IT'S the taxpayer-funded TV journey which set out to change opinions on the climate change debate - and ends with little ground being made by either protagonist.

After four weeks of filming around the world and 60 hours of interviews (at a cost of 60 tonnes of carbon), I Can Change Your Mind About Climate has barely shifted the opposed views of its stars, former Howard government finance minister Nick Minchin and climate activist/author Anna Rose.

The premise was simple: Pitch up a list of people who hold your views on climate science, then go about convincing each other to change.

Funded jointly by Screen NSW (under the O'Farrell government) and Screen Australia's national documentary program scheme, it was produced by filmmaker Simon Nasht and entrepreneur Dick Smith.

It airs on ABC1 tonight.

Mr Minchin, who led opposition to a carbon trading scheme, claimed he was "a little shocked the ABC had signed off on this proposal as it involves airing the views of those sceptical of anthropological global warming ... and it doesn't do a lot of that".

The program flew the pair across Australia, then to Hawaii, Boston, New York, San Francisco, Washington and London filming meetings with leading professors and anti-global warming bloggers.

Mr Nasht said producers purchased renewable energy offsets for Ms Rose and four production crew.

Mr Minchin argued the federal government was "making a mistake spending billions on the assumption we're the ones causing climate change and I don't think that's right".

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He believes the show's value was "in Anna beginning to understand what I call the scare-mongering is actually counter-productive".

Ms Rose said yesterday: "Nick did not present any evidence or coherent explanation for why the world has warmed so significantly that could be attributed to anything other than fossil fuels, cars, coal-fired power stations."

She took up the challenge to educate "people watching at home who might still have some questions about climate science and be able to answer them in a clear way".

While she is steadfast in her position that the climate crisis is a real and urgent one, the duo did share in their disappointment at having several of their suggested interview subjects cut from the final edit.

Mr Minchin said the production filmed two interviews at his request - with British professor Jasper Kirkby in Geneva and UK journalist Christopher Booker in London - which do not appear.

Ms Rose argued a greater imbalance, with four of her interview options not going to air (two appear on the ABC website). The doco ending with the twosome searching for common ground on the white sands of Heron Island and the retired politician and his 28-year-old combatant will continue their argument on tonight's climate-themed Q&A.

Originally published as 65,000km trip = an hour of hot air