WEBVTT - Will the LA fires unleash a wave of climate migrants? 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:12.640 Welcome to zero. I am Akshatrati. This week climate migrants. 0:00:19.640 --> 0:00:23.200 As the fires in Los Angeles continue to burn, displaced 0:00:23.239 --> 0:00:25.560 residents are trying to pick up the pieces of their 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:30.320 lives in an evacuations shelter in Westwood, Bloomberg reporter Michelle 0:00:30.400 --> 0:00:33.000 Ma spoke with a seventy two year old man named 0:00:33.320 --> 0:00:34.360 Paul letter. 0:00:34.720 --> 0:00:37.880 Where and can I ask where you live? Well? 0:00:38.479 --> 0:00:39.760 I used to live in the Palaceades. 0:00:40.040 --> 0:00:40.400 Okay? 0:00:40.479 --> 0:00:41.960 And do you know what the state of. 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:44.280 Your home is? Ninety nine percent. 0:00:45.800 --> 0:00:47.560 Correct? I'm so sorry. 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:51.800 I mean they called it a war zone, app apocalyptic, 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:56.480 it's you've seen the pictures. It's it's unbelievable. And when 0:00:56.520 --> 0:00:57.080 did you leave? 0:00:57.960 --> 0:01:00.000 Paul had just enough time to grab his two cats, 0:01:00.240 --> 0:01:04.039 a few sentimental items before he left, but not much else. 0:01:04.120 --> 0:01:07.520 I and two jackets, my jacket my father used to 0:01:07.760 --> 0:01:12.720 wear a sports jacket and a fifty year old leather 0:01:12.800 --> 0:01:14.800 jacket that I get complimented on. 0:01:15.200 --> 0:01:18.920 Where will he go next? He does not know. Each year, 0:01:19.040 --> 0:01:21.520 the number of people making decisions like the ones he's 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:25.559 facing grows. In the US alone, a Census Bureau survey 0:01:25.600 --> 0:01:28.800 found that at least a million people were displaced by 0:01:28.800 --> 0:01:33.840 climate catastrophes in twenty twenty two, and the International Organization 0:01:33.920 --> 0:01:37.000 for Migration estimates that there might be as many as 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:41.000 a billion environmental migrants around the world within the next 0:01:41.040 --> 0:01:44.200 thirty years. It's something Gaya Vince has written about in 0:01:44.240 --> 0:01:47.680 two superb books. In her twenty fourteen book Adventures in 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:51.040 the Anthroposcene, she traveled the world to document what people 0:01:51.280 --> 0:01:55.000 in places like Nepal and Bolivia are doing to deal 0:01:55.040 --> 0:01:58.120 with a warming climate, and then in her twenty twenty 0:01:58.120 --> 0:02:02.680 book No Matt Century, that thesis forward by talking about 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:06.400 places where people cannot adapt and will need to move 0:02:07.520 --> 0:02:09.519 as these fires rage on. I wanted to talk to 0:02:09.600 --> 0:02:11.960 her about what it will take for us to adjust 0:02:11.960 --> 0:02:13.240 to this new reality. 0:02:13.680 --> 0:02:17.000 This is just more evidence that we are now living 0:02:17.040 --> 0:02:19.080 in a different world. We're living in the post climate 0:02:19.160 --> 0:02:19.760 change world. 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:22.880 Gaya, as you'll hear, thinks about global solutions to these 0:02:22.960 --> 0:02:26.560 kinds of problems, but local solutions are needed to The 0:02:26.600 --> 0:02:29.919 geography and politics of the Los Angeles area poses its 0:02:29.960 --> 0:02:33.079 own challenges. So I also spoke with climate reporter Jake 0:02:33.120 --> 0:02:36.519 Bittle about what California's government is doing when it comes 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:39.360 to the challenges of rebuilding. He's a staff writer for 0:02:39.440 --> 0:02:42.880 Christ and the author of The Great Displacement about migration 0:02:43.080 --> 0:03:01.400 in the uas Cheke, Welcome to the show. 0:03:02.120 --> 0:03:02.919 Thanks for having me. 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:06.480 We're speaking as fires continue to burn in Los Angeles, 0:03:07.040 --> 0:03:10.000 and one of the many questions that is on a 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:15.480 lot of people's mind is what happens after the disaster, 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:19.760 what gets rebuilt and what is not going to be built. 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.200 And you had a very interesting thread on X about 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:28.000 the economics of which neighborhoods get built after a fire 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:31.880 and why they might sometimes be surprising. So, given what 0:03:31.919 --> 0:03:34.320 we know of LA right now, how do you think 0:03:34.400 --> 0:03:35.000 this plays out. 