FRONTLINE Heat is a global report on what is being done by the world’s largest corporations and governments to respond to the challenges posed by climate change and to the call for reductions in carbon emissions. The program takes viewers to the world’s largest coal mine, oil refinery, and off-shore oil rig as well as America’s biggest utility companies and car manufacturers to explore the technological, political, and economic challenges facing global corporations.

In this video case study and corresponding business module, students are asked to consider how industries and governments are responding to climate change through a set of key themes, discussion questions and a classroom exercises. Students will present solutions to the challenging problems posed in the module.

In Cars in America: Investing in Detroit’s Future, we explore how America’s love affair with cars continues to present massive challenges to the reduction of greenhouse gases. Detroit's 'Big Three' have fallen behind in fuel-efficiency and hybrid research and development, and the U.S. government has been slow to impose carbon restriction on vehicles. With Detroit being recently bailed out by government and tax-payer dollars, students are asked to develop recommendations for an industry that is too big to fail and represents the livelihood of millions of Americans.

Key Video Segment Themes:

• Cars may be America’s biggest problem.
• Cars are the country’s second largest contributor to greenhouse gases.
• The companies that produce cars have been slow to develop more fuel efficient vehicles.
• The Big Three have fallen behind foreign automakers and are now asking the government to finance research and development into “greener” technology.
• American cars and trucks emit more CO2 than all the vehicles in Europe, Japan, China, and India combined.
• Detroit and the UAW have successfully prevented CAFE standards from increasing for more than 32 years.