Oil surveyor Masud Khamil narrowly escapes an attack on his camp in the deserts of Saudi Arabia and flees with some valuable data.

The shock of Mika's subsequent ejection causes Tom's daughter to have an asthma attack, but she is saved by Holly Dernay, head of renewable energy at Arrow.

Meanwhile, British Prime-Ministerial Aide Philip Crowley offers unofficial government assistance to the Green Congress as they prepare for the World Forum on Climate Change (WFCC), a United Nations conference about global warming in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Crowley gets support within the Open Business Coalition from McConnell and the insurance companies and they win over the United States Treasury Secretary Brent Schlaes.

The Chinese delegate makes approaches to McConnell and the Green Congress so Crowley brokers a deal with them to sign Kyoto II.

Mack confronts McConnell on the roof and after getting the data from him, he smuggles it past his boss's men and hands it over to Crowley for publication.

[2] Eric Volmers writing in the Calgary Herald states that, "the opening scene is a suitably violent and tense intro that manages to conjure up both a sinister and international tone to the four-hour Canadian-U.K. co-production," and goes on to say that, "Burn Up asks decidedly unsettling questions about big oil and political expediency, the environmental impact of the Athabasca oil sands and even American foreign policy," which he claims, "was perhaps a surprising project to find life amid the "oil-is-good" sentiment of Alberta.

"[2] Sam Wollaston writing in The Guardian compliments the character development and interaction that is, "going on all over the place", and credits Whitford and Warren as "the stars of Burn Up", before going on to say Penry-Jones is, "lively in the lead".

[3] Gareth McLean writing in the same publication said that, "despite the occasional flashy moment, high-octane drama this is not", criticising the series for, "copious amounts of tiresome expositional dialogue and a leaden plot", before concluding, "why not treat yourself and rent Syriana instead?".

[4] Tim Teeman writing in The Times calls the series, "a consciousness-raising thriller", that, "is trying desperately to do that BBC thing of being sexy and responsible".