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Steve Curwood

Steve Curwood created the first pilot of "Living on Earth" in the spring of 1990, and the show has run continuously since April 1991. His relationship with public radio goes back to 1979 when he began as a reporter and host of NPR's "Weekend All Things Considered." He has been a journalist for more than 30 years with experience at CBS News, the "Boston Globe," NPR, WBUR-FM/Boston and WGBH-TV/Boston. He shared the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service as part of the "Boston Globe's" education team. Read full bio.

Steve Curwood created the first pilot of Living on Earth in the spring of 1990, and the show has run continuously since April 1991. Today, it is aired on more than 250 public radio stations in the United States.Curwood's relationship with public radio goes back to 1979 when he began as a reporter and host of NPR's Weekend All Things Considered. He has been a journalist for more than 30 years with experience at CBS News, the Boston Globe, NPR, WBUR-FM/Boston and WGBH-TV/Boston. He shared the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service as part of the Boston Globe's education team.Curwood is also the recipient of the 2003 Global Green Award for Media Design, the 2003 David A. Brower Award from the Sierra Club for excellence in environmental reporting and the 1992 New England Environmental Leadership Award from Tufts University for his work on promoting environmental awareness. He is president of the World Media Foundation Inc. and lectures in Environmental Science and Public Policy at Harvard University. He lives in southern New Hampshire on a small woodlot with his family.

Smoke rises from a processing mill at a palm oil plantation in Sumatra, Indonesia

The world’s tropical forests can help us limit climate change — if we let them

Climate Change

Tropical forests are a treasure trove of biodiversity and contain vast stores of carbon that, if released through deforestation, threaten the stability of Earth’s climate system.

Climate activist Vanessa Nakate, of Uganda, delivers her speech during a Fridays for Future demonstration in Milan, Italy, Friday, Oct. 1, 2021.

Ugandan climate activist Vanessa Nakate: ‘We want climate action and our voices will not be silenced’

Climate Change
A Tesoro Corp. refinery, including a gas flare flame that is part of normal plant operations, in Anacortes, Washington.

Are carbon offsets really as effective as advocates claim?

Climate Change
Air pollution in Tehran on Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012.

New WHO air pollution standards could save millions of lives each year

Health & Medicine
This Dec. 22, 2018, file photo shows a pump jack over an oil well along Interstate 25 near Dacono, Colorado.

Will big oil finally be held accountable for decades of climate misinformation?

Climate Change
In this April 4, 2013, file photo, a mining dumper truck hauls coal at Cloud Peak Energy's Spring Creek strip mine near Decker, Montana.

‘They Knew’: A new book chronicles 50 years of US govt’s failure to address the climate crisis

Climate Change

For the past 50 years, the US government has known about the problem of climate change but has continued to promote fossil fuel development and done little to avert a crisis. Lawyer James Gustave Speth chronicles this failure in his new book, “They Knew: The US Federal Government’s 50-Year Role in Causing the Climate Crisis.”

The Shell Norco oil refinery along the Mississippi River in Norco, LA.

Hurricane Ida adds misery to ‘Cancer Alley’: Part II

Environment

“The chemical plants are really having a ball with this hurricane,” says Sharon Lavigne, a local activist who has been fighting to stop pollution in a highly toxic area of southern Louisiana.

Founder of RISE St. James and 2021 Goldman Environmental Prize winner Sharon Lavigne

Hurricane Ida adds misery to ‘Cancer Alley’: Part I

Environment

Black residents in Louisiana communities hit hard by Hurricane Ida have been fighting for environmental justice there for decades. Hurricane Ida made their task even harder.

Buildings burn as the Dixie Fire tears through the Greenville community of Plumas County, Calif., on Wednesday, Aug. 4, 2021.

Climate change is driving extreme weather events around the world in 2021

Climate Change

As a slew of extreme weather events hit the headlines, the evidence of climate disruption is becoming undeniable. One climate expert warns that humanity is headed for dangerous thresholds of climate disruptions that would be beyond our ability to adapt.

A record number of wolves are roaming the forests and fields of Oregon, 20 years after the species returned to the state.

Charlotte McConaghy’s new novel imagines reintroducing wolves to the Scottish Highlands

Arts, Culture & Media

“Once There Were Wolves” tells a mysterious tale about a woman-led team working to reintroduce wolves to the Scottish Highlands, the people who confront them, and the deadly toll of domestic abuse.