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:38.640 Yeah, it's difficult to tell for sure, because you know, 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:42.360 the housing market that burned, you know, in the Palisades 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:45.720 fire especially, is just one of the most valuable and 0:03:45.880 --> 0:03:49.720 desirable in the world arguably. But I think that what 0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:52.840 we've seen in the past in California is that some 0:03:52.880 --> 0:03:57.400 of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the most complex terrain, not 0:03:57.440 --> 0:04:00.480 only do they tend to be under insured because they're 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:04.000 so high value. Also, you know, the permitting and construction 0:04:04.120 --> 0:04:07.160 process can be really difficult and take a really long 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:11.120 time because you're building just on really really difficult ground. Right, Like, 0:04:11.160 --> 0:04:14.320 there's really steep slopes. Developing those canyons is really hard 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:16.560 to begin with, so redeveloping them is also going to 0:04:16.560 --> 0:04:17.720 be hard and expensive. 0:04:18.279 --> 0:04:22.560 But is there an assumption that given how wealthy the 0:04:22.640 --> 0:04:25.440 people were who could afford to live in the palisades 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:29.880 versus say, the people in the eating fire in places 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:34.159 like Alteradina aren't as wealthy. That is, the palaces that 0:04:34.240 --> 0:04:36.320 get rebuilt and Alternina not. 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:39.040 Yeah. Yeah, you might think right that, oh, well, the 0:04:39.360 --> 0:04:40.920 rich people have more money, so they're going to be 0:04:40.920 --> 0:04:44.040 able to rebuild faster. But very few people have enough 0:04:44.040 --> 0:04:46.599 money on hand to just rebuild a home out of pocket. 0:04:46.640 --> 0:04:46.760 Right. 0:04:46.800 --> 0:04:49.480 You're talking about almost a million dollars of rebuilding costs 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:52.080 in some of these cases, right, So you know, it 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:54.120 really comes down to how much insurance you have, and 0:04:54.120 --> 0:04:56.440 in particular, I think how much of the proportion of 0:04:56.480 --> 0:04:58.920 the value of your home is insured. Right, So if 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:00.800 you're in a home that's maybe six hundred and seven 0:05:00.880 --> 0:05:03.680 hundred thousand dollars, you can probably cover that with a 0:05:03.760 --> 0:05:07.640 typical insurance policy. And the insurance situation in Altadena actually 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:09.520 turns out to have been better than in a lot 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:12.080 of other places in California, in part because the insurance 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:15.000 hadn't gotten around to dropping these people yet, because they 0:05:15.040 --> 0:05:17.520 hadn't had a fire in a while, and the homes 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:20.279 weren't you know, super super high value. But then in 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:23.120 a place like the Palisades, right, Okay, these homes are 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:25.600 worth millions and millions of dollars, it's hard to find 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:28.800 market insurance coverage that covers that. So if you lose 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:32.000 your home and you didn't have insured the full value, okay, 0:05:32.000 --> 0:05:33.440 what are you going to do? Either you dip into 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:36.000 your savings to just rebuild it out of pocket, which 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:38.440 I'm sure some people would do, right, like the wealthiest. 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:40.760 But if you are wealthy and you had a big home, 0:05:40.880 --> 0:05:43.000 but not that wealthy to where you can just sport 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:45.000 you just build a new one with the money you 0:05:45.000 --> 0:05:48.800 have in your you know, Merrilynch account, then you're really 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:51.360 in a pickle. And I saw this happen in Santa 0:05:51.440 --> 0:05:53.919 Rosa after the twenty seventeen Tubs fire. There was a 0:05:53.960 --> 0:05:57.840 hillside neighborhood with relatively wealthy homeowners and on complex terrain, 0:05:57.880 --> 0:05:59.640 and they really struggled to rebuild. 0:06:00.400 --> 0:06:02.680 The other thing that is a wider problem, which is 0:06:02.720 --> 0:06:06.400 just housing in general, and building new housing is now 0:06:06.640 --> 0:06:10.120 competing with sort of rebuilding after a disaster. We heard 0:06:10.120 --> 0:06:13.800 from Governor Gavin Newsom that he wants to see if 0:06:13.800 --> 0:06:18.080 the legislature will suspend some of the Environmental Assessment Act 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:22.640 and the Coastal Planning Act. What do you think happens 0:06:22.640 --> 0:06:28.159 in these situations where a government goes beyond in a 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:32.159 desire to want to rebuild, but in the process perhaps 0:06:33.160 --> 0:06:35.480 encourage is building in the very same places that are 0:06:35.720 --> 0:06:39.599 risky and vulnerable to these disasters in the future. Again. 