In the coming week, Canada fights wildfires that have shrouded the Northeastern U.S. in smog.

OPEC releases its closely watched monthly oil report, and NATO holds its largest ever air defense exercise.

It's June 8, 2023, in time for the world next week. I'm Bob McMahon.

And I'm Carl Ann Robbins.

So, Bob, let's start by talking about the air.

Lots of the East Coast and the northern states have been blanketed with these thick clouds of smoke

and these eerie orange skies.

It's pretty awful here in New York where I am right now, and I gather it's the same in D.C.

This is all being blown down, as you said, for major wildfires in Canada.

Are the Canadians getting these fires under control?

And I suppose more important, is there any signs that this is going to give a boost to climate policies?

Yes, very important topic that one hopes the spurs. But we should first just recap what's going on

right now and what's in store the week ahead. So yes, Canada is in the throes of fighting these wildfires.

Canada gets wildfires every spring, as do other parts of the world. But these are more intense,

and they are more intense by sort of the consensus of the scientific community because of

human cause climate change. Canada, at the moment, according to officials in the province of

Quebec, there are 414 wildfires

burning, 239 of which are determined to be out of control. According to officials in Quebec,

they have the ability to fight 40 fires at the same time, but there are many more than that ongoing.

So there is a problem with the ability to just fight these fires first and foremost,

to get them under control, and then to deal with the smoke that's caused by them. Due to a,

you know, anomaly of nature, the smoke normally gets blown northward. It is getting blown

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