Season 2

Ladakh, India is one of the most remote regions on earth. Beset with religious, political and cultural strife, it is also one of the most tumultuous. Enter the Druk White Lotus School, which intends to equip Ladakhi children for living in the modern world while simultaneously embracing Buddhist traditions. Commissioned by His Holiness The Twelfth Gyalwang Drukpa and designed by Arup architect Jonathan Rose, the school features sustainable technologies that suit the altitude and landscape, as well as Ladakh's cultural climate.

Government buildings are not historically associated with sustainability or exquisite design. But the U.S. General Services Administration's (GSA) Design Excellence program is changing that perception. The program commissioned Pritzker Prize-winning Architect Thom Mayne to design the San Francisco Federal Building, a structure that aims to be the prototype for tomorrow's workplace.

Enrique Peñalosa, the former mayor of Bogotá, Colombia, transformed one of the world's most chaotic cities into a model of civic-minded and sustainable urban planning. He reformed public transportation, added greenways, built mega-libraries and created the longest stretch of bike-only lanes in the world. But along the way, he met tremendous opposition from the very people he was attempting to help.

New York City is known for its diversity, but that quality isn't always reflected in its public housing developments, which often ignore the social and cultural characteristics of the communities who live in them. This episode follows third generation-developer Jonathan Rose through Irvington, Harlem and the Bronx - communities where Rose is putting sustainability within reach of public housing residents.

Dutch planners tap into their innate design sensibility and the industrial landscape to create a sustainable development in Amsterdam's abandoned dockyards, Borneo Sporenburg. Offering an alternative to the trappings of suburban sprawl, the development maximizes space while maintaining privacy, and uses the vast waterways as core landscape design elements.

Buildings are responsible for almost half of all greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. Can a collaborative effort - government leaders, architects, regulatory agencies and building suppliers - avert a climate crisis through policy change and education? Architect-turned-activist Ed Mazria may have the answer. His Architecture 2030 organization is galvanizing commitment to a carbon-neutral building sector by the year 2030.