All language subtitles for Day.Zero.2021.PROPER.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG

[suspenseful piano music plays]

[mechanical reverberations echo]

[suspenseful piano music plays]

[Chiwetel] The Earth from space.

[classical music builds]

The only known planet
in the universe
with surface water.

[suspenseful piano music plays]

Water is what made
life and civilization possible.

But the ancient water patterns
on Earth are shifting.

No one can be sure anymore
where tomorrow's water
is coming from.

[classical music builds]

Already, water scarcity
affects four out of ten
of the world's population.

Soon, it will be the future
for many of us.

And in many places,
the countdown
has already begun.

[dramatic title music]

-[crowd cheering]
-[clock counts down]

-[crowd cheering]
-[clock counts down]

New Year's Eve, 2020,

a very different
kind of countdown.

[crowd chants countdown]

[crowd chants countdown]

-[loud bong emanates]
-[fireworks noise explodes]

[music plays]

It was time to say goodbye
to the teen years
of the 21st century.

More people had had more fun
than at any time in history.

-[music plays]
-[fireworks noise explodes]

None of us knew it then

but 2020
was about to go very wrong.

The first coronavirus deaths
were only days away.

Within weeks
there would be
no more crowds

no more parties

no more celebrations

For years,
experts had predicted
that a pandemic was on its way

but not enough people
were listening.

[fireworks noise explodes]

And on New Year's Eve, 2020,

the coronavirus
was not the only disaster
waiting to happen.

[fireworks noise explodes]

[Anthony Turton]
The human population is
outstripping the water supply.

This is suicidal.

[Jay Famiglietti]
The water crisis
is something

that's happening now
and it's happening
around the world

When we don't have water,
people fight.

-[dramatic music]
-[loud explosions]

All hell breaks loose.

[woman] Oh! Oh, no,
no, no. no.
The house is burning.

[Chiwetel] In Australia,
46 million acres of land

is being incinerated
by wildfire.

Thirty-four dead.

An estimated three billion
wild animals killed

some species driven
to the brink of extinction.

Similar record-breaking
wildfires

reported in California,
Alaska and Siberia.

Worldwide,
extreme weather events
have doubled since 1980.

Officials in Cape Town,
South Africa say

it's just 92 days away
from having to shut off
most water taps.

They are calling April 21st
Day Zero.

[crowd screams and whistles]

[Chiwetel] Mexico City,
one of the largest cities
in the world

struggles to come to terms
with water shortage
as a way of life.

In the worst hit neighborhoods,
the poor have taken control

of the water supply
into their own hands.

[woman speaking Spanish]

[woman speaking Spanish]

In the Midwest,

the water which irrigates
America's Breadbasket

is disappearing forever.

[Mike Callcicrate] We are
in a really, really big mess.

Industrial agriculture
is really a mining operation.

Where they use up water,

they use it up until it's gone

[helicopter whirring]

[Chiwetel] In Brazil,

hard-pressed units
of armed police

are the last line of defense

against the destruction
of the Amazon Rainforest.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

A force of only a thousand
in an area the size of India.

-[laughter]
-[man speaking
Brazilian Portuguese]

The prize on this raid?
An illegal tractor.

But small victories
will do little to slow down
the pace of destruction.

Nearly 20% of the Forest
has already vanished.

And there's a price to pay.

In recent years,
research has shown that,
in a rainforest,

if you take away the trees,
you take away the rain.

And for regions
far beyond Brazil,

the result
could be catastrophic.

[Antonio] What would you do
if you know what I know?

It's absolutely essential

that humanity, uh, understands

what kind of risk
we are running right now.

I mean losing our habitat

losing the planet
where we have evolved

it means really
losing the capacity
of continuing to live on Earth.

[Chiwetel] The day
that water runs out
has been called Day Zero.

This film is about people
who are fighting

to make sure it never happens.

Around three-and-a-half
billion years ago

water was where
life on Earth began

and today all living creatures
depend on it for existence.

[peaceful music
gradually increases]

The Florida Springs.

Thousands of lakes
and dozens of rivers

criss-cross the state
of Florida

on their way to the sea.

For nearly 50 million years,

it has been
one of the wonders
of the world.

And for centuries,
it's provided
the people of Florida

with most of their
drinking water.

But now,
there's something going wrong
in the Florida Springs.

Jill Heinerth
has been diving here
for more than 20 years.

She's seen how things
are changing.

Because below the surface
of the springs,

you can find the backdoor
to the astonishing story

of what is happening
to the world's fresh water.

[underwater noise emanates]

-[choral music builds]
-[insects and birds chirp
in background]

[ethereal choral music plays]

[Chiwetel] The Floridan aquifer,

a reservoir of fresh water
stretching for
100,000 square miles

under the state of Florida,
and beyond

The largest concentration
of fresh water springs
on Earth.

[Jill] I'm still
filled with wonder

every time I have
an opportunity

to go into an underwater cave.

They're just
magical environments.

I liken it to swimming
through the veins
of Mother Earth.

I am swimming
in the sustenance
of the planet.

[Chiwetel]
Of all the water on Earth,

just over two percent
can be used
for human consumption.

