One of our listeners is in a pickle. He’s looking to buy an engagement ring but wants to make sure the diamond comes from an ethical and sustainable source. So he sent us an email asking for help.

This is our latest addition of “This, That, or the Other Thing.” It's a series about the choices we make in our lives to try and build a more sustainable world, whether they have any effect, and what we can do instead if they don't.

Today… Host Nate Hegyi looks into the most sustainable ways to source that big, sparkly rock. Should it be a diamond from the ground? A diamond grown in a lab? Or maybe a different gemstone altogether?

Featuring Saleem Ali, Rachelle Bergstein and Anna Provost.

Produced by Nate Hegyi. For full credits and transcript, visit outsideinradio.org.

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LINKS

Visit our website to see Justine's sapphire engagement ring.

You can find a copy of Rachelle Bergstein’s book here. She was also featured on this episode about diamonds, from 99% Invisible.

The Kimberley Process helped reduce the number of conflict diamonds in the world – here’s a list of countries that are participants.

Anna Provost features a lot of her really cool Montana-mined sapphires on Instagram.

A recent study in the journal Nature found that mining diamonds produces millions times more greenhouse gas emissions than growing them in a lab.