0:06:40.360 --> 0:06:43.159 Yeah, yeah, it's really really hard. In the past couple 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:46.320 of years before this fire, California and Gavinism, they've been 0:06:46.360 --> 0:06:48.880 trying to suspend SECO and the coastal like just to 0:06:48.880 --> 0:06:52.200 build regular housing, right, just to build multi family housing. 0:06:52.240 --> 0:06:54.479 And they've they've made some progress in getting some of 0:06:54.480 --> 0:06:57.800 that permitting streamlined. I think it's a little rich for 0:06:57.880 --> 0:07:00.000 the governor to say, oh, I'm going to suspend this stuff. 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:02.119 It turns out we can just do this the whole time. 0:07:02.480 --> 0:07:05.719 You know, rebuilding after disasters is really complicated, and permitting 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:07.760 is one part of it. But the truth is it 0:07:07.800 --> 0:07:10.600 takes a couple of years even in the best case scenario, right, 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:13.720 But I think that the conversation about whether to rebuild 0:07:13.840 --> 0:07:16.280 or where we're going to rebuild is one that the 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:19.640 governor seems, you know, intent on sort of trying to 0:07:19.680 --> 0:07:22.160 move past that as fast as possible, which is pretty typical. 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:24.520 But you know, in his defense, I guess it's a 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:27.400 pretty hard conversation to have, right, Like, the land is 0:07:27.440 --> 0:07:29.200 still owned by the people who live on it. They 0:07:29.240 --> 0:07:31.760 technically have a right to come back, right since they 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:35.040 own the property, And you know, saying let's not do 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:38.080 this is really tough, and very few places really try 0:07:38.080 --> 0:07:40.840 to do it, especially in California where property values are 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:42.000 so high. 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:44.280 And we should talk about insurance because there are two 0:07:44.360 --> 0:07:47.200 layers to this, which is one, you cannot really rebuild 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:51.200 without insurance, but also the way insurance is playing out, 0:07:51.280 --> 0:07:53.720 especially in California but a few other states in the US, 0:07:54.400 --> 0:07:58.720 there is perhaps misbuilding happening because the insurance that is 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.280 being provided is not private, it's not really taking risk 0:08:01.360 --> 0:08:04.320 into consideration, it's being backed by the state, and so 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:06.920 you're building in the very places that will burn again. 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:10.440 So talk goes through what the changes in the California 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:14.400 insurance system have been and whether you think they are 0:08:14.440 --> 0:08:19.200 actually going to work in this hot world that we 0:08:19.240 --> 0:08:21.080 are creating and caninue to heat up. 0:08:21.720 --> 0:08:24.680 Yeah, it's a really interesting situation in California and sort 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:26.760 of like a far more acute version of what other 0:08:26.800 --> 0:08:29.440 states have experienced, where I think as the fire damage 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:32.240 has gotten worse, they've sort of encountered this trade off 0:08:32.280 --> 0:08:35.880 between you know, price pressure and consumers and the availability 0:08:35.920 --> 0:08:39.360 of coverage. And for a long time, California basically chose 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:41.960 to limit price pressure and consumers and then they're paying 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:44.640 the price with affordability where you know, tens or hundreds 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:46.960 of thousands of people have lost their coverage and the 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:50.679 state basically like two weeks before these fires finally finish 0:08:50.760 --> 0:08:54.120 this failuatory process that Okay, insurers, you can charge more money, 0:08:54.160 --> 0:08:56.440 you can you can account for the risk of climate change, 0:08:56.480 --> 0:08:59.400 you can pass on your costs in an exchange, Please 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:01.960 stay in these areas. And so I think that you know, 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:04.080 it remains to be seen. And the big question I 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:07.400 think for the post La fires world is whether you know, 0:09:07.440 --> 0:09:09.720 if insurers feel like they can set an adequate price, 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:13.920 