Hannah Ritchie’s new book on net zero is a breath of fresh air

Purify the air
Hannah Ritchie, Chatto & Windus (UK); MIT Press (United States, released March 3, 2026)

A few weeks ago, I was having dinner with friends and the conversation veered – as it often does when there is a climate journalist, an activist and two civil servants sitting at the table – onto the topic of renewable energy.

As you may have already guessed, I was dining with some pretty savvy individuals, well-informed about the dangers of climate change and the urgent need to transition to cleaner forms of energy. But the question was still asked to me: surely we will still need gas in our electricity networks as a backup fuel? A country like the UK can’t rely solely on wind, solar and batteries during the dreary and dark winter months, can it?

It’s times like these that data scientist Hannah Ritchie’s new book, Clearing the Air: A Hopeful Guide to Solving Climate Change in 50 Questions and Answersexcels. Thanks to my well-thumbed copy, I was able to take my friends on a quick tour of some of the storage options that could help power the grid when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine. Pumped hydropower, geothermal power, and hydrogen could all play a role, I told them.

Ritchie’s previous book, Not the end of the worldwas a crash course in how to solve the planet’s environmental challenges. Purify the air has the same optimistic tone, but it’s more of a “how-to” guide, providing data-backed answers to any questions you might have on the path to net zero.

Queries are organized by topic, ranging from fossil fuels and renewable energy to electric cars and home heating. Reading it, one can’t help but think that this is Ritchie’s response to the continuing deluge of ill-informed — and often downright misleading — media reporting and political statements about the transition to net zero, the kind that tell people that electric cars will run out of power on the highway, that heat pumps don’t work in cold weather, and that the world doesn’t have enough land available for solar power.

Purify the air pushes back against this misinformation using the power of scientific research and quality data. For example, one of the questions Ritchie answers is whether wind farms kill birds – a favorite line of attack of US President Donald Trump. The answer is yes, wind turbines kill some birds, but that number is dwarfed by the annual death rate from cats, buildings, cars and pesticides.

However, wind turbines pose a real threat to certain bats, migratory birds and raptors. But Ritchie is quick to point out that there are steps we can take to reduce the risks, such as changing the location of wind farms, painting wind turbines black and turning off the blades during periods of low wind. It’s the kind of nuance you won’t get in a newspaper headline or political quip, but it’s essential to understanding the benefits and risks of our clean energy transition.

Each question and answer sequence follows the same format, making it an easy read, but it veers towards formulaic if read in one sitting. Purify the air works best as a sort of reference guide, to keep on hand when a climate-skeptical uncle shows up at Christmas dinner, for example.

Throughout, Ritchie’s now characteristic optimism shines through. It makes clear that for almost every aspect of the net-zero transition, we have viable decarbonization options, without shying away from challenges or wishful thinking. The effect is powerful: you leave informed and full of hope, with the certainty that it will be possible for humanity to emerge from the climate crisis. In a world of fake news and political manipulation, this book is a breath of fresh air.