As environmental visionaries see it, the future of energy is not in greenhouse gas-emitting fuels like oil and coal—whose supply is running out—but in sustainable, non-global warming sources like wind and sun and waves from the ocean and in the enormous storehouse of heat that naturally occurs deep underground. In the coming green economy, utilizing this energy will generate a surge of new employment, while combating climate change and providing additional energy independence for the United States. This program offers a brief history of American environmental concerns and features the voices of several leading lights in the current effort to protect the planet by relying on sustainable sources of energy.

“It will be the biggest transformation in the American economy since at least World War II—possibly since the Industrial Revolution—because you’re talking about essentially retrofitting and repowering the entire country… You just look at the numbers, we have a Saudi Arabia of wind energy in our Plains states. We have a Saudi Arabia of solar energy in the Sun Belt… Taking on the challenge of re-powering this country with clean energy can give us a common cause across lines of class and color, and help the United States go from being the world leader in pollution to the world leader in solutions.”

—Van Jones, founder of Green for All and author of “The Green Collar Economy”