Most of that is inaccessible,

locked up in ice caps
and glaciers.

A third of the fresh water
we can get to
is found underground,

in these vast
rockbound aquifers.

They contain a 100 times more

than all the surface water
in lakes and rivers combined.

Until now, it's been enough
to sustain life on Earth

but modern life on Earth
is something different.

[Jill] What I've learnt
over many years of being here

is that that clear water
doesn't necessarily mean
clean water.

I've seen
the flow of the springs
slow down

as if they're tired
and getting sick.

I've seen
the bottom vegetation disappear

and being replaced
by filamentous algae,

whether that is
nitrate pollution
from agriculture

or whether
it is just using too much!

I've seen it change.

I've seen things disappear.

[ethereal choral music plays]

[Chiwetel]
Jill is like the canary
in a coal mine.

Pollution, depletion

the clues she's found here
are a warning
that something is happening

and not just in Florida.

[tense music plays]

Los Angeles,
a good place to start
an investigation into water.

[tense music plays]

There's never been enough
to go round

-[music plays]
-[passing traffic sounds]

A hundred years ago,
they built the world's
largest aqueduct

to stop the city drying up.

And in the days
of the prohibition,

when the rest of the country
was dying for alcohol,

in LA,
they were fighting each other
over water.

Water crisis
is in the city's DNA.

Los Angeles is the showcase
of the American dream.

The shop-window
of the modern way of life.

The world capital
of the swimming pool,

250,000 in LA County alone.

[choral music builds tension]

But stuck between the desert
and the ocean,

the people of LA

might just be
living dangerously.

[string music rises]

This is Jay Famiglietti.
Water scientist.

Every time California
starts running out of water,

he's the pundit
they come running for.

[Bill Maher]
senior Water scientist

from NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory,

Jay Famiglietti.

[cheering and applause]

Hey, Professor.
How are you, sir?

[string music rises]

-[coffee bubbles]
-[string music rises]

[Bill Maher] Finally,
a witness that will tell us
expert testimony about this.

They call you
the Al Gore of water
I hear.

[Jay] Wow, well,
that's, that's impressive.

-Well, you know it's a--
-[laughter]

[Jay] When stories
like this break,

they break
in a very, very big way.

[Bill] Why isn't there a panic
or at least a sense of urgency?

Where is the governor
going on TV?

-What's the plan, man?
-Well, that's,
that's the point.

Water, it's serious shit, bro.

[laughs]

[Jay] It's not clear to me

that the general public
really appreciates

that the water crisis,
the water scarcity

is something
that's happening now
and it's around the world.

It's happening
all over the world.

[Chiwetel] Severe drought
has been a regular feature
in the Californian story.

[train horn blares]

The years between 2012 to 2014

were the driest
for over a thousand years

but it's not only Californians
who are in trouble.

At NASA, Jay Familglietti
pioneered a space mission

to try to discover
what was happening

to water supplies
over the entire planet.

[woman] Three, two,
one and lift off

of GRACE mission
tracking the movement of water
across our planet.

[Chiwetel] The project
was called GRACE,

the Gravity
and Climate Recovery
Experiment.

It acts like a scale
in the sky.

[digital bleep]

It's composed of two satellites

about the size
of a squashed minibus.

They orbit at about
400 kilometers

and they are separated
by about 200 kilometers,

and they are chasing
each other around
as the Earth spins around.

And when the satellites fly
over that region,

the region exerts slightly less
of a gravitational tug
on the satellites

and they float
just a little bit higher.

[digital bleep]

It's really allowed us
to map up

the regions around the world

that are gaining
or losing water.

[digital bleep]

[Chiwetel] GRACE
was a huge scientific success

but the news from space
wasn't good.

Two billion people
around the world

depend on
vast underground aquifers

for drinking water
and growing food.

The GRACE satellite
proved that
most of these aquifers

are losing water
much faster
than anyone predicted.

[Jay] The drought situation

is much worse, uh, than
I think is generally perceived.

This maybe why
we're not getting
the public response we want.

We found that over half
of the world's major aquifers,

over half, 20 of them,

are past sustainability
tipping points

and by that I mean
that the water
is being removed.

It's being extracted
from these aquifers

at a rate that's greater
than it's being replenished.

[Chiwetel] GRACE
was a wake-up call.

The satellites
had looked into the future,

and for vast swaths
of the US and the world,

the future is dry.

[Jay]
Population is growing,
and climate is changing.

We don't have the water
that we thought that we did.

So its a different world
out there.

[digital bleeps]

-[digital bleeps]
-[background piano music plays]

[William] Weve been spending
all these revolutions
looking at the moon

then as we come around
this non-inviting place,

we look up
and there is the Earth.

Its 240,000 miles away,
it was small enough,

you could cover it
with your thumbnail.

[Anders] Wow! That's crazy.

[Lovell] Aww,
that's a beautiful shot.

[peaceful background
music plays]

-[camera shutter clicks]
-[peaceful background
music plays]

[Chiwetel] The Time:
Christmas Eve, 1968.

The Location:
the Apollo spaceship
on the far side of the Moon.