whether that acts as an effective signal to the homeowners 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:16.360 that you know, from the perspective of fire risk. There 0:09:16.400 --> 0:09:18.880 really shouldn't be living in these homes in these places 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:22.520 unless they take substantial mitigation action, right, because that's what 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:24.520 insurance is supposed to do. It's supposed to be a 0:09:24.559 --> 0:09:27.880 signal about climate risk in the rational way of viewing it, 0:09:28.000 --> 0:09:31.200 and it hasn't been in California effectively. And the question now, 0:09:31.240 --> 0:09:33.880 I think is if you have people paying, you know, 0:09:34.120 --> 0:09:36.679 upwards of five, six, seven, ten thousand dollars a year 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:39.480 for insurance and it won't go down unless they mitigate 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:41.719 or get out of the way, does that start to 0:09:41.800 --> 0:09:43.880 change the building patterns? I'm not sure what the answer 0:09:43.880 --> 0:09:46.240 would be, but that's sort of the big, big question 0:09:46.320 --> 0:09:46.640 I think. 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:49.120 So now we take a step back and just look 0:09:49.200 --> 0:09:51.959 at the book that you've written on the Great Displacement. 0:09:52.000 --> 0:09:55.000 You make the case that you're already starting to see 0:09:55.000 --> 0:09:59.800 in some pockets real climate change driven migration within the US, 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:04.000 and that'll get super charged as extreme weather events get worse. 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:08.720 Could you talk us through what kind of notable stories 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:10.520 have stuck with you? 0:10:10.920 --> 0:10:13.760 Yeah, I think on the fires specifically, there's sort of 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:15.760 two big things that stuck with me. 0:10:15.880 --> 0:10:16.040 Right. 0:10:16.120 --> 0:10:18.520 One is that for people at the lower end of 0:10:18.520 --> 0:10:21.920 the income scale in really tough rental and housing markets. 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:23.960 A lot of times what happened is they either got 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:26.360 pushed out of home ownership and into a really chaotic 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:29.760 rental market where they're being price gouged, or they just 0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:32.000 sort of bounced from apartment to apartment. You know, this 0:10:32.000 --> 0:10:34.319 happened in Santa Rosa. It was almost impossible to get 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:37.160 an affordable apartment even before the fire. But then you 0:10:37.280 --> 0:10:39.920 lose five thousand housing units in the night, and it's 0:10:39.920 --> 0:10:42.240 just really really hard to find a place to settle. 0:10:42.679 --> 0:10:45.240 The other thing that's really interesting, I think, and you 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:47.640 may see this happen too in La but maybe to 0:10:47.720 --> 0:10:50.760 a lesser extent, just given the political geography of the place. 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:53.280 Because a lot of people in Northern California, in places 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:57.040 like Paradise, which are relatively conservative and compared to the 0:10:57.080 --> 0:10:59.720 state as a whole, which is trending left, they took 0:10:59.760 --> 0:11:02.080 them insurance payout that they got from the fire, and 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:04.559 they just made an elective move to a different part 0:11:04.600 --> 0:11:05.120 of the country. 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:05.319 Right. 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:07.800 So I think most notably, like a lot of people 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:09.720 from Paradise, I want to say it's in the dozens 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:12.760 ended up moving to Boise, Idaho, which is obviously more 0:11:12.760 --> 0:11:15.800 conservative state. These people were not on the wealthy end 0:11:15.840 --> 0:11:18.600 of the income scale in California, but in the Boise 0:11:18.760 --> 0:11:21.079 housing market they were like titans. You know, they could 0:11:21.120 --> 0:11:23.880 get huge houses in the suburbs of Boise, and you 0:11:23.920 --> 0:11:25.360 know that they went through a lot. I'm not trying 0:11:25.360 --> 0:11:27.560 to say that they made out great, but like you 0:11:27.600 --> 0:11:30.520 can either for people who are maybe have less equity 0:11:30.520 --> 0:11:32.840 in their home or they're renting to begin with, it 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:35.040 just ends up being this sort of scramble. You know, 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:37.760 a disaster could honestly be a sort of unsticking point 0:11:37.880 --> 0:11:40.560 where it, you know, induces a move that they maybe 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:41.760 otherwise wouldn't have made. 