Energy War
Forget the axis of evil, its the axis of oil. The Cold War and the War on Terror were about ideology and globalization. The 21st century will be dominated by the struggle for energy: It will be every man for himself and it's going to get dirty.
In the two-part documentary Energy War, VPRO's Backlight investigates the major developments with regards to energy sources. Featuring NY Times columnist Thomas Friedman.
The film describes the geopolitical consequences of the dependency on fossil fuels. In the struggle for the last sources of fossil fuels, countries all over the world are forced to take new political and moral decisions and have to enter into awkward alliances: rogue regimes must be tolerated and befriended. With a special focus on the gas conflict between Georgia and Russia and the position of Saudi Arabia.
Featuring a.o. Thomas Friedman, author of international bestseller The World is Flat. Friedman sheds his light on the inverse connection between rising oil prices and the establishment of free democracies.
The film then moves on to take a look at the international markets for alternative energy. If oil and gas are scarce and expensive in the future, where will countries turn to keep their economy going and their population warm and happy? Could solar energy or bio fuels become the main energy sources of the post-fossil fuel era? Will governments, multinationals or small producers be the motor of the green race?
Director: Shuchen Tan, Rudi Boon, IJsbrand van Veelen
Research: William de Bruijn, Sasza Malko, Gijs Meyer Swantee, Henneke Hagen
Editors in chief: Roel van Broekhoven, Jos de Putter
Here Comes the Sun
The sun could easily provide the planet with sufficient energy, if only we are willing to change and to invest in harvesting that solar energy...
The race for the car of the future
With rising temperatures and rising gas prices, cars need to become greener fast. And superficially, the large car manufacturers seem to work hard to improve the fuel efficiency of their products. But are they really? The technology to make cars much more fuel efficient already exists for decades, but it never makes it to the showroom. Why do we have to wait so long for fuel efficient vehicles?