-[camera shutter clicks]
-[background piano music plays]

When this photo was taken,

there were only
three-and-a-half billion people
on Earth.

Already, there
are twice that many.

In the 1960's,
New York and Tokyo

were the only two megacities
with populations
of more than ten million.

Now there are more than 30.

Most of them
much bigger than New York.

It was water
that made these cities possible
in the first place.

But what happens now
if the water
starts running out?

-[tense background music plays]
-[rushing sound of the wind]

-[tense background music plays]
-[rushing sound of the wind]

[children speaking indistinctly]

[children] One step,
two step,
tickle you under there.

[laughter]

[newscaster 1] Cape Town
in South Africa is facing
one monumental question.

How does it survive?

[newscaster 2]
Four million residents
of Cape Town

are staring down
a painful reality.

In a little more
than two months,

the South African city
could run out of water.

-[child] Woah!
-[laughs]

[Chiwetel] February 2018,

Cape Town, South Africa,

there's hardly been any rain
for three years.

The reservoirs
are almost empty.

-[running water]
-[tense background music plays]

[man] Day Zero,
a doomsday scenario
when the taps run dry.

For Cape Townians,
it is a real possibility

as long as their cities
main water supply
looks like this.

They are calling April 21st
Day Zero.

[woman] Im not saying
it's bigger than 9/11

but I'm saying
it poses as much
of a challenge

as a catastrophe
such as 9/11 did

but in a completely
different way.

[Chiwetel] Tourist brochures
were still calling Cape Town

the honeymoon capital
of the world.

But the plastic water cans
were telling a different story.

[Anthony]
There is the perception

that this
is a short-term drought

and Day Zero

is needed
just to tide people over

to the next rainy season,
which will be

two or three months
in the future.

The data that we have
all tells us

that this is not
a short-term disturbance.

From the 1980s onwards,

there's been
a perceptible shift

in the rainfall pattern
in South Africa.

The weather service
in South Africa

are unable
to predict the future

under these conditions
of climate change.

-[bird screeches]
-[tense background music plays]

[Chiwetel] Cape Town
is proud
of its Mediterranean climate

but the climate is changing

and the future
is unpredictable.

A population that was
two million 20 years ago

is four-and-a-half million
today.

The demand for water
never stops growing.

Water is not only
the stuff you drink

or the stuff you shower in
or the stuff you flush
the toilet with.

Water is embedded in everything.

Water is part of,
of our everyday modern living.

Water creates the jobs

that give people the salaries
that they live on.

Water creates the food.

Every element of our
modern economy
requires fresh water.

-[uplifting piano music]
-[water splashing]

[Chiwetel]
The Theewaterskloof Dam,

Cape Town's biggest reservoir.

This is what
it used to look like.

A 100 billion gallon playground
that has kept the city watered

for the past 40 years.

But that was before
it stopped raining.

And when a city
starts running out of water,

no one can be sure
of a soft landing.

[insect chirping]

The same reservoir
three years later.

By then Theewaterskloof

had become
an international icon
of water crisis.

[woman] This is one
of Cape Towns
main sources of water.

A source
that could run completely dry
within a matter of weeks.

The last ten percent
of the water is unusable

so to all intents and purposes
this reservoir is empty.

[Chiwetel] Old farm houses

old roads
from before the dam
was flooded.

Rows of vines
that have stood many years
under water.

The man-made solution
to Cape Towns water problem

was no longer up to its job.

[insect chirping]

[Anthony] A dam always has
in the bottom a sediment pile

and when the dam dries out,
that desiccates.

It becomes dry
like blotting paper.

So, when the rain starts falling

and the first water comes in,
the first thing it has to do

is rehydrate that pile
of blotting paper.

So, you are talking
of 100s of millions,

if not billions
of liters of water

that will get absorbed by that

before the water
becomes available,
uh, as yield.

There is a need
for a philosophical shift

away from
we are masters
and owners of nature

to we are now developing
in partnership with nature.

We have to give nature
a little bit of a space

in order to provide
good and useful services
for humankind.

[Chiwetel]
But the water crisis,
when it comes,

will not affect
all of humankind
in the same way.

This is Helen and Ray,

the kind of people
who until now

have never really had to think
about where their water
came from.

In normal times,
their consumption
is about 80 gallons a day.

Now its down to 13.

And that's a life changer.

We're not the same people
that we were
this time last year.

-[Helen] Its not full.
-[Ray]No, babe.

The idea that

we could turn our taps on
and there would be no water

was real.

[man] The officers
are acting on a tip-off.

Local residents told them,
employees at this body shop

are washing cars
with city water,

and that is a criminal offense.

I personally
felt incredibly anxious.

[aggressive screaming
and shouting]

[aggressive screaming
and shouting]

[woman] There have
already been
scuffles here.

Security guards
now monitor the site.

And there was
this sudden madness
that was going on.

[everyone chanting]
Water for all
or the city must fall.

[woman] The local government
has brought in
severe restrictions

forcing people to look
for alternative supplies.

They ran out of water at the,
at the department stores.

They ran out of containers
at the plastic supply stores.

