Biosphere 2 (1991)

This documentary unfolds with human drama and Machiavellian political maneuvering that sets the stage for current day climate change denial. A major figure in the early Trump administration plays a surprising part in this documentary about the research facility located in Oracle, Arizona. Originally constructed between 1987 and 1991, the 3.14-acre structure was originally built to be an artificial, materially closed ecological system, or vivarium. It remains the largest closed system ever created. It's original mission was a two-year experiment with a crew of eight humans ("biospherians"). Long-term it was seen as an study of the use of closed biospheres in space colonization. It encompassed a 20,000 sq ft rainforest, a 9,100 sq ft ocean with a coral reef, a 4,800 sq ft mangrove wetlands, a 14,000 sq ft savannah grassland, a 15,000 sq ft fog desert, and a 27,000 sq ft agricultural system and a human habitat with living spaces, laboratories and workshops. Below ground was an extensive part of the technical infrastructure. Biosphere 2 was only used twice for its original intended purposes as a closed-system experiment: once from 1991 to 1993, and the second time from March to September 1994. Both attempts ran into problems, but set world records in closed ecological systems. Watch to discover the ultimate fate of this ambitious experiment.