0:01

Hi, I'm Greya, and this is The

0:03

Climate Question, where we ask simply, what

0:06

on earth can we do about climate change? Podcasts

0:10

from the BBC World Service are

0:12

supported by advertising. The

0:19

Global Story, with smart takes and

0:21

fresh perspectives on one big news

0:24

story, every Monday to Friday from

0:26

the BBC World Service. Search

0:29

for The Global Story wherever you get

0:31

your BBC podcasts to find out more.

0:37

What do camera phones, memory

0:39

foam, mattresses and baby formia

0:41

have in common? They're

0:44

all inventions we wouldn't have if it

0:46

weren't for space travel. And

0:48

so it seems only natural to look

0:51

to the stars for solutions to the

0:53

biggest issue of our time, climate change.

0:56

I'm Greya Jackson, regular host of

0:58

The Climate Question, the BBC World

1:01

Service's flagship show on the

1:03

issue. And this week I wanted

1:05

to share with you a golden oldie from our

1:07

back catalogue, plus an update about space

1:10

and the fight against climate change at

1:12

the end. So without further ado, here's

1:14

the show. It

1:21

felt like a dream. I

1:24

would wake up in those three, five

1:26

seconds between when your alarm rings and

1:28

when you're fully awake. I

1:30

would forget that I'm on the space station. I

1:35

would try to move and then I would realise

1:37

that I'm weightless. And

1:41

it was just the best feeling ever because it was like

1:43

a surprise every day. Thomas

1:48

Pescay is a real hero in

1:50

France, an astronaut who spent over

1:52

a year on the international space

1:54

station. In fact, he commanded

1:56

it. It's got quite a

1:58

view. Where

2:03

in the vicinity of the earth?

2:05

four hundred kilometers above the surface?

2:08

And then you see although variety that

2:10

Doris has to offer is all the

2:12

different landscapes, the deserts, the islands to

2:14

forests and lots of see as well.

2:18

I think what struck me is this

2:21

vision of the or something very senate.

2:23

You know it has an end. It

2:25

has a beginning. Everything is changing. All

2:27

the resources that we have our contain.