-[everyone chanting]
Water is life.
-[man] Water is life.

[everyone chanting]
Water is life.

[man] There's no man with water.

No motor cars, no jobs,

no farm workers, no vegetables.

It becomes unimaginable.

[Helen] It has been
quite humbling.

Its always crappy being the

the camel.

[Helen] Pack horse.

If I pass out along the way,

just give me mouth-to-mouth.

Just keep going, little man.

Keep going, little man.

-Stopping.
-You can do it, baby.

Now they are just
cutting into my hands.

[Chiwetel] The water crisis
laid bare a secret

that Cape Town
would like to forget.

Thirty years
after the end of Apartheid,

the city
still has the reputation

of being
one of the most unequal places
on Earth.

The water you get
still depends on who you are
and where you live.

Helen and Ray live in Newlands,

one of Cape Town's
most desirable neighborhoods.

The woman
working on the balcony
is their maid Paulina.

And where she comes from,
every day is Day Zero.

[Paulina] to Newhaven,
I was 28-years old.

I'm now 54 years old.

I'm doing everything
at their house:

wash, clean, iron, everything.

I cook. I do everything.

But with all that things,
I need to save water,

because one day
we're gonna wake up,
we don't have water,

and then what's gonna happen
without water.

[Chiwetel] Every Friday,
Helen gives Paulina water
and Paulina takes it home.

These heavy bottles
contain a hidden truth
about water shortages,

not just in South Africa
but around the world.

[indistinct chatter]

-[indistinct chatter]
-[van door slams]

[Paulina speaking
native language]

[Paulina] I always give
some people,

you know, I always give water.

[Chiwetel] The question
is why Paulina needs
to take the water home.

And the answer becomes clear

once we know exactly
where home is.

Paulina lives in Capricorn.

One of
the informal settlements,

shanty towns,
on the edge of Cape Town.

Few people here
have access to running water
in their homes.

For many years,
there were only

21 public water taps
in the whole settlement.

[van door screech's open]

Bye, guys.

[indistinct chatter]

-[indistinct chatter]
-[feet scrapping on stones]

[Chiwetel]
In prosperous Newlands,
Day Zero

seems like
an unprecedented disaster.

But here in Capricorn,
it's just another day.

[Paulina]
There is a problem with water
in Capricorn.

We get water in the morning
at six o'clock.

Around 10:00, 11:00,
there is no more water.

In my house,
I tell them every day,

we need to save water.

We can't just do whatever we do
with water.

We need to save water.

[indistinct chatter]

I wake up five o'clock
in the morning
to fetch water.

Only lasts for one hour.

Some of us
are working night shifts.

When we are coming back,
there's no water.

Can't bathe for the day.

We must wait tomorrow.

And there's water in the taps.

You can't drink them.

They smell, they horrible.

Sometimes, they green.
You don't even know
what is happening.

But we must drink them.

-There is no choice.
-[child coughs]

Sometimes there's not even water
to cook, to cook prop

-Yeah, to cook.
There's no water.
-[woman] Mm.

Even to buy the water,
it's expensive.

-[Paulina] To buy the water
is very expensive.
-Very expensive.

-[Paulina] Really, really--
-[woman] Because I buy
for my son.

It's safe for him to drink
that water

than this one
that's coming out of the tap.

-I don't
-You don't trust them.

Capricorn just get rotten
every single day.

There's suffering
in this town.

[Chiwetel] In an ideal world,
access to water
is a human right.

But, in the real world,
water is a yard-stick
of inequality.

Over two billion people
still live

without safe drinking water
in their homes.

The average American
flushes more water
down the toilet

than most Africans
use every day.

Worldwide,
poor water sanitation

kills nearly a million people
every year.

The threat to Cape Town
came and went.

In May 2018,
the three-year-old drought
was over.

-[laughter]
-[indistinct chatter]

[indistinct chatter]

[Chiwetel] They prayed for rain
and the rain came.

The whole city celebrated.

[man] So having analyzed
the new data,
we are now in a position

to state that we have not only
managed to avoid
Day Zero this year

but we can also safely
get through the summer of 2019.

[Chiwetel] Water flowed back
into the rivers,

the dams filled up,
Cape Town had been saved

but for how long?

[Anthony] To simply assume

that the next rain
is going to suddenly

wash all your problems away

is, in my view, suicidal.

Unfortunately,
the Day Zero debate
only focuses on,

on water for baths,
water for toilets,

water for drinking,
water for showers.

Domestic water.
Thats not
the significant water.

There's water for the economy.

Theres water to sustain jobs.

Theres water for tourism.

Theres water for agriculture,
for the food that we eat.

Thats big water.

So there is no economic future

based on
the business as usual approach.

[Chiwetel] Scientists
do not expect the Earth

to run out of water
any time soon.

The total amount of fresh water

hasn't changed
since the age of the dinosaurs.

The pattern
of human civilization,

the great cities,
agriculture, power plants,

all the infrastructure
of life on Earth,

has been determined
by the availability of water.

But the patterns
of water availability
are shifting.

The evidence from space
shows that
while in some regions,

the water supply
remains stable,

in others,
there are
unsettling fluctuations.

