Key Australian pioneers of renewable energy featured in the film The Future Makers were assembled on stage last week for its advance screening in Sydney.
These scientists' stories had been told separately, but the power of Maryella Hatfield's documentary is to corral them.
They include Tim Finnigan, who uses "bio-mimicry" to build devices that exploit wave and tidal power. A wave farm of 20 devices could provide energy for 15,000 people.
Also featured are David Mills and Graham Morrison, pioneers in solar thermal technology. Their company, Ausra, is developing zero-carbon power plants in the US, one of which could deliver power to 120,000 homes. Their technology replaces smoke with mirrors - huge panels of steel and glass that roll and tilt to capture maximum sunlight, then boil water to generate high-pressure steam to drive conventional turbines.
It is a eureka moment for scientists Prame Chopra and Doone Wyborn. Standing in a parched-white patch on the edge of the Simpson Desert, the pair witness the reward for 15 years' hard labour: a continuous blast of steam sizzling from a well drilled four kilometres into the deep hot rock beneath their feet.
Their magic moment in the South Australian desert is captured in a documentary, The Future Makers, that will air on the Discovery Channel at 8.30pm next Monday.
Chopra and Wyborn are among Australian pioneers of renewable energy featured in the film, and who were assembled on stage last week for its advance screening in Sydney.
These scientists' stories had been told separately, but the power of Maryella Hatfield's documentary is to corral them. The future-makers' collective might should send a chill through the coal industry, which they consider a 19th-century relic on its last gasp. This isn't Green Left Weekly talking but hard-nosed scientists getting down to the competitive business of making energy in the 21st century.
They include Tim Finnigan, who uses "bio-mimicry" to build devices that exploit wave and tidal power. A wave farm of 20 devices could provide energy for 15,000 people. Also featured are David Mills and Graham Morrison, pioneers in solar thermal technology. Their company, Ausra, is developing zero-carbon power plants in the US, one of which could deliver power to 120,000 homes. Their technology replaces smoke with mirrors - huge panels of steel and glass that roll and tilt to capture maximum sunlight, then boil water to generate high-pressure steam to drive conventional turbines.