2:30

It's not something that is incentives which

2:32

is the impression we have. But

2:34

when you take a step back, you look

2:37

at from afar you realize that is just

2:39

like a rest. You know that's out there

2:41

in the cosmos. The

2:46

point and was weary a climate for

2:48

them of very interested in having the

2:51

powered on the International Space station and

2:53

is it would you not running a

2:55

table the that to with him now

2:57

of were not we we have our

2:59

solar arrays Like most about spacecraft answer

3:01

lies out there We have the equivalent

3:04

of Aids courts can't surface we have

3:06

this is seventy kilowatts of Zola powers

3:08

as being generated so it's huge or

3:10

mean those are raise our a massive

3:12

and you can see them when you

3:14

look out the window. From the space station

3:16

you can see them when you're on the spacewalks with

3:19

us with gives us our energy. our

3:24

make sense. In space good a great the

3:27

as the sun if you're. In the right

3:29

kind of all that the supply them with

3:31

and and are many other options out. There

3:33

but could this idea be of any

3:35

use to is on earth. Space might

3:37

be a great place for so. Help

3:41

me turn my lights on. Me

3:43

on grand. The

3:46

The Climate Question for the Bbc World

3:49

Service and Lead Times and Se. to

3:51

a question this week's could solar power

3:53

in space but my energy for this

4:01

Now this probably sounds very

4:03

futuristic, but the idea's been talked

4:06

about for decades. There

4:09

was an amazing thing that happened in the 40s and

4:12

50s of this speculative science

4:14

fiction. This is Rick

4:16

Tumlinson, self-confessed space geek and amongst

4:18

other things, founder of Space Fund,

4:20

a venture capital firm for space

4:22

startups. So much of

4:25

what we're doing comes from that period,

4:27

Artistry Clark and Robert Heinlein and Isaac

4:29

Asimov. It was

4:31

quite an in the office as

4:33

room once under station number five,

4:36

except for the swift purring

4:38

of the mighty beam director somewhere far below. Robot

4:42

QT1 sat immovable. In

4:44

1941, Isaac Asimov's short story

4:47

Reason imagined a world where

4:49

human-built space stations staffed mostly

4:51

by robots, trapped the sun's

4:54

energy and beamed it back down to

4:56

Earth. The robots

4:58

go on a bit of a power trip, there's a big

5:00

electron storm and things get a bit precarious,

5:15

but let's gloss over that. All

5:18

of these writers were just churning

5:20

out these brilliant ideas about what

5:22

was possible and among them

5:24

were the ideas of space solar power,

5:27

space elevators, all this good stuff. And

5:29

Rick, we can see your office where you're talking

5:31

to us from. I can see a rocket on

5:33

the shelf. I can see return to the moon

5:36

poster. Talk us through some of the space

5:38

merch. It is. I

5:40

am, I guess I don't know if there's a good term

5:42

for it, but I am a swag

5:44

hag. I don't know what you call

5:46

it. Space hoarder. Space hoarder. Yeah,

5:50

over here is just a collection of fun

5:52

Star Trek stuff and things like that. You

5:54

know, there's the high frontier over here, which

5:56

is the Bible. All of this,

5:59

everybody in this. field. I was there inspiration

6:01

and guidance to Dr. O'Neill in this book

6:03

which came out in the 70s. And that's

6:05

Gerard O'Neill and his book is Gerard, Gerard

6:08

K. O'Neill. These

6:10

are the most dangerous decades in

6:13

all human history. We have

6:15

the capability to destroy ourselves and

6:17

yet we have not yet broken

6:20

free of the limitations of

6:22

that thin biosphere of the Earth. Once

6:25

we do so, the human race will

6:27

be truly unkillable.

6:31

Dr. O'Neill was just this amazing

6:33

fellow who really gave

6:35

us permission to dream. He was very inspirational

6:38

and he laid out a pragmatic path where

6:40

he said basically you don't have to be

6:42

an astronaut, government employee, whatever to

6:44

open space. Just use the

6:46

principles of democracy, free enterprise and

6:49

space resources and go forth. So

6:52

Rick, what did Gerard O'Neill have

6:54

to say about this idea of

6:56

putting solar panels in space? Right.

