Speak Up for Blue Podcast Network

Ocean Conservancy's "Not Safe for Wash" campaign is built around a simple premise: the fix for washing machine microfiber pollution already exists, so the fight isn't about inventing new technology, it's about forcing a nearly two-decade-old idea into law. Its own May 2026 poll of 1,010 Americans found concern about microplastics up 32% since 2023, nearly 9 in 10 people concerned, and 81% in favor of requiring filters on new washing machines. The public isn't the obstacle. The real opponent is A

This week on World Ocean Radio we are revisiting the Global Footprint Network and the concept of "overshoot", the number of days by which citizens and corporations of any nation consume the natural resources that are sustainably available for that year. And we're describing numbers as measured through a series of graphs that visualize trends by category, up or down, of human enterprise worldwide. World Ocean Radio is a weekly series of five-minute audio essays available for syndicated use at no

Every wash cycle sheds plastic. Last Monday, Andrew talked with Dr. Anja Brandon of Ocean Conservancy about microfiber pollution, and one question from that conversation stuck with him: has anyone actually fixed this yet? In this solo follow-up, Andrew traces a microfiber's actual path, from the moment agitation, heat, and detergent work it loose from a shirt, through the drain, into a wastewater treatment plant, and out the other side into biosolids, farmland, rivers, and the ocean, with a grow

About this episode This week on World Ocean Radio we are revisiting the Global Footprint Network and the concept of "Overshoot"-- the number of days by which citizens and corporations of any nation consume the resources that are sustainably available. About World Ocean Radio World Ocean Radio is a weekly series of five-minute audio essays available for syndicated use at no cost by college and community radio stations worldwide. Peter Neill, Founder of the World Ocean Observatory and host of Wor

Bacteria that eat plastic sounds like the fix everyone's been waiting for, and Andrew gets sent videos about it constantly. So on this solo episode, following Monday's interview with Dr. Anja Brandon of Ocean Conservancy, he goes looking for the real state of the science. The short version: it's promising, it's roughly a decade of real research deep, and it is nowhere close to running at the scale the ocean plastic crisis actually needs. The bacterium that started this whole field, Ideonella sa

Every shark course needs a bible, and this one just got a second edition. Five years after the first Shark Biology and Conservation: Essentials for Educators, Students, and Enthusiasts landed on shelves and in classrooms, co-authors Dan Abel, Dean Grubbs, Tristan Guttridge, and Josh Moyer rebuilt it from the ground up: new chapters, new contributed essays from researchers around the world, and two co-authors who weren't part of the original book at all. Three of the four join Andrew and Dave (De

Every time you run a load of laundry, your washing machine sheds plastic. Not metaphorically: synthetic clothing made from polyester, nylon, and rayon releases microfibers with every wash, and depending on the study, a single load can shed anywhere from a few hundred thousand to millions of them. Most of us have never thought about it, because unlike a plastic bag on the beach, you can't see it happening. In this episode, Andrew talks with Dr. Anja Brandon, Director of Plastics Policy at Ocean C

A new documentary called Descent – Into the Blue starts airing on public television stations nationwide on September 1, 2026. It's narrated by Peter Coyote, directed by Rory Fielding, and one of its central voices is Mike Goldberg, co-founder of the Florida Keys coral restoration nonprofit I.CARE and owner of Key Dives in Islamorada. Andrew sits down with Mike for the full, unedited version of the conversation this week's four solo episodes have been building toward: 30-plus years running a dive

Six months into your ocean project, you realize nobody knows who it's for. Now you're untangling years of work instead of moving forward. In this episode, host Andrew Lewin sits down with Natalie Gilson, co-CEO of Pisces Oceans, to talk about the cost of treating communications as an afterthought. Whether you're running a nonprofit, a startup, or an academic research project, Natalie makes the case that communications strategy belongs at the start, not six months or a year down the road once th

Most coral restoration groups check on a sample of what they've planted, often around 20 to 30 percent, and report that sample as if it represents everything in the water. I.CARE checks on all of it. Every single coral outplant gets monitored at one week, one month, 90 days, then one, two, and three years, with no substitute and nothing left unaccounted for. That rule was built in by co-founders Mike Goldberg and Dr. Kylie Smith before I.CARE ever planted its first coral, and Mike frames it as a