Better climate crisis reporting calls for learning about LandBack, taking a long view, and getting granular

It’s getting hot out here — and it’s likely to get hotter. 2024 marked the warmest year on record since modern-day temperature record-keeping began in 1880, also capping off the warmest decade (2015-2024) per those records. 

In the U.S., many of President Donald Trump’s slate of initial executive orders position the country to foment, rather than slow, global warming and its effects, from increased rainfall to more frequent heat waves. 

Clear, thoughtful, and specific climate change reporting that highlights the wide-ranging impacts can provide clarity about how to navigate extreme weather events, disasters, and gradual changes brought on by climate change — without propelling people into hopelessness. 

And every reporter can tackle that challenge. Climate change coverage has come a long way from the anodyne curiosity and anecdotal hypothesizing about global warming of the early 1900s and simple stenography of scientific research in the late 1900s. 

Maxwell Boykoff, the department chair of environmental studies at the University of Colorado, has written extensively about how mainstream media has covered climate change. While he said climate change was initially framed as a pollution issue or scientific problem when first recognized, reporters have largely begun to recognize that it isn’t just a single issue confined to the sciences.

“Newsrooms need to understand that denying the need to transition away from fossil fuels in order to preserve a livable climate is akin to climate change denial.”

Emily Atkin, founder, Heated

“This is an issue that cuts through all aspects of our lives, all aspects of how we live, work, play, meet our livelihood needs, and so on,” he said. 

The phenomenon can find a foothold in a sports story, for example. And while different angles can bring levity, Emily Atkin, who founded Heated — a newsletter for “people pissed off about the climate crisis” — says it’s imperative that “journalists who cover climate change … separate what sounds reasonable to them from what are the facts of climate change.”

“Newsrooms need to understand that denying the need to transition away from fossil fuels in order to preserve a livable climate is akin to climate change denial,” she said.

For journalists curious about changes across global media coverage of climate change, Boykoff suggested perusing the Media and Climate Change Observatory’s (MeCCO) reports, summaries and work. The observatory, housed by the University of Colorado-Boulder, monitors 131 news sources across 59 countries in seven different world regions and puts out a monthly assessment of trends in climate change media coverage. 

But media coverage still has strides to make in underscoring the severity and reach of global warming without alienating audiences who may not immediately see its impact or who are stumped about the agency they have in responding to the phenomenon. 

So reporters covering climate change from a variety of perspectives shared their thoughts on how they’ve navigated highlighting the phenomenon’s severity while aiming to give people a sense of hope. 

Cover the cross-section of Indigenous affairs and climate change 

Anyone interested in climate change reporting should be learning about the Native land they’re on and reporting in, along with the LandBack movement — Indigenous peoples’ centuries-long push for land rematriation beyond stewardship.

LandBack has been an integral cornerstone of climate justice, particularly as it highlights ways to live sustainably with the land and to resist defeatism about climate change. Indigenous people are at the frontlines of defending their land and the environment against environmentally destructive projects, from mining to industrial agriculture. Yet around the world, Indigenous people face a disproportionate share of violence despite being 6% of the global population. 

In the U.S., where Indigenous nations have lost nearly 99% of their historical land base, tribes were displaced to areas more vulnerable to climate change. 

Taylar Dawn Stagner, the Indigenous Affairs fellow for Grist, has been covering the intersection of Indigenous communities and their response to climate change for years. She is Arapaho and Shoshone (descendant), and came to journalism by covering the Wind River Indian Reservation where she lives and works. 

“All Indigenous communities are very different and unique, and should be treated as such,” she said. “But we’re also facing very similar [pressures] and a higher rate to be affected by climate change.” 

She added that she’d like to see more non-Native reporters take on this intersection of Indigenous communities and climate change: “These stories are worth telling, and they’re just good human stories that I think are really important for anybody to learn how to do — there’s some cultural things that I think there’s a pretty steep learning curve around, but I’d love to see more people take an interest and be respectful.”

“All Indigenous communities are very different and unique, and should be treated as such. But we’re also facing very similar [pressures] and a higher rate to be affected by climate change.”

Taylar Dawn Stagner, Indigenous Affairs fellow, Grist

One starting place to learn are the Indigenous Journalists Association’s several reporting guides, which cover a range of topics from reporting on First Nations, Inuit, and Métis communities to covering the Dakota Access Pipeline protests and other similar actions nationally.  

Stagner also underscored the importance of critical reporting about green colonialism, in which energy transitions continue to “repeat the sins of the past of steamrolling over Indigenous rights and rights to land.” 

The legacy of colonialism between the Global South and Global North is also important to cover: Alex Ip, the publisher and editor of Asian American science outlet The Xylom, also urged reporters to be more thoughtful about perpetuating white savior narratives, particularly U.S.-centric ones. 

“It’s not just ‘you invest in electric vehicles and you’re investing in things that will magically solve it [climate change],’” he said. “Climate change is a big problem that means big solutions, and that’s why international reporting is so important.” 

One story The Xylom is reporting focuses on the limitations of electronic transition — Japan has been exporting used electric vehicles to parts of Africa where there are no ways of properly recycling electronic materials, offloading toxic heavy metals into dumpsters impacting local communities. Previously, the newsroom also looked at how a Chinese quarrying company’s practices are causing adverse health impacts to Indigenous communities in Nigeria. 

