The Planet is on Fire. And the Journalism Industry is in Turmoil

Amidst mass newsroom layoffs and declining climate coverage, independent climate journalism is helping fill the gap. But it needs support.

Chicago, Illinois was the host city for the 2026 Society of Environmental Journalists conference. Credit: Dana Drugmand

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I recently returned home from Chicago where I attended the 2026 Society of Environmental Journalists (SEJ) conference, an annual gathering of reporters and other professionals engaged in environmental work. It goes without saying that these are incredibly challenging times to be working in the environmental sphere; the same goes for working in the journalism field, which is currently in a state of turmoil. Working at the intersection of these two fields, then – being an environmental journalist – is doubly tough in this moment. The conference did not shy away from this reality.

Its concluding plenary session, for example, titled “Protecting Environmental Journalists, Protecting the Planet: Safety, Support and Resilience,” featured an important and candid discussion about some of the challenges – including emotional distress – facing journalists who cover the state of the planet. Rebecca Weston, co-executive director of the Climate Psychology Alliance of North America and co-founder of the CARES media initiative, highlighted a new report from the initiative that surveyed the emotional and mental wellbeing of environmental journalists. “In short: Many journalists who cover climate change and the environment are not fine. The survey found high levels of anxiety, stress, depression, and climate distress among the 188 journalists who responded,” the executive summary explains.

Another one of the panelists, Nepali journalist Kunda Dixit, discussed some of the broader trends affecting journalists like democratic backsliding and restrictions on press freedom. Protecting journalism, he said, is essential for protecting the planet.

Dixit authored a chapter speaking to that very message in a 2025 UNESCO report, World trends in freedom of expression and media development: global report 2022/2025. “Press freedom is under attack worldwide… In an era when support for traditional media is dwindling amid economic uncertainty, political pressure and techno-logical shifts, defending free, independent journalism must be recognized as a development priority,” UNESCO assistant director-general for communication and information Tawfik Jelassi writes in the report’s foreword. And as Dixit writes in his chapter: “As the triple planetary crisis endangers all life on the planet, the mass media’s capacity to draw attention to the urgency of the issues is seriously undermined by the crisis in journalism and in democracy itself.”

Today, May 3, is World Press Freedom Day, so it seems particularly appropriate to reflect upon this crisis in journalism generally and specifically what it means for climate and environmental journalism. And while the overall picture may seem grim, there are solutions or ways that the situation can be improved (like funding this work!).

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But first, the bad news (no pun intended). The journalism industry in general is going through a period of mass layoffs; nearly 10,000 journalists have been laid off in the past three years, according to a 2025 article in Nieman Reports. “CBS, CNN, NBC and other broadcasters cut newsroom staff,” Climate Rights International’s Felix Horne wrote in a February article in Climate Home News. Even the Guardian, he notes – which does some of the best news reporting especially on the climate crisis – “has acknowledged sustained financial strain and has reduced or consolidated reporting capacity in recent years.”

As newsrooms shrink, climate journalists are getting tossed aside. Mainstream news outlets have been eliminating or slashing their climate desks. “The Washington Post gutted its climate team amid a larger set of layoffs. So did CBS News… ABC News and NBC News also all but eliminated their climate teams,” Covering Climate Now, an initiative that aims to improve climate coverage worldwide, noted in its new white paper titled “A Burning House, A Quiet Media, a Silenced Majority.”

CBS News layoffs last October essentially eliminated the team that supported its climate news coverage. In axing these newsroom positions, CBS’s new pro-Trump chief executive David Ellison “has effectively told CBS News it’s no longer responsible for keeping the public informed about climate change,” climate reporter Emily Atkin wrote in her HEATED newsletter. (Atkin recently brought one of those ex-CBS News journalists, senior climate producer Tracy Wholf, on board with HEATED to produce podcasts).

In early February, The Washington Post (owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos) nixed most of its climate journalists – more than a dozen altogether – as part of a round of mass layoffs that affected nearly one-third of the company with hundreds of journalists losing their jobs. “The climate team was one of many casualties,” climate journalist Sammy Roth (formerly with the Los Angeles Times) wrote in his Substack publication Climate Colored Goggles. “But the sad loss of another dozen jobs only adds to a sad trend of legacy media organizations pulling back from climate coverage, even as global warming accelerates.”

