Summary: Over two decades ago, the original version of this program depicted the effects of wind, waves, and tides on the coastline of southeastern Massachusetts. Revised and updated for the 21st century, this edition takes a new look at the problem of erosion along America's shores, emphasizing the impact of climate change and sea level rise on our coasts. Continuing its case study of Cape Cod and the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: They are now banned worldwide-but the toxins known as PCBs are not going away. This program explains how the compounds have almost irreparably polluted the globe and still threaten future generations. The film begins in 1927, when PCBs became integral to electric power and, eventually, a vast array of agricultural and technological products. Describing the growth of scientific awareness of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: When seasonal rains sweep across South America, the Amazon River and its tributaries overflow their banks to create an ecosystem unlike any other-a place where, for six months out of each year, land-dwellers and water-dwellers mingle. This program joins an expert Amazon biologist in a journey into the flooded forests of the Amazon Basin to film dolphins navigating through treetops, a male...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: This Science Screen Report explains how biologists help endangered species. It highlights captive breeding techniques that have strengthened populations of Malayan tapirs and southern white rhinos; it also examines the artificial insemination of giant pandas and the teaching of survival skills to orphaned orangutans. Emphasizing that humans can learn and benefit from these experiences-for...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: How long will the biosphere tolerate exploitation of the oceans? Are local fishermen a doomed species? What can be done to reverse the decline of fish stocks around the planet? This program documents the environmental and socioeconomic costs of excessive fishing. The film contrasts ancient maritime practices-like those of Mauritania's Imragen fishermen and Djibouti's pearl divers and lobster...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: The tropical rain forests of the world are home to nearly half the animal species on earth and contain some of the most fascinating examples of natural adaptation ever seen. This classic program takes viewers into the rain forests of Costa Rica to witness a richly varied habitat under threat from human encroachment. Here, a basilisk lizard walks on water, howler monkeys bask in the sun, and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Despite the extraordinary engineering of Brazil's Porto Primavera Dam, many scientists and environmentalists view its ecological effects as catastrophic. This program offers a sobering look at a nation's effort to balance its growing energy needs against the long-term benefits of preserving unique and irreplaceable ecosystems. Produced prior to the completion of Porto Primavera and the creation...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Wilson, Edward O.
Summary: In order to stave off the mass extinction of species, including our own, we must move swiftly to preserve the biodiversity of our planet, says Edward O. Wilson in his most impassioned book to date. He argues that the situation facing us is too large to be solved piecemeal and proposes a solution commensurate with the magnitude of the problem: dedicate fully half the surface of the Earth to nature.
Format: sound recording-nonmusical
Publisher / Publication Date: 2016
Copies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Compact Disc Audio Book, Call number: CD 500 WILSummary: Year by year the tourist trade has dwindled in fictional Pingwah Falls, leaving the town practically bankrupt. When a plan was unveiled for a modern resort, everyone's hopes rose.until they learned the land is home to a threatened species of bird. In this Fred Friendly Seminar moderated by Harvard Law School's Arthur Miller, panelists including former county supervisor Tom Mullen; Christopher...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Nothing is so familiar, and yet so elusive, as water. A running faucet would require 136 trillion years to discharge the Earth's 326 million cubic miles of water, but only fresh water-less than three percent of the global supply-can sustain life. As we transport, utilize, and consume water, we are tempted to view it as eternally plentiful. But its protracted cycle of falling from the sky,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Forests protect and nurture humanity in a variety of ways. Why, then, does deforestation continue? Who is responsible for it? This program analyzes the problem through a socioeconomic lens, drawing connections between corporate interests, food security concerns, and annihilation of the planet's woodlands. Outlining the history of deforestation from Roman times to WWII, the film focuses on the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: Use this program to correlate the precarious existence of endangered species and the forces of global trade. Visiting Indonesia, Japan, and the Florida Everglades, the video studies the difficulty of balancing economic and ecological well-being. The plight of animal populations-Sumatran elephants losing their habitat to palm oil plantations, Oriental white storks feeding in pesticide-ridden...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: The five extinctions that have impacted the Earth over the past 400 million years-the Ordovician-Silurian, Late Devonian, Permian-Triassic, End Triassic, and Cretaceous-Tertiary-may be set to include another one on a massive scale. This alarming program assesses the extent to which Homo sapiens is provoking the planet's sixth extinction. According to scientists, wholesale destruction of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In Ghana, olive baboons are ransacking crops and terrorizing villagers; in Namibia, a once-rich fishing ground is struggling to recover while toxic fumes explode from the ocean depths; in Puerto Rico, futuristic sub-sea fish farms are floating far from shore; and off the coast of Canada, migratory salmon are a part of a radical farming experiment. What do these seemingly unrelated scenarios...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: The town of Sunnyville is thrilled with the jobs and development promised by a new factory, which will make efficient, inexpensive solar cells. However, nanomaterials used in the manufacturing process pose an unknown level of risk to city residents and the environment. In this Fred Friendly Seminar, Peabody award-winning correspondent John Hockenberry leads expert panelists through a series of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009