Environmental Sciences

Explores the indelible footprint that humans have left on this planet, and the catastrophic effects of environmental neglect and abuse, and calls for restorative action through a reshaping of human activity.

Americans use 60,000 plastic bags every five minutes that we then throw away. But where is 'away?' Where do the bags and other plastics end up, and at what cost to our environment, marine life and human health? Follows 'everyman' Jeb Berrier as he navigates our plastic world. Jeb is not a radical environmentalist, but an average American who decides to take a closer look at our cultural love affair with plastics.

Investigates the commercialization of the natural world. Protecting our planet has become big business with companies promoting new environmental markets. This involves species banking, where investors buy up vast swathes of land, full of endangered species, to enable them to sell "nature credits". Companies whose actions destroy the environment are now obliged to buy these credits and new financial centres have sprung up, specializing in this trade. Many respected economists believe that the best way to protect nature is to put a price on it. But others fear that this market in nature could lead to companies having a financial interest in a species' extinction.

Former Vice President Al Gore presents evidence that the negative effects of global warming have increased since the release of the film "An inconvenient truth" a decade earlier.

Money flows -- Toxic waters -- Global water waters.
With the recent plummet in California's water supply, America is being hit with a stark reality: a future where fresh drinking water is alarmingly scarce. "Parched" is an important event series that takes a definitive look at the water wars that are now upon us.

The Return of the Cuyahoga is a documentary about the death and rebirth of one of America's most emblematic waterways. In its history we see the end of the American frontier, the growth of industry, the scourge of pollution and the advent of a political movement that sought to end pollution.

A documentary style film, which depicts Rachel Carson in the final year of her life. Struggling with cancer and in the wake of the uproar after the publication of her book Silent spring, she recounts with both humor and anger the attacks by the chemical industry, the government, and the press as she focuses her limited energy to get her message to Congress and the American people.
Filmed in September 2007 at Rachel Carson's cottage Southport Island, Maine.
Adapted from the play A Sense of Wonder written and performed by Kaiulani Lee.

Two places at the edge of our planet are making headlines due to climate change: Thule, Greenland, because of record ice melts there; and Tuvalu, because this remote Pacific island nation is one of the first countries on the verge of sinking as a result of rising sea levels. Whereas for us the warming of the planet occurs almost solely in the media, it is changing the entire existence for the inhabitants of Thule and Tuvalu. The film portrays how they are forced to abandon their traditional way of life as they move towards an unknown future