6:58

So coming out of the Apollo program, we've been

7:00

to the moon, there was a culture of like

7:02

we can do anything. We had seen

7:05

the Earth from space, the environmental movement had kicked

7:07

in and we're like we have to save

7:09

the planet. At the same time,

7:11

there was the Vietnam War, there was

7:13

the Cold War, the young people of

7:15

the time wanted something hopeful. Dr. O'Neill put

7:17

those together. He was also

7:20

though, and he admitted this to me,

7:22

wanting to find an economic driver

7:25

that would create enough jobs and

7:27

the need for enough infrastructure to

7:29

support the development of a human

7:31

civilization expanding beyond the Earth. And

7:34

so the people who are living in these colonies

7:37

or habitats, they're making their

7:39

living by mining

7:42

asteroids and building massive

7:45

solar collectors in orbit that's beaming the

7:47

power back to the Earth. Which sounds

7:50

bonkers, surely, and very much

7:52

the kind of invention that isn't likely

7:54

to make it from science fiction to

7:56

science reality. Well, no. making

8:00

this a reality. I had

8:02

the chance, as I was growing up in

8:04

Malaysia, to meet a NASA shuttle

8:06

astronaut when I was about 15 years old

8:09

who had come to Malaysia to talk

8:12

about his experiences on the shuttle. And

8:15

that got me really interested in space

8:17

exploration. Sanjay Vijendran leads

8:19

Solaris at the European Space

8:21

Agency, their project on space-based

8:23

solar power. My dream was

8:25

to help launch astronauts into space and

8:28

from mission control. That seemed to be

8:30

really exciting. That turned out not

8:32

to be something possible at NASA, not being

8:34

a US citizen. So I

8:36

decided to try to get into

8:38

the robotic exploration program with Mars

8:40

exploration. And how did

8:43

you get into this idea of

8:45

space-based solar power? So in

8:48

the last couple of years, some of us

8:50

started to think about how space could do

8:52

more to help with fighting climate change. And

8:55

so when we looked around, we kind of

8:57

rediscovered this concept of space-based solar power, which

8:59

had gone quiet at the agency for quite

9:02

some time. It does seem bonkers

9:04

sometimes when you think about it. But

9:07

on the other hand, conceptually, it's fairly

9:09

simple and straightforward. So you're collecting the

9:11

energy with solar panels from sunlight, just

9:13

like we do on the surface of

9:15

the Earth. But you're doing this high

9:17

above the atmosphere out of

9:19

the shadow of the Earth. And this is a

9:21

rather crucial aspect. Once you are in a high

9:23

enough orbit, you are able to see the sun

9:25

24-7, 365 days a year. So

9:30

this gives you a source of continuous

9:32

power, something that's just simply not available

9:34

with solar power on the surface

9:36

of the Earth, because we have nighttime

9:38

and we have bad weather. So here

9:41

we have a constant source of

9:43

solar energy, and then a humongous

9:47

antenna to be able to shape it

9:49

into a beam and send it

9:51

down to the Earth, where we collect

9:53

it with a very large receiver and

9:55

then converting that to electricity and feeding

9:57

it into the grid. actually

10:00

do that, how big would the infrastructure have

10:02

to be in space? So

10:04

we're talking about things between one and

10:06

two kilometers in size at the gigawatt

10:09

scale. There are different ways that you

10:11

can do this. You could either have

10:13

fewer, very large satellites providing

10:15

a huge amount of power, or you could

10:17

try to distribute this by breaking it down

10:20

into smaller satellites and having a constellation of

10:22

them. So you're talking

10:24

about a solar farm several kilometers

10:27

in size, thousands of kilometers in

10:30

space. How on earth do you

10:32

get these solar panels up there? So

10:35

we need to start thinking of

10:37

rockets now as essentially delivery trucks

10:39

to send flat-packed solar panels,

10:41

just like we do on the Earth.

10:43

We ship out a whole load of

10:46

panels that have been built on a

10:48

factory line through mass production. We

10:50

put these onto huge rockets and we

10:52

need to have reusable rockets

10:54

to reduce the cost of launch and

10:56

then get a

10:59

fleet of autonomous robots to

11:02

put these panels together into

11:04

a single- and

11:27

ready for. So we deliberately design all

11:29

of these structures and the technologies that

11:31

we need, like the robots, to be

11:34

as standardized as possible and

11:37

produce these in large numbers because

11:39

they'll be needed for such a large

11:41

scale. The cost would not be as

11:43

cheap as terrestrial solar or wind, but

11:46

more comparable to nuclear. And the important

11:49

thing to realize when you think of

11:51

the economics is that we're not trying

11:53

to compete on price with terrestrial solar

11:56

or wind because the electricity that's provided

11:58

is of a different nature. of

12:00

a higher value because it is reliable and

12:02

24-7. In

12:05

order to get these solar panels

12:07

up into space, you're going to

12:09

need a lot of rockets going

12:11

back and forth and launching rockets

12:13

emits a lot of CO2 which

12:15

of course is the very problem

12:17

that we're trying to mitigate. So

12:20

how do you know that this solution

12:22

isn't actually going to do more harm than

12:25

good in terms of emissions? Yes,

12:27

so it only makes sense if we're going

12:29

to reduce the amount of

12:31

CO2 emissions overall. During the lifetime

12:34

of the power station compared to not doing

12:36

it. And it was

12:38

confirmed from studies in the mid-2000s

12:40

that with the sheer amount of

12:43

energy that this produces due to

12:45

24-7 operation, the carbon payback time

12:48

essentially is about six months to a

12:50

year out of a 30-year lifetime of

12:53

operation. Six months? I'm

12:55

shorter than I ever thought. I know, because there is

12:57

real concern about the growing impact of

13:00

space travel on climate change. So

13:08

we've heard about the massive solar panels,

13:10

these solar arrays way up in space.

13:13

What about getting all that energy back down to

13:16

Earth? Well, the plan is to beam it

13:18

back as a microwave signal. The

13:20

beams would need to travel thousands of

13:22

kilometres to get here and when they

13:24

land we'd need receivers two to ten

13:26

kilometres wide to catch all that energy.

13:28

Perhaps some of them would be offshore.

