Speakers

Joel Bourne is a contributing writer for National Geographic. A former senior editor for the environment, he's covered major environmental issues for the magazine, including oil exploration on Alaska's North Slope, the push for biofuels, and the future of New Orleans. He's broken several stories in the national media, including the results of the only oil well drilled in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and the weaknesses in New Orleans' rebuilt hurricane protection system. His 2004 feature on Louisiana's wetland loss opened with a hypothetical scene of a hurricane flooding New Orleans that was eerily similar to what happened during Hurricane Katrina ten months later. Most recently, he was text editor and essayist for National Geographic's special issue on climate change.