“We hear a lot about people who are being laid off, about people who are moving out, people who are being squeezed out. And to be frank, the picture’s not good right now,” Covering Climate Now’s Kyle Pope said during a webinar last December. “A lot of climate journalists are losing their jobs at a very difficult time for journalism in general.”

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The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette recently announced a deep downsizing, slashing jobs that will shrink the newsroom to just under half its current size.

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Unsurprisingly then, news media coverage of climate change is decreasing. Climate coverage declined globally by 14 percent in 2025 compared to the prior year, and was down 38 percent from its peak in 2021, according to CU Boulder’s Media and Climate Change Observatory. In the U.S., climate change coverage by the big broadcast networks has fallen by 35 percent, the Covering Climate Now report, which was released during the SEJ conference in Chicago, notes.

Newsroom staff cuts are of course one reason for this decline in climate coverage. Corporate and billionaire owners of mainstream news outlets are largely silencing reporting on the climate crisis, prioritizing profits over the public’s right to know. As Covering Climate Now wrote in its February 19 Climate Beat newsletter: “The people who own much of the world’s media do not regard coverage of climate change to be in their economic interest. As a result, the rest of us are left in darkness.”

This is part of a bigger trend known as “climate hushing,” where political leaders like U.S. President Donald Trump refuse to talk about the climate problem, except (in the case of Trump) to deny that it’s happening. “That denial has emboldened others — in business, in politics, and in media — to downplay the climate threat,” the Covering Climate Now report states.

Climate has also fallen off the news agenda given the “firehose” of other news items to report on any given day. Trump’s chaos and “flood the zone” strategy has the effect of overwhelming the news media and distracting coverage away from issues that really matter.

What is happening to our planet and its critical life-support systems matters. The journalism industry is in turmoil and climate and environmental coverage is declining at precisely the time when the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution is rapidly worsening. The science is clear that we are in the midst of a climate emergency. And mitigating it at a level that our civilization can survive, as Covering Climate Now’s Mark Hertsgaard said during a recent webinar discussing the new white paper, requires phasing out fossil fuels. The climate story, and the stakes, are “literally that existential.”

Support Independent Climate Journalism

This is important and meaningful work. But, like any public service, it needs support to be able to survive and thrive. “We need journalism funded as critical infrastructure,” journalist Maria Ressa, co-founder and CEO of Rappler and winner of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, said during the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 2026 Doomsday Clock Announcement virtual panel earlier this year.

Ressa warned that the rise of Big Tech, AI and social media threatens democracy and truth itself, noting that a “predatory, extractive business model is corrupting our shared sense of reality.” She echoed the call to support independent journalism.

“Independent platforms, newsletters and Substack writers now produce some of the best climate coverage anywhere. They matter deeply,” Climate Rights International’s Horne wrote in his February commentary piece. “Supporting climate journalism is an investment in truth, accountability and a livable planet for our children and future generations.”

Truth, accountability, and a livable planet are the essence of what drives this newsletter, One Earth Now. It is journalism that tells the truth about the climate emergency, and covers actions and efforts to hold accountable the powerful interests that are fueling the fire. The title reflects the urgency of this fight for a livable Earth, the only planet that all of humanity and all living beings collectively call home.

There are lots of climate newsletters out there, many of them on Substack, so it is not easy to build a readership in an increasingly crowded space. I value each and every one of my subscribers, and I understand that a lot folks are likely not in a position financially to pay for a subscription right now. But paid subscriptions are what really makes a difference for me and other independent journalists on Substack. It is literally what allows us to keep going.

Lack of funding is probably the biggest challenge and constraint on doing this work. Reader support through paid subscriptions certainly helps. But greater institutional or philanthropic funding is also needed. “We think that funders could make more support available for journalists covering climate and environment. Funders should prioritize supporting climate and environmental journalism now, particularly given the urgent nature of the issues,” Gabi Mocatta, senior research fellow in climate science communication at the University of Tasmania and lead researcher on a 2024 report called Covering the Planet: Assessing the State of Climate and Environmental Journalism Globally, said during an October 2024 webinar discussing the report.

That’s really the bottom line (again, no pun intended). Speaking during the recent April 16 webinar discussing the new Covering Climate Now report, SEJ executive director Aparna Mukherjee echoed the call for more financial support for this critical work: “Fund environmental journalism and climate coverage.”

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