Living Planet | Deutsche Welle

The cryptocurrency Bitcoin consumes a huge amount of energy. We take a look at why this is and what can be done about it. And how do lawmakers ensure a green energy transition actually reduces fossil fuel use? South Africa is planning to move away from its reliance on coal, but plans are afoot to extract natural gas from the ocean. In the EU, new regulations make exceptions for nuclear and gas.

We live on a watery planet — nearly three-quarters of the Earth's surface is underwater. As climate change raises temperatures, water is being pushed in new and more extreme directions. But are there ways we could use water to our advantage, environmentally? This week, we hear from communities trying to push back the seas and others suffering from diminishing water supplies.

This week, we bring you an episode of DW's On the Green Fence, hosted by Neil King. In it, he heads to the forest in search of urgent answers on how to save them. Around the globe, climate change and severe droughts have wrought havoc on forests far and wide. As forest dieback increases, even young trees are dying. So what happens if we lose our forests? And what we can do to stop it?

In this special episode, we reflect on a year of environmental reporting that’s taken us from the northern stretches of oil-producing Russia to the frog-filled forests of Australia. We listen back to snippets of our favorite stories and interviews, reliving the most important environmental events of 2021, along with the funny, weird and mind-blowing moments on Living Planet in the year gone by.

How should we construct our houses and cities to better withstand a changing climate? This week we explore building strategies that reduce emissions and deal with new climate realities. From the promise of hydrogen fueling neighborhoods and businesses, to towns and cities that are using flooding to their advantage, we dig into how we can better design the places we live.