Energy Videos - The Documentary Network

Risky Business – Coal seam gas the new Superpower?

Documentary.net staff — Sun, 13 Jan 2013 20:50:27 +0000

Some of the world’s largest energy giants are moving into eastern Australia and investing billions of dollars to exploit coal seam gas reserves so vast they could rewrite the world’s energy map. Despite generating massive amounts of revenue and creating thousands of new jobs, they are being met by a groundswell of public protest and a rising chorus of concern about the long-term impacts of coal seam gas extraction on the nation’s health, environment and land. A few years ago hardly anyone in Australia had even heard of coal seam gas, now the industry finds itself under intense public scrutiny as it plans to drill thousands of new gas wells a year – many of them under farms and rural communities in the middle of the nation’s agricultural heartland. As Australian farmers face the prospect of being forced by law to allow energy companies to drill for gas on their land, property owners and greenies are uniting in a grassroots protest movement to fight what some people are calling ‘the greatest environmental battle in Australia’s history’. Coal seam gas could make Australia an energy superpower, but at what price to the nation’s health, environment and land?

The Thorium Dream – An alternative Nuclear Fuel

Documentary.net staff — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 07:20:09 +0000

There are many lingering questions about thorium, including sourcing the fuel, regulations, industrial inertia and persistent fears about radiation. While the disaster at Fukushima raised the specter of atomic destruction and pushed countries like Germany and Switzerland to announce an end to their nuclear programs, it’s also proved to be another teachable moment about how and why technologies come to be, and how to improve them. There’s much to take for granted in the evolution of technology, or at least in the way that technology appears to us today – refined, perfected, ever cutting-edge. In the case of energy, where innovation has never been more sorely wanted, what we take for granted are a set of circumstances that are both entrenched and terrible. Coal and oil and natural gas seem like the only sure-fire ways of providing base-load energy, if your only criteria is cheap electricity. Globally, if they don’t look paltry, our energy and resource supplies are becoming increasingly costly to extract and use. Demand has never been higher; ditto levels of CO2 and other terrible greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Nuclear energy is powerful, but it’s even worse than the others, given persistent waste storage issues (these really need to end) and the threat of proliferation. A film by Alex Pasternack

24/7 Solar Energy – Operating when the sun does not shine

Documentary.net staff — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 15:44:06 +0000

Torresol Energy in Spain's Andalucia province has overcome one of solar energy's biggest challenges - operating when the sun does not shine. The huge 20MW concentrated solar power plant has two tanks of molten salt that store heat generated throughout the day. As they solidify again at night they release energy, which means that, unlike normal plants, Torresol can keep generating electricity long after sunset.

Radioactivists – Protest and Discourse in Japan since Fukushima

Documentary.net staff — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 18:40:15 +0000

The film explores the Japanese protest culture under the effects of Fukushima and to illuminate the backgrounds of the current movements, protests and critical voices, which keep getting louder, not only in Japan. First look at an upcoming documentary by German filmmakers Julia Leser and Clarissa Seidel. They accompanied the rallies and demonstrations within end-April to mid-May 2011 and talked to all those critical voices about the current situation: scientists, journalists, activists and bloggers.

We, Clarissa Seidel and Julia Leser, were both in Japan on the day of the giant earthquake, followed by the Fukushima accidents. We were shocked about the way the media both in Japan and Germany reported about those events.But, the first anti-nuke protests in Tokyo surprised us in a very positive way.

If you like the project you can support the team.

Innovative Energy

Documentary.net staff — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 05:16:10 +0000

A report looking at innovative energy. To start, French researchers try to identify the sweetest of trees with a high sugar content to produce a fruitful harvest of biofuels. Meanwhile in Spain CO2 from a cement factory is sucked up by algae leading to the mass production of bio petroleum. Finally how green are the latest shiny engines to hit the road? They avoid polluting petrol but nonetheless need powerplants many still fueled by coal to run.

Power in the Air

Documentary.net staff — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 08:28:34 +0000

Nikola Tesla built a tower to broadcast electric power. It failed. Soon, sending power through the air might be the norm.

Who’s Afraid of Nuclear Power

Documentary.net staff — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 09:51:55 +0000

Almost every day seems to bring more horror stories on fossil fuels. We're bombarded with reports about global warming. The price of oil keeps increasing. But with each gloomy media prediction, the nuclear industry can boast: we've got the clean answer. This documentary looks at different approaches to nuclear power. It focuses on Australia and Scandinavia - where attitudes couldn't be more different. While Australia derives 80% of its energy from coal, half of Sweden's power is nuclear. This doc holds the answers to why we persist with nuclear power.