Abrahm Lustgarten
Abrahm Lustgarten writes about human adaptation to climate change, including global migration, demographic change and conflicts in response to a warming planet.
Need to Get in Touch?
Abrahm Lustgarten writes about climate change and works frequently with The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic and PBS Frontline, among others. His forthcoming book, “On The Move,” explores how climate change is uprooting American lives and where people will go.
Lustgarten’s recent reporting focuses on global migration, demographic change and conflict in response to a warming climate. His 2022 investigation into how the International Monetary Fund and global finance institutions have kept Barbados and other climate-vulnerable nations paralyzed by high levels of debt led in part to the introduction of the Bridgetown Initiative, a global effort to reform climate finance for developing countries crafted by Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Mottley. In 2020 Lustgarten’s three-story cover series on a great climate-driven migration, published in partnership with the Times Magazine, helped prompt President Joe Biden’s formation of a climate migration study group and research report in the run-up to the COP26 conference in Glasgow, Scotland.
Lustgarten’s other investigations include an examination of the global palm oil trade, the climate drivers of pandemics and BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill (which led to the Emmy-nominated “The Spill” with Frontline, a project he worked on). His 2015 series examining water scarcity in the American West, “Killing the Colorado,” was a finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting, received the top journalism honor from the National Academies of Sciences and was also the basis of the 2016 Discovery Channel film “Killing the Colorado,” which Lustgarten co-produced. His early investigation into fracking, starting in 2008, exposed one of the oil industry’s most dangerous legacies — its ongoing threat to America’s drinking water. The work received the George Polk award for environmental reporting, the National Press Foundation award for best energy writing and a Sigma Delta Chi award; it was a finalist for the Goldsmith Prize.
Before joining ProPublica, Lustgarten was a staff writer at Fortune. He holds a master’s in journalism from Columbia University and a bachelor’s in anthropology from Cornell, and was a 2022 Emerson Collective Fellow at New America. He is the author of two books: “Run to Failure: BP and the Making of the Deepwater Horizon Disaster” and “China’s Great Train: Beijing’s Drive West and the Campaign to Remake Tibet.”
Proposed California Law Would Punish Companies for Failing to Limit Harm to the Planet’s Forests
The legislation could affect everything from what paper gets used in state offices to what gets served in California cafeterias.
Scientists Call for Drastic Drop in Emissions. U.S. Appears to Have Gone the Other Way.
A report by a private research company found that U.S. emissions, which amount to one-sixth of the planet's, didn't fall in 2018 but instead skyrocketed. The 3.4 percent jump for 2018, projected by the firm, would be second-largest surge in greenhouse gas emissions from the U.S. since Bill Clinton was president.
Palm Oil Was Supposed to Help Save the Planet. Instead It Unleashed a Catastrophe.
A decade ago, the U.S. mandated the use of vegetable oil in biofuels, leading to industrial-scale deforestation — and a huge spike in carbon emissions.
Potential Insurance Bill From Hurricane Florence Could Take Toll on Wallets Far From North Carolina’s Coast
Insurance companies retreated from some communities amid stronger storms, leaving a “last-resort” plan to fill the growing gap.
by Abrahm Lustgarten and Talia Buford,
Defense Inspector General to Investigate Military’s Toxic Open Burning
The inquiry will evaluate whether the polluting practice is legal, and whether contractors have proper oversight.
How the EPA and the Pentagon Downplayed a Growing Toxic Threat
A family of chemicals — known as PFAS and responsible for marvels like Teflon and critical to the safety of American military bases — has now emerged as a far greater menace than previously disclosed.
Suppressed Study: The EPA Underestimated Dangers of Widespread Chemicals
The CDC has quietly published a controversial review of perfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, that indicates more people are at risk of drinking contaminated water than previously thought.
by Abrahm Lustgarten, Lisa Song and Talia Buford,
Congress Aims to Force Pentagon Reform on Open Burning of Munitions
A provision of the latest proposed defense spending bill mandates that the Department of Defense address one of its longstanding and dangerous sources of pollution.
Get an Inside Look at the Department of Defense’s Struggle to Fix Pollution at More Than 39,000 Sites
For the first time, the Pentagon’s internal database used to track its environmental problems is available to the public.
Canadian Research Adds to Worry Over an Environmental Threat the Pentagon Has Downplayed for Decades
A study released late last year gives environmental experts a way to quantify how much RDX, a chemical used in military explosives, is spreading into surrounding communities.