13:30

And if we remember what one of Rick's sci-fi writers

13:33

was talking about decades ago. Enough

13:35

to blast hundreds of square miles of Earth

13:38

into incandescent ruins. We

13:44

surely do. Well,

13:46

thankfully that's the fiction part for

13:48

science fiction. Sanjay can explain. Most

13:51

of the concepts in the last decades

13:53

have moved towards designing inherently

13:56

safe power beaming systems

13:58

using radio frequency. using

14:01

similar frequencies to Wi-Fi and

14:03

mobile phones, where there's

14:05

been a lot of study about the

14:07

safety of using low intensity signals

14:09

in that frequency range. So we know that

14:11

it's a frequency that is not carcinogenic, and

14:14

if we keep the intensity low enough,

14:16

below safe limits, then it's something

14:18

that we believe is compatible

14:21

with satellites, with planes flying through it, with birds, flora

14:23

and fauna on the Earth as well. So

14:27

what countries are actively working on all of this

14:29

and planning for it to be used? A

14:32

few have been working on technology

14:34

for space-based solar power for quite

14:36

some time, like Japan, but

14:38

China is the only country actually in

14:41

the world that has a declared program

14:43

to build a first space-based solar power

14:45

station at the gigawatt scale by 2050,

14:49

with a plan to put a first demonstrator in

14:51

orbit by 2028. The

14:54

US is also working on this,

14:56

not at NASA yet, but the

14:58

US military have been for some

15:01

years funding activities in this area

15:03

because there's an interest for the military to be

15:05

able to send energy to

15:07

their forward operating bases, which

15:09

may be in very remote regions where it's

15:12

difficult to get fossil fuels,

15:14

for example, to provide energy. So

15:16

how soon will the European Space

15:19

Agency have a prototype for

15:21

one of these? We've

15:23

given ourselves three years to confirm

15:25

that we are able to reach

15:27

the performances, the costs, and

15:30

the feasibility of these technologies in

15:32

the next 10 to 15 years. And

15:35

if that decision is made in

15:37

2025 to go forward with a full program, we

15:41

would see a first in-orbit demonstrator in

15:43

the 2030 timeframe, and

15:46

then scaling up towards the commercial

15:49

scale during the 2030s, hopefully

15:52

before 2040 to be fully operational. available

16:00

24-7, sounds pretty promising and several

16:03

countries already well underway exploring the

16:05

idea. Yeah but there are some

16:07

big obstacles to overcome. There's still a

16:09

lot of the technology that's not possible

16:12

quite yet. We don't currently have

16:14

large reusable rockets that can go reliably

16:16

back and forth to space to get

16:18

the solar panels up there. We

16:21

don't yet have the robotics that could

16:23

assemble these enormous solar arrays that Sanjay

16:25

was describing and so far no

16:27

one's been this much energy back down to

16:29

earth before. And on that point in particular there

16:32

is a bit of skepticism. Dr. Ivana

16:34

Rizulovic is head of mechanical and design

16:37

engineering at Portsmouth University in the UK.

16:39

It would work but it

16:42

wouldn't work very well because

16:44

transmitting energy over distances wirelessly

16:47

is not as easy as wirelessly

16:50

charging our phones. So

16:52

there are losses associated with

16:54

that transmission and the greater

16:56

the distances the bigger the

16:58

losses are. Until recently

17:00

that transmission efficiency was reported

17:03

to be in single figures

17:05

so very very low. Single

17:07

figures meaning that 90% of

17:09

the energy was lost

17:11

on the way. So

17:17

even though the solar energy from space would

17:19

be much more powerful and efficient

17:22

than land solar as Sanjay was saying

17:24

by the time you've beamed it hundreds

17:26

of kilometers down to earth you

17:28

might lose most of it in the process. But

17:30

some experts dispute this. Fraser Nash a

17:32

consultancy that did a big report on

17:35

space-based solar for the UK government said

17:37

the efficiency of the beam could be

17:39

about 60% and

17:42

they argued that efficiency isn't such a

17:44

big concern when you've got a free

17:46

limitless energy supply per sun but

17:48

no one's actually done it yet to scale so

17:50

we'll have to see. And of

17:53

course the other big barrier is cost

17:55

Even if it might one day be

17:57

comparable to nuclear energy sending a rocket.

18:00

With the solar panel up into space cause

18:02

a lot more than driving them to us

18:04

field with a truck or putting a wind

18:06

turbine in the same you own a things

18:08

are resources could be better spent close to

18:10

home. whenever. There is an

18:13

allied suffices this crazy ideas come

18:15

into focus and cause they'll have

18:17

their merits but throughout history we

18:19

have all this seems as costs

18:21

of does this prohibitive boss that

18:23

lot of the a say I'm

18:25

not saying that. The couldn't be

18:27

working towards solar power and space.

18:29

There's a lot more that we

18:32

could be doing that should be

18:34

doing sir Stamp here on Earth.

18:36

So lot on Earth has

18:38

certainly got a lot cheaper.