The world's wetlands,
in the tropics

and the extremely
high latitudes
are getting wetter.

[digital bleeps]

The dry areas in between
are becoming drier.

Too much water, or too little,

either way,
these fundamental shifts

can be devastating.

[digital bleeps]

[gentle guitar music plays]

[Mike] My name
is Mike Callicrate.

We're in St. Francis, Kansas.

We raise cattle and hogs
and we have some chickens
for eggs.

And we basically produce food.

[gentle guitar music plays]

[Chiwetel] Mike Callicrate
is a country boy
through and through.

Born third of eight children

to a family
that had been farming
on the plains

since the early 1900s.

His dad and his granddad
had been farmers

and Mike was never going
to be the one
to change anything.

-[guitar music plays]
-[cheering and hollering]

[Mike] I started riding bulls
when I was in high school.

Id go to high school rodeos
and then it was an easy

transition to want
to go to college
and rodeo in college.

I not only was a bull rider
and could make money rodeoing

but I made the bull ropes
that the bull riders
use to, to hang onto.

I ended up being one of
the top three bull rope makers
in the country.

[Chiwetel] This is
Calicrate Country,
the High Plains,

home to 20%
of the entire
agricultural output

of the United States.

Today, Mike raises
1,500 head of cattle
on his family farm.

But small family farms
are dying out
on the High Plains.

And Mike Callicrate
has every reason to be worried.

His family have seen
the high plains die
once before.

For a time, the waves
of migrants who settled
in the High Plains

in the late 19th
and early 20th centuries
had enjoyed success.

Demand was high,

and the crops were rich
and plentiful.

But deep ploughing
and over exploitation
had loosened the top soil.

[wind blows tumble weed]

And when drought came
during the 1930s,

followed by high winds,

the fine soil of the prairies

blew as far as Chicago
and Washington D.C.

The High Plains
became a dust bowl

covering 100,000,000
acres of land.

Many believed
the Day of Judgment
had arrived

and the world
was coming to an end.

And in a sense,

the worst
environmental disaster

in American history

was a judgment.

[haunting wind bellows]

The farmers of the Dust Bowl
knew there
was water underground.

They used to say
they could feel it moving
beneath their feet

but they couldn't reach it.

It was only in the '40s
that geologists worked out

that they were sitting
on enough water

to submerge
the entire state of Colorado,

to a depth of 45 feet.

They called it
the Ogallala Aquifer,

one of the biggest
underground reservoirs
of fresh water in the world.

The water contained
between layers of clay, silt,
sand and gravel

has been there
since the last ice age.

And there was enough of it
to fill Lake Huron.

Under the High Plains,
the Ogallala reaches out

for 175,000 square miles

from the Texas Panhandle
to South Dakota.

The wooden windmill pumps
used by the early settlers

made little impression
on the massive reserves
of water

which lay underneath
their farms.

But after World War II,
they adopted
better drilling technology

and high-tech
irrigation systems.

Soon, a new,
industrial-scale agriculture,

was turning the lands
of the Dust Bowl
into America's Breadbasket.

But it all depended
on the Ogallala,

and water
was now being extracted
from the aquifer

faster than it could
be replaced.

By the 1950's,
some of the survivors
of the Dust Bowl

were turning
into millionaire landowners.

It was boom time for America.

The birth of rock and roll.

Nineteen cent hamburgers
in the drive-in diner.

Modern life moving so fast

that even a reservoir
the size of Lake Huron

couldn't keep up
with the demand.

Almost a third
of the Ogallala's water
has already gone,

most of what's left
will disappear in the
space of a lifetime.

The farmers of the High Plains

are looking down the barrel
of a new Dust Bowl.

[Mike] We are in Yuma County

and Yuma County
is probably the most

irrigated county in Colorado.

The heart
of the industrial agriculture
of Colorado.

On the left is probably
the biggest feed-lot
in the country.

There is about 130,000
in capacity there
in that facility,

and next to it on the west side
is probably
another 20,000 cattle.

So right in that area,

there could be as many
as 150,000 head
of cattle on feed.

This is not a farm,
this is a factory.

So the big feed lot
is going to be located
where the water is

and that is over
the Ogallala aquifer.

You can see
all of the irrigation around.

These feed lots,
these are center pivots.

The water used in a feed lot
is not, is not
what the cattle are drinking,

it's what the crops
are consuming

in the production of the corn,
the alfalfa hay.

I can tell you
that the industrial model
will fail

because it is not sustainable.

It is like killing the goose
that lays the golden egg.

[Chiwetel] The statistics
stagger the imagination.

More excrement

comes from the biggest feed lot

than a city
the size of Denver.

The world's
one-point-five billion cattle

drink five times more water

than the entire human race.

[man 1] Our BBQ is prepared
with just the right amount
of heat

to keep in the natural juices
and hold in
that wonderful flavor.

[Chiwetel] Over 90% of water
from the Ogallala
is used for irrigation.

[woman] Ever hear
of a criss-cross burger,

it's easy to make
and wonderfully good to eat.

[Chiwetel] It takes 600 gallons
for a simple hamburger.

