3: to you and your gang. Yes, please support your local
Speaker 3: farmers with their truly humanly raised eggs, costing in many
Speaker 3: cases lessen store bought. Like Chuck said, you're getting an
Speaker 3: amazing deal for higher quality eggs. Number two, guys. The
Speaker 3: waxy coating is called a bloom. It's a naturally produced
Speaker 3: coating which is not hard or thick, that is placed
Speaker 3: as a part of the laying process to protect the
Speaker 3: egg contents from bacteria. I believe Josh said.
Speaker 2: That comes off easily with just a little bit of dawn.
Speaker 3: Th'e Please do not use dish soap to wash your eggs.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, while eggshells are strong, they're not inpermeable. Eggs
Speaker 3: need to be washed with just water or water and
Speaker 3: an egg safe cleaner at a temperature about twenty degrees higher, right,
Speaker 3: but no more than that, because you can cook the
Speaker 3: egg on the inside.
Speaker 2: Oh that makes sense.
Speaker 3: Twenty degrees higher than the temperature of the egg interior.
Speaker 3: Washing an egg at too high will potentially cook it.
Speaker 3: Wash it a temperature lower than the shell contents, and
Speaker 3: the permeable nature of the shell will actually absorb the
Speaker 3: exterior contents. So you're eating whatever soap that you are using.
Speaker 2: Well, not dawn, it says on the label Eggs Safe Cleaner.
Speaker 3: This knowledge is gained from keeping my own backyard flock
Speaker 3: for over a decade, and that is from the wonderful Meg.
Speaker 2: Thanks a lot, Meg, that was a top notch email.
Speaker 2: We appreciate it, and thank you for saving everybody who's
Speaker 2: about to wash their eggs with dish soap. Under my suggestion,
Speaker 2: if you want to be like Meg and get in
Speaker 2: touch with this and be like, oh no, no, no, here's
Speaker 2: what you really should do. We love those kind of emails.
Speaker 2: You can send it off to stuff Podcasts at iHeartRadio
Speaker 2: dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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