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:45.320 But there's also a sort of stunning admission in the 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:49.960 book where if you look at current migration patterns, yes, 0:11:50.080 --> 0:11:54.480 California and perhaps Louisiana the two states from where people 0:11:54.480 --> 0:11:57.520 are leaving, and some of that might be climate links, 0:11:57.520 --> 0:11:59.959 some of that might be just affordability link, but more 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:03.040 to the migration is actually happening towards stages that are 0:12:03.040 --> 0:12:05.920 being affected by climate change. So Florida is seeing a 0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:10.120 lot of migration. State that gets hit by hurricanes all 0:12:10.160 --> 0:12:13.679 the time. Arizona another state which gets hit by droughts 0:12:13.720 --> 0:12:19.120 and heat. Is that just us seeing an old pattern 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:22.720 of economic migration, or are we going to start to 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.200 finally see a reversal because of climate change? Like how 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:26.960 do you square the circle here? 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:31.440 Yeah, this was the most deviling question that still remains 0:12:31.520 --> 0:12:34.120 with me from the book. You know, it's climate migration. 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:37.840 It's just people not liking the climate in Michigan and 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:42.120 deciding to move to Fort Lauderdale, you know. And that's 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:45.280 the median form of climate migration, even in just in 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:48.080 the twenty first century so far. I don't know at 0:12:48.120 --> 0:12:50.520 what point that trend reverses itself, but I do think 0:12:50.640 --> 0:12:53.560 a lot of the places that the post war housing 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:56.040 boom took place in the United States, where there was 0:12:56.080 --> 0:12:59.040 a ton of cheap land, I think we've sort of 0:12:59.040 --> 0:13:01.680 gotten to a point. This is true in Colorado too, 0:13:01.800 --> 0:13:04.120 like at the Front Range. You've gut to a point 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:06.920 where we're just pushing out from what was the sort 0:13:06.920 --> 0:13:10.000 of central cities at those times into really really risky land. 0:13:10.280 --> 0:13:12.280 And in Arizona, of course, it's just very hot there. 0:13:12.760 --> 0:13:16.400 I think insurance, you know, probably is the mechanism, at 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:18.600 least in the case of Florida, right, that would sort 0:13:18.600 --> 0:13:21.280 of force like a slow down or a cessation of 0:13:21.320 --> 0:13:24.120 this dynamic. I think like Florida is probably the place 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:26.040 to look for this, right because you also have to 0:13:26.040 --> 0:13:28.679 pay for flood insurance and wind insurance there. And I've 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:32.400 spoken to people and these these rapidly developing metroplexes right 0:13:32.480 --> 0:13:35.360 like Fort Myers or Tampa where I'm from, sometimes they 0:13:35.360 --> 0:13:37.720 can pay upwards of twenty thousand dollars a year and 0:13:37.800 --> 0:13:41.240 insurance costs combined between the two formats, and that is 0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:44.240 just not sustainable for almost anybody. And then you know, 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:46.520 the rebuilding rules are really tough too. So I think 0:13:46.520 --> 0:13:49.200 that it's possible that in the next couple of decades, 0:13:49.400 --> 0:13:52.200 in a geographically specific way, you might sort of start 0:13:52.200 --> 0:13:55.800 to see the housing market be unable to tolerate further 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:57.920 expansion into these areas. And then what comes out to 0:13:57.920 --> 0:13:59.400 that is another big question. 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:04.360 So most climate change link migration, as we know, happens 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:08.240 within countries. Obviously, you focused on the US with your book, 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:11.720 but are there lessons that the rest of the world 0:14:12.000 --> 0:14:15.240 can take from it? Noting that, of course the US 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:18.400 is is, you know, the world's largest economy, one of 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:21.400 the richest countries in the world has a much more 0:14:21.520 --> 0:14:26.880 developed and widespread insurance market. But still are there lessons 0:14:26.880 --> 0:14:28.160 that others can take. 