[man 2] Put the BBQ'd meat
on a tender bun

and you've got some eating
that is world-beating.

Try our famous barbeque
at the refreshment stand now.

[Chiwetel] Nearly
a thousand gallons
for a regular steak.

[man 3] Is there anything
more important
for a family meal than meat?

Better buy it from a store
you can trust.

[Chiwetel] The water
to produce a full-grown cow

is enough
for a ten minute shower
every day

for over 130 years.

The Ogallala
will run out of water
in the space of a lifetime.

This is where it is going.

It's not the water we drink
which is the problem,

it's the water we eat.

And the world's appetite
is growing fast.

There's been a 500% increase
in meat production since 1961

and with the world population
expected to grow
to nine billion by 2050

further massive increases
in production
will be needed to meet demand.

But by then,
almost all the Ogallala
will be dry.

[Jay] Whats become very clear

is that the world's
major aquifers
are being depleted.

Some of them
at a very rapid clip.

Weve got the aquifers
in the Arabian Peninsula
and across the Middle East.

Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran,
India, Bangladesh,
North China Plain.

Over here
in North Western Australia,
really all over the world,

so this is a cause
for huge concern

because those aquifers

provide the water
for irrigation to grow,

uh, most of the food
that we grow in the world.

The high plains aquifer,
in particular,

we grow a tremendous amount
of grain and, and beef.

And this is a region
that is projected

to run out of groundwater
in about 30 years.

When I think
about the collapse
of water availability

in our
big food-producing regions,

so much of that middle part
of the United States

is dominated by, by agriculture
and provides food security
for the country

so what will those people
do for jobs?

And what will we do
for food security?

The implications for that
I think are staggering.

[digital bleeps from satellites]

[Chiwetel] Today, the face
of the cattle business
on the High Plains

is the face
of industrial agriculture.

They take the lion's share
of the market.

They take the lion's share
of the Ogallala's

rapidly diminishing supply
of water.

The small farmers
are being pushed aside.

[Mike] I think that we are
in a really, really big mess

as far as agriculture
is concerned.

That we would exploit
our resources to the point

where there isnt
any more water.

Where there isnt
any more healthy soils.

What about my grandson?
Whats he going to do
for water?

[Chiwetel] The threat
to the Ogallala's fresh water
haunts the High Plains.

Ghost towns
are making a comeback.

Tens of thousands
of small farmers

have sold up
and moved on
in the past 20 years,

unable to keep pace
with the demands of the market.

[Mike] What we would like
to do up here
is really show

a regenerative model
of production.

What can heal the land?
What can use less water?

[Chiwetel] From where
Mike's coming from,
it's no surprise

that he's become the champion
of the traditional family farm.

The dilemma is,
the farms that use less water

cannot satisfy
the world's craving for beef.

And the farms that produce
most of the worlds beef

are killing off the supply
of fresh water for everyone.

[Mike] Without the water
of the Ogallala Aquifer

the big corporations
wouldn't be here at all.

And the, and the thing
that is so tragic, I think, is,
is that the water is free.

It doesn't cost them anything.

Its absolutely free.

It should be the property
of people everywhere
that live in the region.

That water should be
the people's water.

Like, it's like
the air we breathe.

I mean how long can you live
without water?

[Chiwetel]
But time on the High Plains
is running out.

Every day that passes,
there's less water
in the Ogallala.

When it's dry,

it will take
6,000 years of rainfall

to fill it up again.

[Mike] The corporate model
of industrial agriculture
is really a mining operation.

It's really an extraction model
of agriculture,

where they use up
the natural capital,
that being water and soil.

Or when that water
is depleted to a point

that it makes no more sense
to pump it,

the big corporations
and the industrial
agriculture corporations

will be gone,

and like in a mine,
when a mine is spent,

when a mine has no more gold,
no more silver,

no more coal,

what does the mining company do?

They shut the mine down
and they leave.

[poignant piano music plays]

[Mike] They leave behind

broken communities.

They leave behind
empty feed lots

and they leave behind
the destruction.

Big industrial farmers
are not going to stop

until the Ogallala Aquifer
is pumping air.

[digital bleeps pulse]

[digital bleeps fade]

[percussive music builds]

[Chiwetel] Brazil.

The front line between nature

and modern civilization.

Many believe that this

is where the future
of the world's climate
will be decided.

A frontier

[gun clicks]

where the idea
of climate change

ceases to be an abstraction.

Already, Brazil
is the world's
ninth biggest economy.

But economic development
has come at a high price.

The Amazon
is the biggest rainforest
in the world.

But in Brazil,

illegal logging

has already reduced its size

by almost a fifth.

While the country's population
doubled to over 200 million
since 1970

the rainforest
lost an area the size of Texas.

It is already possible

to envisage an Amazon
without a rainforest.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

There's more fresh water
in Brazil
than anywhere on Earth.

But its biggest cities
are being hit by drought.

[crowd chants]

Water demonstrations
in the streets,

a sense
that something in the climate
is going wrong.

And the growing awareness

that the fate of the trees
in the forest

and the failure of the rains
in the city

are somehow connected.

