Plot Synopsis

In CHANGING PLANET, global conservation scientist Dr. M. Sanjayan explores how communities from Africa to the Amazon to the Arctic confront climate change and implement solutions, as he embarks on a seven-year effort to monitor changes in some of Earth's most vulnerable ecosystems.



On Wednesday, April 19, 2023 from 9-11pm on PBS (check local listings), CHANGING PLANET returned for a second year to revisit some of our planet's most vulnerable ecosystems and provide updates on how communities are working to develop resilience in the face of climate change. Two new hosts, Ella Al-Shamahi, a paleoanthropologist and stand-up comic, and Ade Adepitan, a television presenter, Paralympian and children's author, join global conservation scientist and CEO of Conservation International Dr. M. Sanjayan to uncover this year's stories. Season 2 travels from Brazil to California, Greenland to the Maldives, Kenya to Cambodia to chart how inspiring individuals and communities are making progress -- and facing setbacks -- over the last 12 months. Over the last year, much has happened to report, from the devastating effects of drought in Kenya to the Maldives, where new scientific discoveries offer hope for the world's coral reefs. "We have an opportunity to do things properly," said Sanjayan. "We have the inherited wisdom, we have the science, and we have the tech to understand when things are going wrong and why. Now we need the money and political muscle to implement what needs doing."

In Hour 1, Sanjayan hosts from Australia, a country on the frontline of climate change, both in terms of its devastating effects but also possible solutions. He travels to the remote Gibson Desert, where the land is under the stewardship of the Indigenous Pintupi, who are having spectacular success preserving a vast and vital ecosystem. Sanjayan learns about cultural burning and how small managed fires guard against megafires and invigorate the landscape with new plant growth. He discovers that invasive species -- like the camel -- threaten native species, but efforts are being made to control and eradicate their population. Megafires are also a problem in Northern California and CHANGING PLANET reports on cultural burning, practiced by the Tule, Mono and Yurok tribes. Other efforts to create a fire-resistant landscape include reintroducing the beaver, a native keystone species. The beaver's natural damming activities restore creeks and rivers and function like speedbumps for forest fires, changing how fire moves through the landscape. In Kenya and the Pantanal in Brazil, climate change exacerbates human and animal conflict over resources. Host Ade Adepitan explores how scientists are working with Kenyan farmers to develop practical, affordable solutions to keep elephants away from farmland, including a solar-powered box that emits the sound of angry buzzing bees. In Brazil, ranchers, who consider jaguars a nuisance, are coming to understand that their presence increases eco-tourism, a boost for the economy. Scientists are placing GPS collars on jaguars to track their location and avoid human-animal conflict.

Hour 2 catches up with game-changing scientists fighting to protect vulnerable ecosystems. In Australia, Sanjayan explores the potential of "blue carbon," the carbon captured and stored by the world's oceans and coastal ecosystems. In Cairns, Traditional Owners work with airport officials to maintain the surrounding carbon-rich mangrove forests. Sanjayan is thrilled to encounter dugongs, the elusive marine mammal whose digestive system distributes and helps germinate seeds from seagrass, an important blue carbon plant. In Cambodia, host Ella Al-Shamahi examines the heroic efforts being made to support the nearly extinct Siamese crocodile. Scientists are working with Indigenous communities -- who consider the crocodile sacred -- to raise and release them back into the wild. Scientists are also using technology to track the devastating effects of sand mining on the country's largest river system, hoping to use the evidence to pressure the government to act more responsibly. In Greenland, researchers track musk oxen, shaggy survivors of the Ice Age, to learn more about how they are being affected by climate change. Musk oxen play an essential role in maintaining the health of the tundra, transporting nutrients uphill and creating more vigorous plants through grazing. And in the Maldives, acoustic experts and ecologists use hydrophones to listen to the heartbeat of a coral reef, leading to the discovery that larval coral responds to specific sound frequencies, actually moving towards the sounds of a healthy reef.
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CHANGING PLANET returned for a third year on Wednesday, April 24, 2024 from 8=9pm on PBS (check local listings). In this one-hour installment, conservationist Dr. M. Sanjayan travels to the Maldives and the Florida Keys for an in-depth look at coral reefs -- a habitat under urgent threat from climate change -- and the innovative techniques that could save them. Featuring spectacular underwater cinematography, the program explores how scientists from across disciplines are collaborating on projects that offer glimmers of hope for the future of coral reefs. Globally, coral reefs are at a crisis point; warming seas have caused corals to bleach and die at an alarming rate. Five hundred million people worldwide rely on reefs for food and to protect coastlines from storms and rising sea levels. But without action, scientists predict that nearly all reefs could die off in the next few decades.

In CHANGING PLANET: CORAL SPECIAL, Sanjayan visits Laamu Atoll in the Maldives to take part in a first-time collaboration that could be the key to restoring reefs. Professor Peter Harrison from Southern Cross University in Australia has devised a fertility treatment to help corals reproduce more successfully: coral IVF. Corals spawn on just a few nights a year, releasing billions of eggs and sperm into the ocean. The resulting larvae settle on a reef and grow to become baby coral. But in the wild, spawn is at the mercy of currents and predators; only one in a million may survive to adulthood. Peter's technique involves collecting spawn and maximizing fertilization, then allowing the larvae to develop in the safety of a net before releasing them onto areas of the reef that need restoration, significantly increasing their chance of survival. Peter is now working with a scientist who hopes to enhance this process further. Professor Steve Simpson from Bristol University in the UK discovered that coral larvae move towards the sound of a healthy reef -- and it is fish vocalizations, in particular, which trigger them to sink to the bottom, settle and grow. The scientists' audacious plan is to combine Peter's fertility technique with Steve's fish recordings to lure them to set up home on a damaged reef. This method has never been tried before, but if it works, it could be a global game changer for reef restoration.

In the U.S., Florida has the third largest barrier reef in the world, but it has lost an alarming 98% of its coral. Dr. Erinn Muller at Mote Marine Laboratory in Florida oversees a high-tech warehouse where thousands of coral fragments are carefully nurtured, a last-ditch attempt to prevent them from going extinct. As part of a $100 million reef restoration project, her team is breeding millions of coral to be planted back out on the reef, selecting ones that can best withstand warming oceans. At the University of Miami, Professor Andrew Baker is creating a hybrid reef -- a concrete structure seeded with coral larvae that will grow into a vibrant coral layer. These ready-made reefs could soon provide a home for wildlife and protect coastlines everywhere from extreme weather.