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:31.880 Yeah? Absolutely. I think that the main lesson is that 0:14:31.960 --> 0:14:37.280 for a lot of disasters, climate displacement just kind of 0:14:37.320 --> 0:14:42.240 looks a lot like regular housing displacement does, right, And 0:14:42.280 --> 0:14:44.520 so I think like La is a good example. Right, 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:47.160 this is like a giant housing market, and it's a 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:49.240 giant rental market. It's like one of the biggest in 0:14:49.280 --> 0:14:53.000 the country. So you're not likely to see people get 0:14:53.080 --> 0:14:56.440 up out of their house in Altadena and walk up 0:14:56.440 --> 0:14:58.600 to North Dakota, right, or to Canada. 0:14:58.720 --> 0:14:58.880 Right. 0:14:59.200 --> 0:15:01.600 They can go to the suburb or the next suburb of, 0:15:01.720 --> 0:15:03.640 or the next suburb of. And that's the way that 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.280 housing displacement works in LA generally, Like if you get evicted, 0:15:06.280 --> 0:15:08.000 you're not going to go to North Dakota, right, So, 0:15:08.440 --> 0:15:10.720 and I think that's probably true in other countries too, right, 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:12.960 Like people sort of move in ways that are typical 0:15:13.120 --> 0:15:16.400 of those places. I think that the typical image in 0:15:16.440 --> 0:15:18.800 the United States and other places of a climate migrant 0:15:18.880 --> 0:15:22.480 is someone who you know, flees from one climate to another, right, 0:15:22.560 --> 0:15:24.720 Like they want to make an elective move away from, 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:26.800 you know, one type of weather event, and I think 0:15:26.880 --> 0:15:30.600 that it's probably better from a policymaking standpoint if we 0:15:30.720 --> 0:15:33.040 just think about climate change as being kind of a 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:36.840 factor that exacerbates all the other weaknesses in the way 0:15:36.880 --> 0:15:39.240 that we house people. In the United States, we have 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:42.320 specific weaknesses, as you know, and then in other countries 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:43.440 there are other weaknesses. 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:56.240 Thank you, Jake, No problem. After the break, Guy Evins 0:15:56.280 --> 0:15:59.880 on why climate upheaval is a global problem and needs 0:16:00.000 --> 0:16:03.640 global solutions. If you've been enjoying this episode, please take 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:05.560 a moment to rate and review the show on Apple 0:16:05.600 --> 0:16:15.440 Podcasts and Spotify. It helps other listeners find the show. Kaya, 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:17.640 Welcome to the show. Oh, it's such a pleasure to 0:16:17.640 --> 0:16:21.120 be here Atala now. Both of us have been watching 0:16:21.120 --> 0:16:24.520 the news from Los Angeles. The fires are still burning 0:16:24.560 --> 0:16:27.760 as we record this, and there's a lot that we 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:32.000 aren't going to know about how communities in the Pacific 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:36.800 Palisades or other areas will recover. In the intro, we 0:16:36.880 --> 0:16:39.000 heard from Paul who was living there. He has no 0:16:39.120 --> 0:16:41.600 idea whether he's going to get a chance to go 0:16:41.680 --> 0:16:46.600 back and move into the Pacific Palisades. What has surprised 0:16:46.640 --> 0:16:50.560 you or perhaps confirmed conclusions from your own reporting as 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:51.440 you've watched the story. 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:54.640 Well, I mean, obviously I'm seeing it from London, so 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:57.800 I don't have that very first hand view. But it's 0:16:57.880 --> 0:17:01.240 so photographed, isn't it. Because it is, and I think 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:06.840 what we're seeing here is perhaps the first example of 0:17:07.080 --> 0:17:10.280 wealthy climate migration, right, because we're seeing some of the 0:17:10.359 --> 0:17:13.040 richest people in the world having to move. But I 0:17:13.080 --> 0:17:16.600 think it's a reminder that we are all at the 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:21.360 bottom of everything, a puny mammal that has certain needs. 0:17:21.720 --> 0:17:21.960 Right. 0:17:22.040 --> 0:17:24.840 We can't live under certain temperatures. We can't live where 0:17:24.880 --> 0:17:29.000 there's flames around our homes, you know, we can't breathe 0:17:29.080 --> 0:17:31.800 air that is infused with smoke. We have to move. 0:17:32.240 --> 0:17:36.200 And so for all our luxury mansions and our dreams 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:40.879 of paradise, we are actually an animal that needs to 0:17:40.920 --> 0:17:44.440 find a safe home. And we are seeing the very 0:17:44.480 --> 0:17:48.479 real dangers from these huge, huge earth systems, and we 0:17:48.560 --> 0:17:50.600 can't just push them back, you know. 