🗞️ Local journalists report the state of climate coverage
Reporters across the country share the biggest climate issues facing their communities.
We’ve seen a lot of turbulence in climate so far in 2024: Extreme weather has scorched the U.S. with temperatures in parts of the country reaching above 120°F. Storms like Hurricane Beryl hit earlier than usual, leaving thousands without power. Not to mention we’re in an election year, the outcome of which could determine the fate of key climate policy.
At the center of it all, journalists are working hard to disseminate education and information about key climate issues to their communities—whether it’s explaining nuanced policy or advising about how to manage the impact of extreme weather.
The Cooler reached out to local reporters from across the country to learn more about the key issues facing their communities, and how they approach covering those subjects. We asked them three questions:
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in your community?
What are the biggest climate issues affecting your community, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
Their responses highlight key obstacles and considerations to advancing the climate conversation nationally, and what support is necessary for furthering these reporters’ critical work.
📍National –Teri Hayt, Director of Corps and Newsroom Excellence, Report for America
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in the U.S.?
The challenges environmental reporters face are the same as those faced by every reporter today:
Financial: Shrinking staffs make it more difficult for any beat reporter to stay on their beat. As budgets shrink or are cut, beats are eliminated.
Access: Many reporters wait months, a year, or more for responses to their Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).
Politicization: Basic environmental reporting, again, like much reporting, has been politicized. Stories on climate are labeled as biased, and those reporting on these issues and their stories are labeled biased or liars. Science has been vilified by many in this country.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting the U.S. writ large, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
Clean water and climate change are affecting communities—many places do not have A/C, and local government organizations are not trained to respond to climate change or respond to reporters asking questions on these subjects. I always point to the Flint, MI water crisis. Clean drinking water is basic. Without that local reporting, this community might never have known what was happening. This one story reinforced the importance of attending city council, county supervisors, and legislative meetings and sessions. Reading agendas is critical. When we pay attention, critical basic needs get addressed.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
More reporters are required on every beat, but this goes to figuring out a sustainable business model for our industry. A new organization with a decent depth chart can make all the difference—city hall and politics reporters, education, health, GA, religion-culture, sports, environment-climate, community, etc. A well-staffed newsroom works in concert to support a balanced, consistent news report for the community.
“When we pay attention, critical basic needs get addressed.”
—Teri Hayt, Report for America
📍New Orleans, LA – Delaney Dryfoos, Environment Reporter, The Lens New Orleans
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in New Orleans?
One of the big challenges to covering climate-related topics in my community is the fear instilled in potential sources from the oil and gas industry. Many people are not willing to speak about their experiences with the industry out of fear of retribution. This includes employees and local council members who have spoken out against further development. The industry also provides many residents with the livelihood that they depend on, even if the emissions from the plant where they work might make their community sicker.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting New Orleans, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
The building of industrial canals for transportation through wetlands hastened the speed at which southern Louisiana is losing land. This has left areas such as New Orleans more vulnerable to storm surge, a threat that is increasing as the Gulf of Mexico heats up. The oil and gas plants along "Cancer Alley" are known to emit dangerous air pollution. Reporting on recent science and local policies that regulate the industry is important for the public to stay informed about their health. Southern Louisiana is also set to become a major export center for liquefied natural gas and home of carbon capture technology. Both will extend the lifetime of the oil and gas production industry and contribute further to global warming.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
Funding. Most climate reporting is funded through nonprofits or charitable foundations, even when published in for-profit newspapers. Sustaining the local journalists who are committed to this important storytelling would be the best way to ensure communities stay abreast of what is happening in their backyard.
“Reporting on recent science and local policies that regulate the industry is important for the public to stay informed about their health.”
—Delaney Dryfoos, The Lens New Orleans
📍Denver, CO - Elise Schmelzer, Reporter, The Denver Post
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in Colorado?
One of the challenges I face is covering all of the unique communities in Colorado across a huge swath of very different landscapes. We have high plains fed by groundwater on the eastern side of the state, a booming urban corridor, the quintessential Rocky Mountains and its alpine ecosystems, and the desert towns on the western slope. While many of the base issues are the same—water quality and quantity, balancing recreation with conservation, the energy transition—how those issues present differ greatly across the state.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting Colorado, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
Our number one climate issue in Colorado is water. Climate change means less water is making it from the winter snowpack that we rely on and our groundwater supplies are shrinking—all while our population continues to grow. Reporting on water issues in a way that is accessible to regular people is critical. Water policy is wonky, but most people are not water policy wonks. I try to craft my stories in a way that shows the importance of the issue without making it seem like an existential crisis without a solution. There are answers.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
There is a huge gap in covering agriculture and how the industry that feeds us all will need to shift as our climate changes. Few local news outlets have dedicated agriculture reporters, but it's hard to think of issues more important than the food on our table.