Yet covering the wide array of Native communities has also strengthened Stagner’s commitment to reporting: “If other people are fighting, I can cover the fight against climate change.” 

And there are victories, like the largest dam removal project in the U.S., which Yurok and Karuk tribes in Northern California had been fighting in support of for decades.

“Larger lens, sharper focus”

Seasoned reporter Emily Atkin may have Heated, but in the face of a Trump administration hellbent on wreaking havoc on the science establishment as it exists — and on undoing the measures implemented in hopes of slowing the march of a changing climate — she says she’s not orienting her coverage toward being a “rage machine.” 

Instead, she plans to provide readers a full picture, “looking at things with a larger lens in order to have a sharper focus.”

A larger lens means including context, says freelance disaster journalist Colleen Hagerty. She writes the newsletter “My World’s on Fire”, about community resilience after disaster, disaster preparedness, and more. 

“When we look at climate change, we’re not just looking at the emissions of today — we’re looking at the sort of historical decisions that have been made,” she said. 

“A lot of disaster researchers do not like the phrase ‘natural disaster,’ because what we really see in modern disasters are natural hazards colliding with the built environment that we have created.”

Colleen Hagerty, My World’s on Fire

For reporters covering extreme weather events, one easy way Hagerty suggests shifting perspective is to take after disaster researchers: Drop “natural” from “natural disaster.” 

“A lot of disaster researchers do not like the phrase ‘natural disaster’, because what we really see in modern disasters are natural hazards colliding with the built environment that we have created,” Hagerty said. “And I mean that not just from the infrastructure but from the policy decisions that have shaped the communities that are built there.” 

In the wake of disasters, that can look like examining zoning and development in impacted areas while understanding the history of a particular space. For example, reporting on why some homes survived the Eaton and Palisades fires in the Los Angeles area and looking at Altadena’s history as a landmark city where many Black people were first able to become homeowners. 

For Atkin, who took a month-long break to re-evaluate and reorient Heated, her focus is turned on three types of stories: ones pulling the curtain back on the fossil fuel industry’s footprint on the presidential administration, ones focused about corporations and businesses reneging on climate commitments, and ones highlighting an array of activism strategies. 

“The most common question I get from readers is, ‘What can I do?’” Atkin said. “I’m not gonna be able to tell all readers what’s the best path for them individually, but it’s important to highlight different paths that people are taking in activism.” 

Collaboration, consistency, and specificity

Pulling together different expertise is crucial to better climate change reporting, Ip, The Xylom editor, said — especially when covering areas and communities you may not have lived experience with. 

“The minimum you do is show respect towards groups, folks of other countries, other cultures,” he said. “When you do your reporting and work with stringers, work with photographers that are based in other countries, pay them well. Pay them a living wage. That’s what everybody deserves.” 

And, he added, cite your sources — while there are a lot of news outlets trying to do this work, some often fail to credit original reporting or inadequately trace their research. 

That’s important, Atkin said, because “we’re all in the same news ecosystem and we could work to highlight each other’s stuff in filling [news] gaps.”

Reporters told me that climate change reporting, like other beats, rests on consistency and particularity: in the wake of disaster, continuing to follow the arc of recovery, generally knowing one’s audience, and writing from a specific perspective. 

“Something I’ve really learned over the years is that it’s hard to be prescriptive for news media in general when it comes to climate change, because everyone’s audience is different and different audiences need different things,” Atkin said. “What I would like to see is more engagement with audiences to see what they actually need from the journalism that they consume.”

“Something I’ve really learned over the years is that it’s hard to be prescriptive for news media in general when it comes to climate change, because everyone’s audience is different and different audiences need different things.”

Emily Atkin, founder, Heated

As a disaster journalist, Hagerty is cognizant that people are often scattered and may be displaced — when government officials say, “We will rebuild,” her aim is to give communities clarity on that promise and provide tangible information. 

“It’s about helping them understand the different players that are going to come into their communities, whether that’s the federal government, state government or even, like, … what an emergency manager in their local community actually does, what that role entails,” she said. “Once they know all the roles these people play, they have a better ability to hold them accountable to doing the work of actually building back better.” 

She and Grist fellow Stagner both emphasized the importance of local reporting, which Stagner called the “lifeblood of a healthy community.” 

“We can kind of get swept up in this national coverage, which has real implications for everything,” she said. “But it’s also good to ground yourself in a local community where you care about what’s going on and build your sourcing that way. And that takes time, and that is not easy by any means, but it’s also a very gratifying, worthwhile way to do journalism.” 

As newsrooms have continued to push back on people reporting on a topic they’ve had personal experience with — one notable case being the Washington Post barring Felicia Sonmez from sexual and gender violence reporting due to her being a sexual assault survivor — Ip says he’d like to see newsrooms confront their hypocrisy as climate change continues to impact more and more people.

“What happens if you’ve been personally affected by climate change — for example, your house just burned down, or, your FEMA insurance is too large and you can’t afford paying for your mortgage with your current general salary?” he said. “Are you considering yourself as part of this community you’re reporting about … or are you treating a community as just a place to parachute in and go out of?”

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Cite this article

Salanga, James (2025, Feb. 13). Reporting on a burning world. Reynolds Journalism Institute. Retrieved from: https://rjionline.org/news/reporting-on-a-burning-world/