18:40

The of course there's one

18:42

big problem, which is that

18:44

there's no sunshine at night

18:46

on battery storage isn't currently

18:48

good enough, so unless we

18:50

look at these radical solutions,

18:52

how would she solve the

18:54

problem in getting sanity I

18:56

completely agree of of batteries

18:58

can't be the only solution

19:00

than it's And storage fair

19:02

most storied says well understood,

19:04

tried and tested technology. The

19:06

idea. Of using green electricity

19:09

to invest into a different

19:11

type of. Surveys. Hydrogen

19:13

is often men send and that

19:15

suspect. That. Various different

19:17

solutions, but I think it's clear

19:19

that we won't find one answer.

19:22

It's all this going to be

19:24

a full range. of different

19:26

electricity generation as well as storage

19:28

system was is that when it.

19:31

And that is the point. By the

19:33

time Space By Solar has been developed,

19:35

we could very well have the storage

19:38

technology needed to make first based. Would

19:40

you blow energy available whenever you need

19:42

it? True. Meanwhile, silence reduce the cost

19:45

of space. Based Solar does a beep

19:47

development underwhelm, Spacex,

19:55

making his to it's a falcon

19:57

nine rocket monday and twenty fifteen

19:59

a mile stone towards reusing rockets.

20:02

Fast forward to today and SpaceX is

20:04

preparing to send a much bigger reusable

20:06

rocket on its first orbital flight. It's

20:09

designed to carry 100 tonnes and 100

20:11

people into space and back time

20:15

and time again. Rick Tomlinson,

20:17

who we heard from earlier, says cracking

20:19

this will be a game changer for

20:22

space-based solar power. We're about

20:24

to have Starship that's going to bring the price

20:26

down to a very low number. But

20:29

from SpaceX by Elon Musk, and

20:31

right behind him by the way is Jeff Bezos,

20:33

who's dead set on doing the same thing with

20:35

his rocket ship and a half dozen

20:37

other smaller companies. As

20:39

that happens, the viability

20:42

of large construction projects

20:44

like space solar power

20:46

facilities is going

20:48

to become much more realistic and

20:52

much more competitive with

20:54

almost any other terrestrial

20:57

energy supply. And while

20:59

space-based solar may always be more expensive

21:01

than land-based renewable power, as Sanjay said

21:03

earlier, it's not the same as we're

21:05

potentially talking about a 24-7 steady supply.

21:10

And even if it just made up a small

21:12

proportion of our energy mix, that constant stream

21:14

of power could give us the base load

21:16

we need, the minimum demand on an electrical

21:19

grid at any given time, as

21:21

are all currently played by climate-polluting fossil

21:23

fuels. In terms of

21:25

new clean energy sources that could help

21:27

solve the climate crisis, Rick says space-based

21:30

solar has one main rival, nuclear

21:32

fusion. In February 2022, scientists

21:35

made a major breakthrough in their quest

21:37

to try and create energy from this

21:39

process, the same one that powers stars.

21:43

What I find very interesting is

21:45

that both fusion and space solar

21:47

power have become credible within the

21:50

same one or two-year period. I

21:53

think that one or maybe both

21:55

in some combination, but one of

21:57

them is going to absolutely be

21:59

necessary. Cerebral and it. And

22:01

if he would, you place your

22:03

money on either of those options

22:06

becoming a reality. Where would you

22:08

place it? Oh you're gonna get real trouble

22:10

here. Ah, That's.

22:12

Tough on. Prior.

22:15

To. The. Recent breakthrough

22:17

infusion. My betting on

22:19

space solar power would have been very, very

22:22

very high. Given. The fact

22:24

that. He lawn and

22:26

Chef and a half dozen other

22:28

rocket ship manufacturers are working on.

22:31

Developing a reusable. Rocket.

22:33

Ships. Which. Is the.

22:36

Tipping Point technology for all of

22:39

this. I would have bet

22:41

that we would be moving towards space

22:43

solar power. The Saudis. In the

22:45

future. But. Just recently.

22:48

We've. Had this breakthrough and fusion power

22:50

so I think it's gonna be. Race

22:52

was dead on both. Well.

23:01

The races own space based solar

23:03

power could take years to become

23:05

a reality for with billions of

23:07

dollars be invested investigating his and

23:09

China planning on having a prototype

23:11

working by Twenty Twenty Eight, we

23:13

could there soon enough whether it

23:15

could help us all on our

23:17

way to plead reliable renewable energy.