“I try to craft my stories in a way that shows the importance of the issue without making it seem like an existential crisis without a solution. There are answers.”
—Elise Schmelzer, The Denver Post
📍Kansas City, MO – Cami Koons, Rural Affairs and Sustainability Reporter
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in Kansas City?
There is still a lot of stigma around climate change, or more so that people get antsy thinking they're embarking on a political conversation when that term is used. I tend to use the term "sustainability" more often to get past that. Most farmers have an interest in taking care of their land and keeping it productive over the years through practices like cover crops and no-till, but they aren't likely to say that those practices are in response to climate change. When it comes to sustainable energy expansion, rural communities especially have very strong opinions. It's a challenge to balance the concerns of landowners who are worried about the impact of wind turbines or solar panels near their properties, with the global need for clean energy sources.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting Kansas City, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
Farmland, especially in this region, is flat and has an abundance of sunlight and wind. This makes it the perfect place for solar or wind energy, but there are huge concerns among farmers and landowners that we are taking good farmland out of production to meet our energy demands. Reporting that looks at both sides of this issue is of paramount importance as this region forges forward in renewable energy conversations and policy decisions. The same goes for reporting on industrial farming, water conservation and air pollution. Reporters need to balance the climate solutions with the perspectives of the people it will impact most. This, in my opinion, is the best way to shape public understanding of these issues and their complexities.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
I'm really encouraged by the amount of environmental reporting I continue to see. It seems like most outlets have added environmental/climate reporters to their newsrooms. My focus is primarily on agriculture and looking at the rural areas of this region, but I think we could use more of a climate focus in city reporting and legislative coverage. There is a lot of reporting to be done to hold municipalities and states accountable as they approach the deadlines for their climate goals.
“Reporters need to balance the climate solutions with the perspectives of the people it will impact most.”
—Cami Koons, Rural Affairs + Sustainability Reporter
📍Helena, MT – Amanda Eggert, Reporter, Montana Free Press
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in Montana?
One of my touchstone goals as a journalist is to bring good, reliable information to complicated subjects so that we all have a shot at benefiting from sound, carefully considered policy. In Montana, a not-insignificant number of policymakers, elected officials in particular, either deny that anthropogenic climate change is occurring or take a nihilistic view toward our state's role in responding to it. Knowing that fringe views have a disproportionate impact on our state's policy because individuals in powerful positions espouse them is difficult. Though Montana does have some helpful resources and experts to explain what climate change means for this state and its residents' health, those reports could use updating. First, though, we'll need more political will to do that.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting Montana, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
In Montana, climate change results in a longer, more intense wildfire season, shrinking snowpacks that reduce summertime streamflows, and a rise in extreme weather events like flooding. Nearly a decade ago, I attended an event where a local university's environmental studies students discussed their thesis projects. At that event, one of the students said something to the effect of, 'You can't argue with someone's lived experiences.' The idea that telling a story through the experience of one impacted individual will resonate differently with readers than telling a story that's exclusively focused on policy or research has stuck with me ever since. Now, I aim to bring both a human perspective and trustworthy data to climate issues. I think both are help demonstrate impacts in different ways that will—hopefully—help my stories reach a broader audience.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
I think solutions-oriented stories are powerful, especially in the context of climate change. I've found that they can take a lot of work to produce, but I like the idea of offering readers a glimpse into a different landscape, ideally a more livable one. It's also fascinating to me how different solutions take root in different areas. I also think that more climate reporting incorporating rural voices is a worthy goal and I am continually looking for resources that can make climate science and research more accessible to me, and by extension, Montana Free Press' readers.
📍Phoenix, AZ – Joan Meiners, Climate and Environment Reporter, The Arizona Republic
What are the challenges of covering climate-related topics in Arizona?
Arizona remains a hotbed, in pockets, of climate denial even in 2024. Whereas in some other places the conversation has moved on to discussing details of how best to implement solutions, in this state, despite its scorching temperatures and worsening drought, there is often still a need to communicate the basics about how scientists understand that burning fossil fuels contributes to rising average temperatures and more chaotic weather patterns, and how that will make life for residents more expensive, uncomfortable and inequitable. Even though heat-related deaths have increased more than 50% just in the last year, many readers are reluctant to view that as evidence of a climate problem that needs to be addressed on a large scale with some pretty big changes to how we live.