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:53.960 So in the two books, out of the many books 0:17:54.000 --> 0:17:58.280 you've written, in the Adventure in the Anthroposy, you documented 0:17:58.640 --> 0:18:00.960 how people in different parts the world, especially in the 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:03.560 Global South, are starting to adapt to the warming that 0:18:03.600 --> 0:18:07.480 exists already. But then in no matter century, you took 0:18:07.480 --> 0:18:11.440 this one step forward to think about places which are 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:15.719 beyond adaptation. When did that hit you that these places 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:17.400 are there and they're growing in size. 0:18:18.359 --> 0:18:19.959 I think I took a two and a half year 0:18:20.040 --> 0:18:24.360 journey around the world to research adventures in the anthroposcene, 0:18:24.400 --> 0:18:27.159 and it slowly sort of crept up on me that 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:30.720 what I was seeing was enormous amounts of climate migration, 0:18:31.320 --> 0:18:35.520 even though people themselves didn't recognize themselves as climate migrants. 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:38.040 They thought that they were perhaps you know, moving for 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:42.560 a better job, leaving rural areas because the economy wasn't 0:18:42.640 --> 0:18:46.000 working there. But actually, when you dug into it, why 0:18:46.160 --> 0:18:49.800 wasn't it working? It was because of persistent chronic drought 0:18:49.840 --> 0:18:52.960 that had got worse over the last decade or so. 0:18:53.560 --> 0:18:58.080 It was because of the encroachment of salt water from 0:18:58.160 --> 0:19:02.160 rising sea levels into Agrica cultural fields. It was because 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:06.879 the coastline had completely eroded through you know, more vicious storms, 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:10.240 and that constant rising of sea levels, and all of 0:19:10.280 --> 0:19:13.320 these things made me recognize that we don't have an 0:19:13.359 --> 0:19:18.080 honest level of debate at all anywhere, certainly not from leadership. 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:22.280 We're not talking about the climate change that has already occurred. 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:25.560 We're not talking about what our cities will look like 0:19:26.080 --> 0:19:28.320 over the coming decades. You know, what will la look 0:19:28.440 --> 0:19:32.439 like in twenty forty, twenty sixty, What will London look like? 0:19:32.680 --> 0:19:35.680 What will New York? What will Miami? Because we need 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:38.400 to adapt right now to those changes, and we need 0:19:38.440 --> 0:19:41.280 to recognize that some of those places are just not 0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:44.200 going to be livable. So we're not having that conversation 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:46.200 and people are going to have to move. 0:19:46.760 --> 0:19:50.520 What is the scale of migration that we're talking about. 0:19:50.760 --> 0:19:52.919 It's impossible to put a figure on that because it 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:55.560 depends on a lot of things. We've just had the 0:19:55.560 --> 0:19:58.560 first full year where the average temperature was one point 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:01.520 six degrees above the pre and US average. You know, 0:20:01.640 --> 0:20:03.959 temperatures may go down slightly, but they are on an 0:20:04.040 --> 0:20:08.879 upward trajectory, and if we look ahead, it's quite likely 0:20:09.000 --> 0:20:10.840 that we will end up by the end of the 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:14.320 century somewhere between three and four degrees above the pre 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:18.000 industrial average. We already have people living in unlivable zones, 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:21.120 some of them heavily adapted and some of them suffering horribly. 0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:25.719 Places from Sudan to Malia have hunger because of drought 0:20:25.840 --> 0:20:30.120 or floods. We have people in Asia farm workers who 0:20:30.200 --> 0:20:32.880 are now working at night with head torches because it's 0:20:32.920 --> 0:20:36.400 simply too hot during the day. We already have these 0:20:36.440 --> 0:20:39.440 unlivable areas, but what will happen is they will increase 0:20:39.640 --> 0:20:43.240 in severity and intensity and last for many months of 0:20:43.280 --> 0:20:48.280 the year, if not throughout. Some studies have put the 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:51.960 zone of unlivability this kind of climate niche of humanity 0:20:52.119 --> 0:20:56.520 sort of shifting up, and that area will encompass some 0:20:57.000 --> 0:21:01.640 three billion people by twenty seventy according to one study. 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:05.120 That doesn't mean three billion people will have to move, 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:07.960 but it means that vast areas will have to be 0:21:08.040 --> 0:21:10.960 adapted and people will have to be accommodated, either within 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:14.639