Maximizing Minerals at Home, with Beia Spiller

In this episode, Sarah Armitage, an assistant professor at Boston University, sits with host Daniel Raimi to share findings from a working paper she wrote with coauthors about the transfer sales of oil and gas wells and why this practice of oil and gas companies selling wells to each other can lead to negative consequences of “unplugged,” or “orphaned,” or abandoned wells. Armitage explains why unmaintained oil and gas infrastructure, such as orphaned wells, can lead to negative environmental consequences if not “plugged” or sealed after use; these abandoned wells often contain pollutants that can leak into the environment. She also lays out key factors behind project financing that can mitigate a mismatch in business incentives and environmental safety. Given that oil and gas wells, new and old, are spread across the United States, Armitage points to the continued challenges of navigating the state regulations and potential financial solutions that can make proper maintenance easier for old oil and gas wells. Policies that ensure some level of financial assurance, Armitage and coauthors find, can help fill a gap in incentives and put a plug on pollution before it starts. References and recommendations: “Cutting Costs or Cutting Corners: Asset Reallocation in Oil and Gas Production” by Sarah C. Armitage, Judson Boomhower, and Catherine Hausman; https://www.nber.org/papers/w34961 “Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion-Dollar Trash Trade” by Adam Minter; https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/junkyard-planet-9781608197934/ “The World for Sale: Money, Power, and the Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources” by Jack Farchy and Javier Blas; https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-world-for-sale-9780197651537 Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

In this episode, host Margaret Walls talks with Jade Stevens, founder and executive director of 40 Acre Conservation League, a Black-led nonprofit land trust in California. The organization, named after the historic promise of “40 acres and a mule” given to formerly enslaved Black Americans after the Civil War, honors the legacy of the promise by expanding land stewardship and outdoor recreation throughout California. A complementary objective of the land trust focuses on wildfire prevention and forest preservation, which involves extensive efforts to thin out overcrowded trees and restore wildlife. Despite challenges in site acquisition and dense tree regrowth, Stevens notes that maintaining outdoor space creates lasting improvements to quality of life for nearby communities. By merging the two aims of conserving land and expanding public lands, 40 Acre Conservation League aims to make the great outdoors more accessible to urban families in California while protecting the ecosystems within it. References and recommendations: 40 Acre Conservation League; https://www.40acreleague.org/ “The Wild” podcast with Chris Morgan; https://www.thewildpod.org/ Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

In this episode, host Kristin Hayes is joined by Beia Spiller, a fellow and director of the transportation program at Resources for the Future (RFF), to explore new RFF research findings on critical minerals. (Note that this podcast episode is a sneak preview of a forthcoming report! We will add a link to the report in the show notes once the research has been released on the RFF website. Stay tuned.) To understand contemporary market dynamics for critical minerals, Spiller says that one must understand the history of mineral extraction in the United States. With high operational costs, explained in part by environmental regulations and workforce limitations, and with overseas firms bypassing many of these expenses, the US supply of critical minerals lies at the intersection of national security and global market tensions. While critical mineral policies in recent history have taken varied approaches—bilateral, multilateral, plurilateral, and more—evaluating the efficacy and implications of these policies is key to understanding which mechanisms actually advance US goals. Spiller argues that effectively addressing this “critical” issue requires a clear prioritization of policy objectives and concerns. References and recommendations: Stay tuned for the forthcoming report on critical minerals! The Critical Minerals Research Lab is now open for applications through May 31: https://www.rff.org/news/press-releases/critical-minerals-research-lab-now-accepting-applications/ Critical Minerals Research Lab; https://www.rff.org/topics/transportation/critical-minerals/critical-minerals-research-lab/ “Burn Book” by Kara Swisher; https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Burn-Book/Kara-Swisher/9781982163907 “Future of Travel: Is It Boom or Bust Time for EVs?” featuring Beia Spiller as a guest on the “Pivot” podcast hosted by Kara Switcher and Scott Galloway; https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/future-of-travel-is-it-boom-or-bust-time-for-evs/id1073226719?i=1000660297338 Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

