The devastation of the 2020 West Coast wildfires far exceeds that of any previous wildfire season on record. There have been millions of acres destroyed, multiple casualties, thousands of homes burnt to ashes, and massive displacement—not to mention the extremely low air quality that poses a significant danger to those in vulnerable health categories—and also just anyone and anything that lives and breathes.

Why? You know why. Climate change. We’re not here to discuss why the climate is changing, as that’s pretty obvious. What we want to know is how this country can transfer over to a clean energy economy that is robust without sacrificing the planet. We were so lucky to get to talk to Ratnika Prasad, Director of Energy Strategy at the Environmental Defense Fund to pick her brilliant brain about what it takes to get there. The EDF is doing such incredible work tackling sustainability challenges across the globe by targeting sources of climate pollution and figuring out how to transform energy in a way that is also advantageous for the economy. We’re also pretty stoked on this new tool they built to keep corporations accountable for their emissions. Read on to see how they are helping transition fossil fuel dependent communities, what countries are already doing this well, and an estimate of when our transportation systems will be running on clean energy.

As the director of energy strategy at the Environmental Defense Fund, what's in a day's work for you?

No two days ever look the same and that’s what makes the job really interesting! On any given day, I’ll be in a mix of meetings with the companies we work with to foster and further their climate ambition and with internal EDF folks on strategizing how to move our mission to accelerate the energy transition forward. As most of the meetings happen East Coast time, my afternoons here in California have been a bit calmer; which gives me time to work on drafting proposals, responding to emails and helping pen materials, whether they are principles on offsets or ideas for engaging investors. 

Wildfires and their compounding effects have intensified over the past few years. How might this smoke exposure affect citizens on the west coast long-term? 

Health science is not my area of expertise, but one doesn’t need to be a health expert to recognize that prolonged exposure to smoke and other particulate matter from wildfires can have negative, long term health consequences. My colleague Maria Harris recently wrote a great piece on how the air quality issues exacerbate asthma and increase cardiac vulnerabilities. What’s especially concerning is that there is the additional vulnerability of children, who might face lifelong impact from this such as breathing difficulties.  

For communities where fossil fuel production provides a lot of jobs, how can these communities shift towards producing cleaner energy in a way that is still economically sufficient? In some ways, is it just that people will have to lose money in the short-term to gain more money and a better-functioning planet in the long-term?

I became passionate about sustainability at an early age because people matter, and it was increasingly evident that climate change is a human problem—one that further exacerbates inequality, literally washes away people’s homes and significantly erodes their ability to live a life of meaning and dignity. It is in that vein that the case for working to transition fossil fuel dependent communities is an important one not just from the environment, but for the ability of these communities to thrive in the long run. If you look at the work of experts like Adele Morris for example, coal powered communities in America have been steadily losing jobs and revenue not because of climate mandates, but because of competition from natural gas and that has affected their ability to finance their schooling system and their infrastructure. As Covid-19 has increased volatility in the energy markets, fossil fuel driven communities have been hard hit. But there are ways to revitalize  these communities and build back better than we were before the pandemic. This includes, for instance, putting oil and gas workers back in the field to clean up the thousands of oil and abandoned wells that leak methane and pose a risk to community health. I don’t see jobs and climate as a tradeoff for these communities, but rather a transition that is critical if we care about protecting the people that make these communities.

Do you feel that due to the increase in climate disasters + a global pandemic, that there will be more pressure put on world leaders to truly focus on innovating in the clean energy sector? Are there certain countries that are already doing this well? If so, why can't we follow in their footsteps?

Absolutely. The pandemic has exposed all the vulnerabilities of our global system to externalities beyond our control, and the realization of our own humanity in the face of disease has heightened global awareness of just how vulnerable we are to climate disasters. All global states have work ahead of them, so what stands out to me is the examples of good effort such as Germany and all the investment they have made in moving clean energy along; Norway and how it has directed its fossil fuel derived sovereign wealth into protecting forests; India in its ambitious clean energy targets and most recently China, for stepping up leadership to set ambitious carbon neutrality goals. The most impressive has been the innovation and action at the state and local level, not just in the developed world, but also in developing nations that will bear the burden of climate change.  

Do you think all planes and cars can potentially be powered by renewable energy in the next 50 or so years?

Given the unprecedented level of innovation and progressive policy around this topic in China, in India, in the EU and in states like California, I am confident that we will be have a sustainable transportation system in the next 50 years. What will really make me happy is if the work that EDF and others are doing to make a renewable transport system a reality in the next 20—not 50—years. This includes not just cars and planes, but also the trucks and buses in our system!