Science & Society Term2 Week3 Lecture

Diploma Lecture 2012

Diploma November 2007

Diploma Lecture 27th April 2015

The most important story of our time. Despite climate chaos raging across the planet and urgent warnings from experts, our dependence on fossil fuels persists. How did we get here?

The story of what the fossil fuel industry knew about climate change more than four decades ago, as scientists working for Exxon reveal how they sounded the alarm about the effects of fossil fuels.

Even as the science grew more certain, the oil industry continued to block action to tackle climate change in the new millennium.

How the 2010s became another lost decade in the fight against climate change – as the move to natural gas delayed a transition to more renewable sources of energy.

At the heart of the climate change debate is a paradox - we've never had more information about our changing climate, yet surveys show that the public are, if anything, getting less sure they understand what's going on.

David Attenborough travels to the end of the earth, taking viewers on an extraordinary journey across the polar regions of our planet.

David Attenborough travels to the end of the earth, taking viewers on an extraordinary journey across the polar regions of our planet, North and South.

Spring arrives in the polar regions, and the sun appears after an absence of five months; warmth and life return to these magical ice worlds - the greatest seasonal transformation on our planet is underway.

It is high summer in the polar regions, and the sun never sets. Vast hordes of summer visitors cram a lifetime of drama into one long, magical day; they must feed, fight and rear their young in this brief window of plenty.

For the animals in the polar regions, autumn means dramatic battles and epic journeys. Time is running out - the Arctic Ocean is freezing over and the sea ice is advancing at 2.5 miles per day around Antarctica.

There is no greater test for life than winter, as temperatures plummet to 70 below and winds reach 200kph. Darkness and ice extend across the polar regions and only a few remarkable survivors gamble on remaining.

David Attenborough reveals the vast wildnerness of the polar regions and their inhabitants. At the North Pole, the sun returns after six months of darkness.

David Attenborough journeys to both polar regions to investigate what rising temperatures will mean for the people and wildlife that live there and for the rest of the planet.

This Frozen Planet special brings together the very best highlights of the series, taking viewers on a spectacular journey through the entire polar year - from the depths of winter to the melting world of the polar summer.

This Frozen Planet special brings together the very best highlights of the series, taking viewers on a spectacular journey through the entire polar year - from the depths of winter to the melting world of the polar summer.

Climate activist Greta Thunberg takes a year off school to explore the science of global warming and challenge world leaders, calling for action on climate change.

Greta travels through North America on her way to a UN climate conference in Chile. To understand the impact of climate change, she stops at three key locations that reveal how the planet is changing.

Greta sets off to the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, which will be attended by US president Donald Trump and other world leaders, to call for action on climate change.

The pandemic reveals the enormity of the challenge that tackling climate change poses as Greta learns the drop in emissions caused by the 2020 lockdowns is not enough to put the world on track to meet its climate goals. With mass protests off the agenda, Greta investigates what else could help limit the impact of climate change.

Iain Stewart investigates a new and controversial energy rush for the natural gas found deep underground. Sometimes, this is right under the places people live in. Getting it out of the ground involves hydraulic fracturing - or fracking.

In the past few years we have shivered through two record-breaking cold winters and parts of the country have experienced intense droughts and torrential floods. It is a pattern that appears to be playing out across the globe.

Professor Iain Stewart examines the powerful geological forces that unleashed the devastating Japanese earthquake, and explores how the release of this power of the planet brought Japan to the brink of a nuclear meltdown.

In 1992 the nuclear industry celebrated its 50th anniversary and the report on the accident at Chernobyl claimed there was no evidence of long term health effects. Within months, a team of western scientists presented a very different picture with evidence of an epidemic of thyroid cancers in local children.

In 2014, the International Space Station had to move three times to avoid lethal chunks of space debris and there is an increasing problem of satellites mysteriously breaking down. With first-hand accounts from astronauts and experts, Horizon reveals the scale of the problem of space junk.

It\'s easy to think of the human impact on the planet as a negative one, but as this programme discovers, this isn\'t always the case.It is clear that humans have unprecedented control over many of the planet\'s geological cycles; the question is, how will the human race use this power?

The demand for energy has risen relentlessly over the last 150 years in line with industrial development and population growth.