For this week’s episode, host Daniel Raimi is joined by David M. Hart, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and professor emeritus at George Mason University, to discuss the making and findings of CFR’s Global Energy Innovation Index. According to Hart, energy innovation—and policy that supports it—is crucial to addressing climate change. Through comprehensive data synthesis, Hart and his team created an index for 39 countries that evaluates a nation’s capacity to support energy innovation across three categories: the policy environment for investment, the market friendliness for new technologies, and the production of knowledge via research and patents. Results show that while Scandinavian countries take the lead overall in the index, the United States scores strongly in the policy and market measures and leaves room for improvement in terms of research and patents. The index provides a global lens on energy innovation efforts, Hart notes, as one country’s strides in technology can help spur innovation internationally. References and recommendations: “Global Energy Innovation Index” by David M. Hart, Colin Cunliff, Mia Beams, and Akkshath Subrahmanian; https://www.cfr.org/reports/global-energy-innovation-index Biathlon event in the Olympics; https://www.olympics.com/en/milano-cortina-2026/sports/biathlon “Semiosis” by Sue Burke; https://torpublishinggroup.com/semiosis/ “A New (and Controversial) Approach to Climate Policy, with Varun Sivaram” from Resources Radio; https://www.resources.org/resources-radio/resources-radio-a-new-and-controversial-approach-to-climate-policy-with-varun-sivaram/ Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

In this episode, host Margaret Walls talks with Kevin Stiroh, a senior fellow at Resources for the Future and a former senior advisor at the Federal Reserve. Pulling from his extensive career in the financial sector, Stiroh expounds on how financial institutions evaluate climate-related risks and the analysis necessary to address risks across loans, insurance, and investment portfolios. Stiroh emphasizes that sound banking practices require active collaboration between research and policy to navigate financial risks. As calculations of the macroeconomic impacts of climate change evolve, past research may be less relevant and accurate than newer studies on climate change as sources of information about climate-related financial risk and shocks. Effective risk management is in a bank’s best interest, Stiroh notes, and requires rigorous, credible economic research that informs durable policy solutions. References and recommendations: “The Evolving View of Climate-Related Financial Risks in the US Financial Sector” by Kevin Stiroh; https://www.resources.org/common-resources/the-evolving-view-of-climate-related-financial-risks-in-the-us-financial-sector/ “The Effects of Climate Change–Related Risks on Banks: A Literature Review” by Olivier de Bandt, Laura-Chloé Kuntz, Nora Pankratz, Fulvio Pegoraro, Haakon Solheim, Gregory Sutton, Azusa Takeyama, and Fan Dora Xia; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joes.12665 Work from the Network of Central Banks and Supervisors for Greening the Financial System; https://www.ngfs.net/en Books and readings on Antarctic explorers Robert Falcon Scott (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Falcon_Scott) and Ernest Shackleton (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Shackleton) Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

In this episode, Destenie Nock, an associate professor at Carnegie Mellon University, joins host Daniel Raimi to discuss measures utilities and policymakers can take to better capture energy-accessibility and affordability metrics. Whereas energy data is often specific to energy providers, Nock argues that evaluating energy at a household level enables a more holistic understanding of energy usage and the energy transition. With electricity rates on the rise, accurate energy consumption data is central to ensuring comfortable temperatures in more homes. Progress in energy affordability, Nock notes, requires a multifaceted policy approach that integrates energy-equity and wellbeing metrics into measures of success. Energy affordability is not a standalone problem, and decisionmakers must recognize its ties with other cost-of-living issues and the need for inclusive data to effectively address energy burdens. References and recommendations: “Justice as a Measure of Energy Transition Success” by Destenie Nock; https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-025-01870-1 “Evicted” by Matthew Desmond; https://evictedbook.com/ “Unveiling Hidden Energy Poverty, with Destenie Nock” from Resources Radio; www.resources.org/resources-radio/unveiling-hidden-energy-poverty-with-destenie-nock/ Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

In this episode, host Kristin Hayes sits down with Resources for the Future (RFF) Senior Fellow Bryan Hubbell to look back at Hubbell’s public-service career at the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). As an environmental economist, Hubbell led efforts to integrate the social sciences into EPA’s environmental policy research and establish methods to calculate the benefits of clean air. Under his leadership, EPA developed the Environmental Benefits Mapping and Analysis Program, which has provided an accessible and rigorous way to evaluate the impacts of air-pollution regulations. The quantification and monetization of air-quality benefits are foundational to benefit-cost analyses, which Hubbell stresses are crucial to well-informed policy decisionmaking. Hubbell maintains that recent efforts to remove benefit calculations from federal benefit-cost analysis practices do not stack up against the years of stringent testing and research invested into creating these measures. References and recommendations: “If/Then: Ignoring the Benefits of Air Pollution Regulations Will Lead to Worse Policy Decisions” by Bryan Hubbell and Alan Krupnick; https://www.resources.org/common-resources/ifthen-ignoring-the-benefits-of-air-pollution-regulations-will-lead-to-worse-policy-decisions/ “How the US Environmental Protection Agency Got It Wrong About Monetizing Benefits of Air Pollution Regulations” by Bryan Hubbell and Alan Krupnick; https://www.rff.org/publications/reports/how-the-us-environmental-protection-agency-got-it-wrong-about-monetizing-benefits-of-air-pollution-regulations/ “Benefits and Costs of the Clean Air Act 1990–2020” from the US Environmental Protection Agency; https://www.epa.gov/clean-air-act-overview/benefits-and-costs-clean-air-act-1990-2020-report-documents-and-graphics “Estimating the Public Health Benefits of Proposed Air Pollution Regulations” from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; https://www.nationalacademies.org/publications/10511 “Particles of Truth: A Story of Discovery, Controversy, and the Fight for Healthy Air” by C. Arden Pope III and Douglas W. Dockery; https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/771621/particles-of-truth-by-c-arden-pope-iii-and-douglas-w-dockery-foreword-by-gina-mccarthy/ “The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet” by Jeff Goodell; https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/jeff-goodell/the-heat-will-kill-you-first/9780316497558/ Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

