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Portland has become a global model of transit-oriented development (TOD). For more than 40 years, city planners have integrated transport decisions into urban growth and development efforts. The result: Portland is consistently ranked as one of the country's most livable cities, boasting a healthy two percent population growth annually - and the second-lowest per capita transportation spending of the 28 largest U.S. metropolitan areas.
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This episode looks at new technologies and policies that could offset the aviation industry's substantial greenhouse gas emissions, such as Amyris Biotechnologies' new synthetic jet fuels and Hybrid Air Vehicles' second generation of dirigible airship. To reduce fuel emissions, industry leaders like Boeing are also advocating towing planes on runways and implementing smarter air traffic control systems.
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Concrete production is a leading cause for climate change today, generating many times more carbon dioxide pollution than air travel and leaving a significant footprint on our environment. This 2009 Falling Walls lecture video highlights Franz-Josef Ulm's nano-engineering of materials, which sets out to eradicate climate change. Ulm investigates the replacement of calcium carbonate, the active ingredient in lime, and the reduction of the massive carbon...
25) Critical Mass
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Things aren't looking too good for the world's population; as we multiply at an alarming rate there is not enough food, space or sense. With the planet bursting at the seams, the intelligence and physiological traits that make us human are now crucial to mankind's survival. This intelligent film interweaves a 1960s rat experiment with a snapshot of today's urban jungle and a number of disturbing parallels emerge.
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In 2003, the city of Seoul took a rare step "back in time," demolishing a major downtown freeway to uncover and restore the ancient Chonggyecheon stream that once flowed beneath it. An impressive feat of engineering, the project repurposed nearly 75 percent of the dismantled highway material for reconstruction and rehabilitation of the stream's banks and commercial corridor.
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This episode of The Green Interview features Rob Hopkins, the founder of the Transition movement, an idea that began in 2008 and since then has gone viral around the world. It's been called "the biggest urban brainwave of the century," a visionary, practical blueprint that took root in a town and is circling the globe. The Transition movement is founded on the principles of permaculture, gardening techniques modeled after natural ecosystems. At its...
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Mongolia is a new frontier in the feverish global race for resources. Among those leading the charge to exploit the country's mineral riches are two big Australian companies-Rio Tinto, about to open one of the biggest copper mines on the planet, and developer Leighton, which is operating a large joint-venture coal mine in the Gobi desert. Rio Tinto has ceded the Mongolian government a 34 percent stake, but whether or not the deal will truly help Mongolia's...
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Based on the economic principle of demand management, London's congestion charge challenges the 20th-century notion that cities should be designed around cars and asks drivers to pay for access to public roads and parking spaces. Thanks to visionary municipal leaders like Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron, this plan is the core of a sweeping push to transform London into a transit-efficient and pedestrian-friendly mega-city in time for the 2012 Olympics.
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It is the vast, sprawling complexes of oil refineries and petrochemical plants that help make the Texan economy one of the largest in the world. But does the wealth come at too high a price to local residents? This film is an intimate portrait of a community battling not only the health effects of environmental pollution, but the corporate powers that deny their responsibility. As the refineries release millions of tons of toxins into the air each...
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"Living at the border between life and non-life, fungi use diverse cocktails of potent enzymes and acids to disassemble some of the most stubborn substances on the planet, turning rock into soil and wood into compost, allowing plants to grow. Fungi not only help create soil, they send out networks of tubes that enmesh roots and link plants together in the 'Wood Wide Web.' Fungi also drive many long-standing human fascinations: from yeasts that cause...
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Having witnessed land-clearing firsthand in Africa and South America, tropical biologist Bill Laurance thought he had seen everything-the worst that deforestation has to offer. But, as he explains in this eye-opening program, what has been allowed to happen on the Indonesian island of Sumatra amounts to "ecological Armageddon." In addition to Laurance's testimonial on the size and scale of forest removal, viewers also learn about aggressive land-acquisition...
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Heavy hitters in the corporate world have become bastions of environmental responsibility-or have they? At any rate, a newfound commitment has appeared in the ever-evolving cosmos of advertising and packaging. Some brands employ convenient "green" labeling to boost their perceived credibility and sell more products. But critics assert that the activities of these same righteous, eco-friendly companies call into question their assurances of environmental...
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Taking viewers to the crossroads of aesthetic, functional, and sustainability issues, this program looks at aspects of design that can have negative ecological consequences. Students learn about eco-friendly design and the use of life-cycle assessments by architects and product designers to ensure that their work has minimal environmental impact. Sustainable design techniques are investigated through case studies of a "zero energy" home that makes...
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Although seawater covers more than 70 percent of the Earth's surface, and a large proportion of the planet's population lives along the coastlines, we know more about the dark side of the moon than we do about the ocean depths. This stands in contrast to the many known opportunities and risks the sea brings: untapped energy and mineral resources below and at the seafloor; bioactive substances from bacteria and other organisms, precious for new forms...
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In the Kolli Hills of India, hardy, nutritious millet has been reintroduced to the farming community as a sustainable alternative to the short-term benefits of cash crops. And in Italy, a "food archaeologist" searches for long-lost varieties of fruit, aiming to promote biodiversity by breeding commercially viable strains. This program visits the people and places involved with agro-ecology projects, making the point that 75 percent of traditional...