Leah Stokes: 2024 Schneider Award Winner

Every year we highlight the work of a scientist who excels in communicating their work to the world. Climate One is delighted to present the 2024 Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Climate Science Communication to political scientist and energy expert Leah Stokes.

Her rare ability to communicate complex information to both academic audiences and the general public has established her as one of the most influential voices in climate action and clean energy policy.

“What I've started to think about is not how can I make my impact as small as possible, like a carbon footprint, trying to shrink, but actually how can I make my impact as big as possible by joining with others in campaigns to try to change policies and laws so that we're not just trying to make marginal, incremental improvements on a fossil fuel-based energy system, but actually change the system towards clean electricity,” she says.

Leah Stokes

Anton Vonk Associate Professor at UC Santa Barbara; Senior Policy Advisor, Rewiring America; Co-host of the podcast “A Matter of Degrees”

Rebecca Solnit

Author, journalist, and activist

The quintuple wildfire system ravaging Southern California is a stark reminder that, in the words of Gov. Gavin Newsom, “[Wildfire season] is year round in the state of California.” Until this year, only four of the 423 California wildfires to exceed 15 square miles since 1984 burned during the winter, with summer and early fall the historic peak of wildfire season. But firefighters and climate scientists are increasingly worried that climate change has created “fire years” rather than fire seasons.

Carbon emissions lead to warmer temperatures year-round, which, when compounded by climate-driven drought conditions, creates an environment ripe for the rapid spread of conflagrations. The city of Los Angeles has received less than one-fifth of an inch of precipitation since October, rendering natural areas around the city extremely dry. Parched grasses were then easily carried by the naturally occurring Santa Ana winds, allowing the fire system to grow at an unprecedented rate.

Worldwide, the United Nations forecasts that climate change will result in a 14% increase in extreme wildfire occurrences by 2030. Other human factors contributing to this increase include the rapid expansion of urban communities, the abandonment of Indigenous fire management practices in favor of total fire suppression throughout the 20th century and the continued underfunding of agencies in charge of fire prevention such as the Forest Service. 

Once the fires are extinguished, the burn scars will pose imminent flood and landslide risks, illustrating the deadly phenomenon of compound climate events, whereby one natural disaster makes others more likely to occur. And even if California is lucky enough to avoid any compound events, if carbon emission continues unchecked, the state can expect up to a 52% increase in annual forest areas burned.

PLUS:

There are a plethora of scientific and moral reasons to protect coral reefs. But for those more persuaded by dollars and cents — such as Congress — a recent slate of studies on the economic value of coral reefs may be the best motivation yet. Researchers examining coastal properties in Hawaiʻi and Florida found that the nation’s coral reefs protect a staggering $1.8 billion in economic assets from floodwaters each year.

The researchers’ findings are in line with the proposal from economist Ralph Chami of the International Monetary Fund to assign monetary values to marine conservation efforts. For example, Chami estimates that each whale sequesters $3 million worth of carbon over the course of its lifetime. Alongside three other climate marine conservation leaders, Chami joined Climate One for our episode Blue Carbon: Sinking It in the Sea, which you can listen to now wherever podcasts are found.

Source: Zachary Labe/Copernicus

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