2057: The World [Discovery Channel] (2007)

"The World" is probably the most complex episode of the three, discussing topics as varied as satellites that transmit data at extreme speed using lasers, to more political topics such as probable future geopolitical scenarios involving China and the United States as two opposing superpowers and the ramifications of a world-wide energy crisis with solar power positioned as a likely candidate to relieve the world's energy needs. It features an American and a Chinese man in a space elevator laboratory discovering how to make more efficient solar panels but being disrupted by their respective countries' political friction mirroring a Cold War. [imdb]