What is the legacy and the work still to do for one of America's foremost climate champions?

Climate One conversations feature all aspects of the climate emergency, the individual and the systemic, the exciting and the scary.

I'm Greg Dalton.

Mary Nichols is not a household name, but she arguably has done more than any other public official to reduce America's carbon pollution.

No wonder Joe Biden is considering tapping her to lead the U.S. EPA.

She's beat oil companies in court many times and has crafted detailed air pollution rules adopted by China, Canada, and other countries.

She first served as chair of California's

Air Resources Board, or the Air Board, from 1979 to 1983 in Democratic Governor Jerry Brown's

first term. When she returned to the job, almost 25 years later under a Republican governor,

the board had evolved into a much more powerful and important player in what had become an urgent struggle against climate change.

Climate 1's Andrew Stelzer starts us off with highlights of the airboards rise to prominence.

In September of 2006, Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger went against the grain of his party

and signed the country's first major law confronting climate change.

The scientist bill will begin a bold new era of environmental protection here in California

that would change the course of history.

AB 32, where the Global Warming Solutions Act is the country's strongest climate change law and aims to reduce greenhouse

gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.

We can't do this simultaneously. We can make the economy grow and also protect our environment.

The following year, the governor appointed Mary Nichols to head California's Air Resources Board.

The agency was given authority to write the rules on an economy-wide transition away from

fossil fuels. Before they got very far, the subprime mortgage crisis plunged the country into

the Great Recession. The oil industry seized the moment to fight back by putting

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