[waves crashing]

-[child screaming and yelling]
-[waves crashing]

[Chiwetel] The man on the beach
playing with his daughter
is Antonio Nobre.

[child shouting
in Brazilian Portuguese]

He works for
the Brazilian Institute
for Space Research.

And if you ask him
what he does,

sooner or later
he will tell you

the same story
he tells his daughter:

hes trying to save the world.

He'll tell you
that saving the world
is stressful.

That hes already had
four major heart operations.

He'll tell you
he delayed having a family

because he was so involved
with his work
in the AmazonR ainforest.

[converses in Brazilian]

[Chiwetel] Tonights story
is about the minotaur.

But the story
he tells about the Amazon
is far more frightening.

[speaking in Brazilian]

[Chiwetel] Professor Nobre
is one of Brazil's
leading scientists

and has made it his mission
to make the world understand
the coming catastrophe

[speaks Brazilian]

[Chiwetel] The Amazon:

seventeen times the size
of the British Isles.

The largest treasure house
of plants and animal species
in the world

and for many
the closest place on Earth
to the Garden of Eden.

Thirteen hundred
different kinds of birds
live among its trees.

Three thousand species of fish
swim in its rivers.

Compared to the forest's
55 million years of existence,

human beings
are mere newcomers.

But now the newcomers

are threatening
to destroy the rainforest
forever.

[Antonio]
We're producing a desert

in, in the most rich
forest ecosystem
in the world.

One species from ignorance
is destroying the whole system.

We are basically compromising
the very web of life
that sustains us,

without which
we don't have a chance.

I have
this incredible suffering
from people not listening.

The Indians are more careful,
and they are more respectful

because they are a product
of the forest.

One of the traditional leaders
of the Yanomami told me

that if you chop down
the forest,

the rain will stop,

and there will be nothing
to drink or eat.

And when I asked him,
how they knew
about this connection

between the forest
and the rain,
he said,

"Our ancestors
have always known
how the rain was made."

"They learnt it
from the spirits
of the forest."

[Chiwetel] Without trees,
there would be no water.

The thought had occurred
to Christopher Columbus

when he first came to America.

The trees in the forest
are not there
because of the rain.

The rain is there
because of the trees.

It's the idea
that has been at the heart

of Antonio Nobre's work
in the rainforest.

We have a phenomenon
that's so mundane.

Everybody say, "Oh, a tree".

But they don't realize,
we don't realize
what is happening inside.

We don't realize how complex,
how incredibly evolved.

It took
400 million years
to get to this point.

T he tree
is an incredibly complex
machine

that is able to pump water
deep from the water
in the soil,

and pump it against gravity

and keep going and going
and going, all the way
to the leaves.

And release that
in the atmosphere
like if it were a geyser,

and you don't see it
because it is vapor,
it is invisible.

And as it does it,
it's like an irrigation system
in reverse.

[Chiwetel] Water vapor alone
will not turn into rain
unless it is seeded.

In the Amazon,
the forest produces
its own rain

by throwing out into the sky

clouds of volatile
organic compounds,

which transform the vapor
into raindrops.

And the more rain
the forest needs,

the more particles
the trees release
into the atmosphere.

[Antonio] It's magical,
in a sense.

It's magical dust

that sprinkles there
into the atmosphere,

which makes the rain
to come down,

pixie dust.

And this was
the explanation for it,

the solution to the mystery.

We finally, "Elementary,
my, my dear Watson."

[orchestral music plays]

[Chiwetel] Its been called
the river in the sky.

Every day,
each of the forests
400 billion trees

sends 1,000 liters of water
into the atmosphere.

Twenty billion tons.

More water above the tree tops
than flows
from the River Amazon itself.

Now all of this is threatened
by interests that want
to turn the forest

into cattle ranches
and soya beans.

[satellite digital bleeps]

Satellites
from NASAs Landsat program
monitoring the rainforest.

For 25 years,
photographs from space

have documented
the deforestation.

6,800 acres of rainforest
destroyed every day.

Nearly 300 an hour.

An area the size of almost
three football pitches
every minute.

[helicopter whirling]

It is the job of IBAMA,
Brazil's environmental
police force,

to protect the rainforest.

But it's a dangerous business.

In the Amazon,
the fight
against climate change

goes head-to-head
with the fight to make money.

Brazil has become
the most dangerous country
in the world

to be an environmentalist.

[helicopter whirring]

Midsummer 2018.

IBAMA are on a mission
near Concelvan,

in Northwestern Mato Grosso,

at the heart of an area
known as
the Arc of Destruction.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

[Chiwetel] They'd hoped
for an element of surprise

but here, as often happens,
the loggers have been
tipped-off.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

[Chiwetel] Militia protect
the IBAMA investigators
from ambush.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

[Chiwetel] The timber yard
has a license.

But IBAMA suspects
it's a front
for illegal logging.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

[Chiwetel] They are looking
for contraband timber,

extracted illegally
from protected areas.

[speaking Brazilian Portuguese]

[Chiwetel] The bosses
are missing.

Little can be done

but to book
the low-grade workers

who are left behind.