Arizona is also one of the most politically divided states in America, so covering climate change and its consequences in a meaningful and effective way looks different here than it would in many other places. Often climate writing here requires more of a delicate (but clear) touch when it comes to explaining how one party is heeding warnings from scientists about escalating risks and the other party is simply not. In my view as a local reporter, we need to clearly communicate the science and pursue accountability for failures while making an effort to meet readers where they are and not alienate those not already part of the choir. That often means selecting wording and crafting tone carefully and striving to provide coverage at various levels, either within the same story or as different stories, so we can meet the needs of readers at different stages of acceptance and understanding of this problem.
Then, of course, there are all the practical field reporting considerations of trying to cover climate issues in extreme heat and drought across expansive and sometimes unforgiving, rugged landscapes! If I’m setting out to attend a community meeting or cover a wildfire in a remote corner of the state, for example, I need to be sure I bring enough water and emergency supplies with me that I don’t become the story if my car overheats in some remote area without cell service.
What are the biggest climate issues affecting Arizona, and what kind of reporting is important to help shape public understanding?
Phoenix is the hottest big city in America, and our high-temperature records keep falling at alarming rates. Arizona is also struggling to adjust to a new water reality amid rapid population growth, enduring drought, and long-ignored requests from Indigenous communities for their fair share. At the same time that we report those stats to the locals living them, though, I aim to provide a counterbalance to the all-too-common and careless national characterizations of this area as an “unlivable hellscape,” by also informing readers about the wealth of heat and water expertise and solutions testing going on in this region, while not excusing lagging action and progress by many of our leaders. It can be a lot to juggle!
Arizona is also home to 22 tribes as well as large Latino, unhoused, and elderly populations, all groups that statistically suffer worse consequences of climate change than mainstream white communities, often due to being less sheltered from extreme heat or unable to keep up with rising utility bills, for example. It’s important to highlight the unequal impacts of this human-caused problem and give those residents a voice while outlining steps residents can take to help and make all Arizonans feel welcome in the conversation about solutions.
What gaps still need to be filled in local climate reporting?
As one of the regions of the country that has been existing at the edges of many climate extremes (heat, drought, wildfire, energy demand) for a while now, I’m not sure we have major local gaps in climate coverage other than that there is increasingly a lot going on related to climate, and it can feel overwhelming to try to adequately cover and explore how conditions and decisions alter the lives of different demographics. New, surprising connections between climate change and parts of life in Arizona keep popping up in research and real scenarios, so there will always be important variants of a past story that we’ve not yet captured. I suppose that with the state’s political history, we are probably still missing some pieces of the accountability picture related to lacking public scrutiny of past actions and attitudes. But that is true in a lot of places and reporters are working to chip away at that retroactively.
Perhaps a silver lining of climate change becoming the urgent issue of our times now is that reporters on other beats are increasingly helping with coverage by working explanations about how climate change plays a role in all sorts of situations into their stories (I don’t always agree with the exact way they do this, but that’s another conversation). In some ways, having too many climate-related announcements and initiatives to keep track of is a blessing in disguise. But as the Arizona state newspaper’s only dedicated climate reporter, it can be a challenge to triage which topics need coverage most and to decide on any given day whether to use the platform of journalism to spotlight problems, demand accountability, communicate science, highlight solutions or simply cover the news. With my position being new as of early 2022, though, we are now covering more local climate ground than ever.
“It’s important to highlight the unequal impacts of this human-caused problem and give those residents a voice while outlining steps residents can take to help and make all Arizonans feel welcome in the conversation about solutions.”
—Joan Meiners, The Arizona Republic
(Water) Cooler Talk
🗣Climate Talks with Yale
Laura Thomas-Walters, research specialist and deputy director at the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, says we need to be having more climate conversations—with your friends, your family—even your doctor. “I’ve been consciously making more of an effort to just talk to random people about climate change,” she said in a recent interview with Teen Vogue editors. The piece, published as part of Covering Climate Now—a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story—dives into some strategies for how to have these conversations. The editors and Thomas-Walters talk about addressing climate deniers, methods to approaching people who seem open to change, and processing climate anxiety.
🎥‘Twisters’: Climate Conversations in Summer Blockbusters
With its discussion of scientists and changing weather patterns, summer blockbuster ‘Twisters’ seems like an example of climate change coming to the big screen. Surprisingly though, climate change is never explicitly mentioned in the film. Director Lee Isaac Chung stated, “I just wanted to make sure that with the movie, we don’t ever feel like (it) is putting forward any message.” In their coverage of the film, Jeva Lange at Heatmap pointed out that there’s a lack of scientific evidence when it comes to tornadoes and climate change. “Suggesting otherwise might actually have done more damage to public understanding by blurring the line between a frightening enough reality and Hollywood fiction in the name of topical relevance,” Lange wrote.