--- --- Sep 25, 2025 # Environmentalist Sylvia Earle Says There Is 'No Excuse in the 21st Century' to Deny Climate Change by [Simmone Shah](https://time.com/author/simmone-shah/) ## Simmone Shah Reporter  Alex Aronson Marine biologist, diver, and environmentalist Sylvia Earle has dedicated most of her life to exploring our oceans. But even after logging more than 7,000 hours underwater, she says there’s still a lot that remains undiscovered. “The deeper you go in the ocean, the less we know,” she said at the TIME100 Climate Leadership Forum on Sept. 24\. “It's like diving into the history of life on Earth.” At 90, Earle has seen parts of the ocean most people will never see, and currently holds the record for deepest walk on the sea floor. “When you go into the sea, essentially all the major divisions of animal life are there from the earliest forms, the microbes, the sponges, the jellies, the whole categories of life that are so unfamiliar to most people, and yet, they're our neighbors,” she said. “They're our ancestors. There are fellow citizens, if you will.” Earle’s organization Mission Blue aims to create a worldwide network of marine protected areas known as “Hope Spots” to conserve those species and their habitats. As of now, the organization has 166 Hope Spots and is still growing—largely in part to individuals around the world who are championing the spots that are important to them. “It's a network not just of hope, but it's a network of action, gathering information and data that can be shared across the network and beyond,” she said. On the heels of President Donald Trump calling [climate change a “con job”](https://time.com/7319744/trump-un-speech-climate-change/) at the U.N. General Assembly, Earle urged politicians to “look at the evidence,” noting that we know much more about the world now than when she was young. “Nobody had been to the moon when I was 10-years-old, for sure, nobody had been to the deepest part of the ocean,” she said. “We didn't have the means to communicate knowledge. Now we do. There's no excuse in the 21st century for denying that the climate is changing and that we're the cause.” Acknowledging the problem is the first step to taking action, she says. “Imagine if we did not know this, if we continued to take the last tree, to kill the last blue fin tuna. Imagine if we were still killing whales instead of protecting them.” She urged the audience to take action—and fast. “We're learning things so fast, but we're not keeping up with the loss of the natural systems,” Earle said. “It's our last best chance.” _The TIME100 Climate Leadership Forum was presented by AstraZeneca, Fortescue, and Official Timepiece Rolex._ Environmentalist Sylvia Earle Says There Is 'No Excuse in the 21st Century' to Deny Climate Change ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-leadership-forums-2025/7319304/sylvia-earle-climate/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-leadership-forums-2025/7319304/sylvia-earle-climate/"},"headline":"Sylvia Earle Says There's 'No Excuse' For Denying Climate Change","datePublished":"2025-09-25T02:31:12.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T00:54:30.775Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/time100-leadership-forums-2025/7319304/sylvia-earle-climate/","keywords":["climate","News Desk","sponsorshipblock"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt72de9c9ca6c9ee9d/6998ca1293610c2444c30044/9.24.25_TIME100Climate_192.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Simmone Shah","jobTitle":"Reporter","url":"https://time.com/author/simmone-shah/"}],"creator":"Simmone Shah","articleSection":"Climate","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt72de9c9ca6c9ee9d/6998ca1293610c2444c30044/9.24.25_TIME100Climate_192.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/climate/","name":"Climate"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/climate/","name":"climate"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-leadership-forums-2025/7319304/sylvia-earle-climate/","name":"Sylvia Earle Says There's 'No Excuse' For Denying Climate Change"}}]}] ```