From the Magazine: The Decade We Almost Stopped Climate Change

Global warming, rising sea levels, carbon emissions, displacement and more. View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Friday, August 3, 2018 [NYTimes.com »]( [Losing Earth]( By THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE [Nathaniel Rich writes about the decade we almost stopped climate change.]( Nathaniel Rich writes about the decade we almost stopped climate change. George Steinmetz for The New York Times This week’s issue of The New York Times Magazine is dedicated to a single article, titled [‘‘Losing Earth,’’]( by Nathaniel Rich. It is a work of history, addressing the 10-year period from 1979 to 1989: the decisive decade when humankind first came to a broad understanding of the causes and dangers of climate change. Based on 18 months of reporting and well over a hundred interviews, it tracks the efforts of a small group of American scientists, activists and politicians to raise the alarm and stave off catastrophe. It will come as a revelation to many readers — an agonizing revelation — to understand how thoroughly they grasped the problem and how close they came to solving it. Complementing the text is a series of aerial photographs, all shot over the past year by George Steinmetz. The pictures demonstrate the consequences of the inaction documented by the story — melting glaciers, wildfires, desertification, floods. As you shift between the time frames of Rich’s project and Steinmetz’s — the 1980s, when these disasters were still theoretical, and the present, when they are all too real — another thought begins to form: What visions of the future are we unable to see? What will be the effects, 40 years hence and beyond, of our actions, and inaction, today? Please note the editor's letter that opens "Losing Earth" will repeat this newsletter. I've highlighted some of our other excellent coverage of climate change from previous issues below. Onward, Jake Silverstein Editor-in-Chief Illustration by Valero Doval [Is It O.K. to Tinker With the Environment to Fight Climate Change?]( By JON GERTNER Scientists are investigating whether releasing tons of particulates into the atmosphere might be good for the planet. Not everyone thinks this is a good idea. Illustration by Christoph Niemann [Our Climate Future Is Actually Our Climate Present]( By JON MOOALLEM How do we live with the fact that the world we knew is going and, in some cases, already gone? [Can Dirt Save the Earth?]( By MOISES VELASQUEZ-MANOFF Agriculture could pull carbon out of the air and into the soil — but it would mean a whole new way of thinking about how to tend the land. [‘I’m Just More Afraid of Climate Change Than I Am of Prison’]( By MICHELLE NIJHUIS How a group of five activists called the Valve Turners decided to fight global warming by doing whatever it takes. [A refinery and wetlands near Myrtle Grove, La.]( Jeff Riedel for The New York Times [The Most Ambitious Environmental Lawsuit Ever]( By NATHANIEL RICH A quixotic historian tries to hold oil and gas companies responsible for Louisiana’s disappearing coast. [Rob Bilott on land owned by the Tennants near Parkersburg, W.Va.]( Bryan Schutmaat for The New York Times Feature [The Lawyer Who Became DuPont’s Worst Nightmare]( By NATHANIEL RICH Rob Bilott was a corporate defense attorney for eight years. Then he took on an environmental suit that would upend his entire career — and expose a brazen, decades-long history of chemical pollution. [How a Warming Planet Drives Human Migration]( By JESSICA BENKO Climate displacement is becoming one of the world’s most powerful — and destabilizing — geopolitical forces. Feature [The Water Wars of Arizona]( By NOAH GALLAGHER SHANNON Attracted by lax regulations, industrial agriculture has descended on a remote valley, depleting its aquifer — leaving many residents with no water at all. ADVERTISEMENT FOLLOW NYTimes [Twitter] [@nytmag]( Get more [NYTimes.com newsletters »]( | Get unlimited access to NYTimes.com and our NYTimes apps. [Subscribe »]( ABOUT THIS EMAIL You received this message because you signed up for NYTimes.com's The New York Times Magazine newsletter. [Unsubscribe]( | [Manage Subscriptions]( | [Change Your Email]( | [Privacy Policy]( | [Contact]( | [Advertise]( Copyright 2018 The New York Times Company 620 Eighth Avenue New York, NY 10018