23:19

Yeah, and this is how susan

23:21

How pressing the challenge of climate

23:24

change is. It feels inspiring and

23:26

quite so full that scientists around

23:28

the world of working on radical

23:30

solutions like this, easing really advanced

23:32

technology. that with the cost of

23:34

it being so high and needing

23:36

years to. Get the tech ready. Question

23:39

is whether this money the consensus and

23:41

down here on earth. Greater

23:51

than his hair in the studio. High

23:53

grass and I see store. nice to

23:55

see you. Have there been any development

23:57

since he made this program in the.

24:00

Solar. Power. They have this into

24:02

significant updates. One is from a research

24:04

team in the United States at Santa

24:07

for Near Institute of Technology. They launched

24:09

a prototype into a low orbit so

24:11

not a whole shebang but it kept

24:14

it so the energy it converted it

24:16

into electricity and it successfully been to

24:18

wireless. the back down to Ah suffers

24:20

Like I mean that's proof of concept

24:23

right? Exactly. It's thought to be a

24:25

world first and it was just a

24:27

tiny amount of power but as he

24:29

say is proof. That it's possible. So.

24:32

That the some really promising. Does

24:34

that mean that we might see

24:36

this take off quicker than expected?

24:38

Some of the best. The saying,

24:40

like ten fifteen years, possibly? well

24:43

is still not gonna be any

24:45

time soon by Nasa's predictions, because

24:47

that's the other interesting updates Nasa

24:49

has just on a huge ripple

24:51

about space based soda looking at

24:54

the pros and cons and in

24:56

particular how competitive it will be

24:58

with regular land based renewables. and

25:00

that's really key. Nasa say

25:02

that it's not gonna be fully

25:05

operational until twenty sixty and when

25:07

they compare the cost and the

25:09

greenhouse gas emissions as this whole

25:11

project it gets really interesting. Save

25:13

works out that it would need

25:15

thousands of rocket launches to get

25:18

the solar farms in space up

25:20

and running. is like what signs

25:22

a said about seeing these rockets

25:24

his delivery trucks that go back

25:26

and forth and that means that

25:28

the cost of the electricity is

25:31

gonna be much. Higher than what

25:33

we can get here on earth.

25:35

Nasser reckon between twelve and eighty

25:37

times higher than land based renewables,

25:40

so it's just not cost competitive

25:42

unless they're advances that would change

25:44

the modeling as we hide in

25:46

the program earlier. Maybe that doesn't

25:49

matter. It all depends on the

25:51

rest of the mix and what

25:53

better up since might be available

25:55

down on us. Yeah. Okay,

25:58

because I was thinking that yoga. Sanjay

26:00

did say that admit doesn't matter because

26:02

we need all the solutions that we

26:04

can gas the and that's the whole

26:07

issue with the intermittent see problem with

26:09

the been your bills and therefore we

26:11

might need very expensive storage solutions to

26:13

solve that. Some I wonder if those

26:16

are incorporated into Nasa's findings as well.

26:18

What did they say about greenhouse gas

26:20

compresses or interestingly they think that they

26:22

would be relatively similar to land based

26:25

renewables, but they're studied didn't include the

26:27

impact of rocket launch emissions in the

26:29

upper atmosphere and they are thought to

26:31

be much worse than the impact in

26:34

the lower atmosphere and as still being

26:36

studied and I said are still some

26:38

unknown that need to be worked out

26:41

and a space and Texas for the

26:43

end of the say thank you for

26:45

less than and thanks to the team

26:47

he made the program Simon to let

26:50

Matt to son Alex Louis and sign

26:52

a Collins the man he made the

26:54

mix with tom brick know I'm great

26:56

accents and I'm Se to. Get.

26:58

By. The

27:06

group of story helps make sense of

27:08

the headlines with expert analysis from Bbc

27:10

journalist around the world. Social media

27:13

has essentially silos a lot of

27:15

young men and women into different

27:17

algorithmic bubbles. Men and women in

27:19

have a few. The same environment in

27:21

the real world are very different ones

27:24

on line one. Global story as a

27:26

time in detail every Monday to Friday

27:28

from the Bbc World Service. For

27:30

those Russians who sympathize with Alex in

27:32

of own, it will cost her a

27:35

very dark shudder. This looks like a

27:37

message to search for the global story

27:39

wherever. You get your Bbc podcasts.