For this week’s episode, host Daniel Raimi is joined by Deputy Executive Director of the Energy for Growth Hub Katie Auth to examine the significance of shutting down the Power Africa program, which had been sponsored by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), along with related implications for international energy development and energy access. Auth notes how the sudden shuttering of Power Africa (and USAID) has weakened US credibility and raised confusion for countries that had been promised energy assistance via Power Africa. Auth identifies a chance for the international-development community to not simply rebuild this and other programs in coming years, but to move forward by emulating the positive, collaborative elements of Power Africa in future energy development. References and recommendations: “High Energy Planet” podcast from the Energy for Growth Hub; https://energyforgrowth.org/article/high-energy-planet-all-episodes/ “Demon Copperhead” by Barbara Kingsolver; https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/barbara-kingsolver Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

For this week’s podcast episode, host Kristin Hayes chats with Resources for the Future (RFF) Fellow Milan Elkerbout alongside Massachusetts Institute of Technology Professor and RFF University Fellow and Board Member Catherine Wolfram to make sense of the significant new global launch of the Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Markets at last year’s 30th Conference of the Parties. In accordance with a key tenet of the Paris Agreement, the declaration of the Open Coalition establishes formal—and actionable—intent for the participating countries to align on a shared global framework for carbon markets. Elkerbout and Wolfram characterize this initiative as a sign of adapting to new dynamics that have been governing international climate negotiations, with strong possibility of more countries joining. With this momentum, Elkerbout and Wolfram note progress toward emissions reductions and climate cooperation. References and recommendations: “Building a Climate Coalition: Aligning Carbon Pricing, Trade, and Development” by Catherine Wolfram, Joseph Aldy, Candido Bracher, Vaibhav Chaturvedi, Kimberly Clausing, Christian Gollier, Frank Jotzo, Marcelo PL Medeiros, Athiphat Muthitacharoen, Axel Ockenfels, Mari Pangestu, Daouda Sembene, E. Somanathan, Dustin Tingley, Jennifer Winter, Simon Black, and Carolyn Fischer; https://salatainstitute.harvard.edu/building-a-climate-coalition-gcpp-flagship-report/ “Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare” by Edward Fishman; https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/726149/chokepoints-by-edward-fishman/ “The Old World Order Is Dead” by Paul Musgrave; https://musgrave.substack.com/p/the-old-world-order-is-dead Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/

For this week’s episode, Dan Egan, the Brico Fund Journalist in Residence at the Center for Water Policy at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee and Pulitzer Prize finalist, joins host Margaret Walls to discuss his book, “The Devil's Element: Phosphorus and a World Out of Balance.” Through stories about the history of phosphorus—including why it earned the “devil’s element” title—Egan describes the large-scale ecological experiment in a Canadian lake that opened people’s eyes to the connections between phosphorus, agriculture, and algal blooms, also noting the challenges of reconciling business interests with environmental concerns. Despite ongoing water pollution in the Midwest, Egan’s experience as a Great Lakes journalist has shown that clearing toxins from waters is a goal within reach that has wide-reaching benefits. References and recommendations: “The Devil’s Element: Phosphorus and a World Out of Balance” by Dan Egan; https://wwnorton.com/books/the-devils-element “The Dark Frontier: Unlocking the Secrets of the Deep Sea” by Jeffrey Marlow; https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/652987/the-dark-frontier-by-jeffrey-marlow/ “A Terrible Country” by Keith Gessen; https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/545063/a-terrible-country-by-keith-gessen/ Subscribe to stay up to date on podcast episodes, news, and research from Resources for the Future: https://www.rff.org/subscribe/