To those who want
to save the Rainforest,

IBAMA have always been
the good guys.

But the odds have turned
heavily against them.

While this film was being made,

a new president
has come to power in Brazil

with a different agenda.

IBAMA's strength
has been drastically reduced.

Budget cuts,
senior officers fired,

operations cut back.

Even the loggers they catch
are going unpunished,

as the new government
paves the way

to open up the rainforest
to agribusiness and mining.

In the six hours it took
to make the raid,

elsewhere in the Amazon

another 1,300 acres
of rainforest

have disappeared forever.

[Antonio] Everything
thats living
obeys the same principles,

the circulation
in the human body,

the circulation
in the rainforest.

When we started looking
into the water

and how the water flows
and how the water is

manipulated by trees
in so many ways,

I start feeling like
there should be
a better parallel

with human physiology
or human workings, metabolism,

and they found
the, the, the analogy
was a heart.

'Cause its actually pumping.

Then, you have the rivers
coming off the Amazon.

They are draining
the tissues of nature.

The tissues of the landscape.

And you see,
that is precisely what the blood
does in our body.

When the blood go through
your tissues,

it collects all the waste,
and then bring it back
to the heart,

which pumps it again.

Its refreshed in the lungs
and go all around your body.

And this
is precisely what happens
in, in, in a large scale,

in a continental scale,
uh, in the Amazon.

But instead of blood,
you have water.

So water
is the blood of the landscape.

[Chiwetel] All things in nature
are connected

and water
is the common thread
of circulations

that links all forms of life.

What is happening in the Amazon
affects all of us.

In nature,
what goes around, comes around.

[Antonio] The notion that
the forest functions
like a heart is a new one.

Once you take it out,
the heart dies

and then
the whole system dies.

We are crossing
the point of no return
right now.

[Chiwetel] Since
the new government
came to power in Brazil,

the pace of destruction
has accelerated.

An estimated loss
of two-and-a-half-billion trees
every year.

In their place, cattle ranches.

Eighty percent
of the deforested Amazon

has gone to supply the world's
rocketing appetite
for beef.

In exchange for the rainforest,

Brazil now boasts
the second largest cattle herd
in the world.

Anyone can buy
a Brazilian hamburger

in New York, London,
Moscow or Beijing.

Meanwhile,
as Professor Nobre predicted,

Brazil's great cities
are already beginning
to pay the price

for deforestation.

Diminished rainfall
in Rio and Saão Paulo,

severe drought
in Belo Horizonte.

[waves crash onto the shoreline]

[Antonio] What would you do
if you know what I know?

[Chiwetel] The question
that has haunted
Antonio Nobre's working life

has come to haunt us all.

[Antonio] World War II
was nothing.

What is coming our way
is 1,000 times worse.

[Chiwetel] The filming
of this story
began in a very different world

than the one we live in today.

Everything has changed.

Coronavirus has taught us
that some warnings
do come true.

[Antonio]
It's absolutely essential

that humanity, uh, understands

what kind of risks
we are running right now.

I mean losing our habitat

losing the planet
where we have evolved

it means really
losing the capacity
of continuing to live on Earth.

[woman] More than
15,000 scientists

are sounding an alarm
about climate change,

they call it a warning
to humanity.

[indistinct chatter]

[newscaster]
there's a frantic effort
underway tonight

to find survivors.

[man 1] the warmest year
in the Earth's recorded history

and it's only getting hotter.

[man 2] As we see
the climate warming,

the one thing
that we're most clear about

is you'll have more cold events
and more heat events.

[Chiwetel] The world
is experiencing a perfect storm

of climate change
and rising population.

[male 3] More than
1,200 people
are believed to have died--

[Chiwetel]
Experts say it's through water

that most of us
will feel the effects
of climate change first.

[male 4] Nobody can say
when the next flood will be

but everybody knows
the waters will rise once more.

[Chiwetel] But for many,
the water crisis
has already begun.

Until now, Day Zero

was something
that could only happen
to other people

in far-off places.

The fight back begins
when the message
comes closer to home.

Fighting back
is what the farmers
on the High Plains are doing

to protect their water
from over-exploitation.

-[whistling and jeering]
-[somber music plays]

Fighting back
is what has been happening
in city after city

as water shortages
drive protesters
onto the streets.

[crowd jeering]

But Day Zero
is more than a local problem.

-[whistling and jeering]
-[somber music plays]

It's a global problem

-[whistling and jeering]
-[somber music plays]

and involves us all.

To the world leaders,
and those in power,

I would like to say
that you haven't seen
anything yet!

[Chiwetel] Australia. Cape Town.
California. Kansas.

Behind all these
local Day Zeros,

science has discovered
a common denominator

and a common solution.

[background insect noise]

[Chiwetel] "What would you do
if you knew what I know?"

Well, now we know.

And now it's up to all of us
to do something,

before it's too late.

Modern life on Earth,

the life we've grown used to,

is unsustainable.

There's not enough nature
to go round.

They used to say that water

was nature's way
of talking to mankind.

Well, we've reached
the point in time

where we're going
to have to start listening.

[ethereal choral music plays]