ROB CAMERON

“Could you,” I once asked a train-mad friend “travel right across the Czech Republic using only the slow, stopping trains?” The answer was yes, as I and another friend proved in 2007. We spent 19 days covering 2,000 kilometres, setting foot in over 80 towns and villages, and crossing the border into Germany, Poland, Slovakia and Austria. This is an audio diary of that journey.

The United States is the world’s most powerful economy, but most of that power is still derived from fossil fuels. When I toured the marshalling yards of Nebraska in 2006, more than half of the country’s electricity was still being produced by burning coal. Twenty years later it’s slipped into second place behind gas – but Americans still rely on the black stuff for 19% of their power.