What Goes Around, Comes Around. Then Stays Around

A good few years ago, a group of friends and I rented a flat down near Leith Docks. The area was just starting to be gentrified, with plans for the new Scottish Office building in the pipeline. I don't think we truly appreciated the area though - we looked out onto the very end of the Water of Leith, just as it met the sea.

We didn't appreciate it, because it was always covered in garbage.

Wood mixed with plastic as it slid around inside the "basin" area at the mouth of the river. After a heavy rainfall, it was even worse as every bit of rubbish that had been dumped in the Water of Leith found it's way there. It was our very own localised version of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

If you've never heard of it, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is exactly what it says on the tin. Ocean currents draw every bit of junked plastic from the world's seas to the North Pacific Gyre, where it floats on top of or just under the surface. It breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces but never disappears - that's if it's not eaten by fish and mammals.

Have a look at this slideshow from treehugger, look at the photos from this flickr group, and take four minutes to watch this video. Then walk down to your nearest river mouth and stare in horror!

(As always, if you're reading this via email or some RSS readers, you may have to visit the site to see the video)

Wood You Say That's Sustainable?

Photo by tinken

Forth Ports have said they want to build four new biomass power plants at their Scottish ports. Each would produce 100MW to power the ports themselves, with any surplus being sold to the National Grid.

They say they will use sustainably sourced wood and forestry by-products to power the plants but they already admit that there's a problem - there's not enough source material in Scotland. They'll have to import waste wood.

Is importing waste wood and timber sustainable? I have to admit that despite the environmental costs of shipping the stuff from other countries (and I would imagine they won't have to look outside of Europe for it), I'd rather see them importing wood chips than importing coal.

Green In The Media 31st August - 6th September

Should we railroad new renewable energy schemes and ignore all objections, in the name of the greater good for the country? Or should we protect our unspoilt wildernesses? I'm in two minds on this, but uppermost is always the thought that if we don't check climate change then our unspoilt wildernesses aren't going to survive as they are anyway. Costing The Earth on Monday investigates.

Monday 31st August

Costing the Earth

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 21:00 to 21:30 (Also Thu 1330)

All over the country, alternative energy schemes are being thwarted by local people determined to stop wind farms and bio-mass plants being built on their doorstep. Tom Heap asks if radical action is needed to break through the blockade. Should the new planning laws intended to rush through urgently-needed road and airport projects be extended to all green energy projects? Should we even allow wind farms to be built in National Parks? They are the highest, windiest regions of the UK, ideal for producing wind energy, but are currently off-limits to developers. Some senior officials within the National Parks and in the National Trust now believe that the maintenance of flawless beauty must now come second to the national need for clean energy.

Future of Food

On: BBC 2

Time: 21:00 to 22:00

George Alagiah travels the world in search of solutions to the growing global food crisis. From the two women working to make their Yorkshire market town self-sufficient to the academic who claims it could be better for the environment to ship in lamb from New Zealand, George meets the people who believe they know how we should feed the world as demand doubles by the middle of the century. He also heads out to Havana to find out how they are growing half of their fruit and vegetables right in the heart of the city, investigates the 'land-grabs' trend - where rich countries lease or buy up the land used by poor farmers in Africa - and meets the Indian agriculturalists who have almost trebled their yields over the course of a decade.

Tuesday 1st September

Home Planet

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 15:00 to 15:30

Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about the world we inhabit and our interaction with it, from astronomy to geology, biology to environmental science.

Relocation, Relocation

On: more4

Time: 17:05 to 18:05

Kirstie and Phil are going green to help house hunters Sue and Neil. The pair are self-styled 'chico warriors' who want a home in Devon, where, using water, wind and solar power, they can create all the energy they need, as well as design a modern, funky interior that proves being green doesn't mean giving up on style. But, unsurprisingly, they've a huge list of requirements: a south-facing house with its own wood, stream and more than 3.5 acres of land, the potential to convert the interior to an open plan contemporary living space, plus outbuildings for an eco holiday business. Oh, and there's also a flat in Brighton to find so Sue can visit her daughter and grandson. They've sold their businesses and have a budget of £1,000,000, but while Sue's keeping an open mind, Neil's just not ready to compromise. Can our property superheroes find a solution that pleases everyone?

Thursday 3rd September

One Planet

On: BBC World Service Radio

Time: 10:32 to 11:00 (Also 1630, 2030, 0130)

One Planet looks at how we use our planet.

Grand Designs

On: more4

Time: 19:00 to 20:00

In 2005, Kelly and Masoko Neville set about building a spectacular oak-framed, straw-baled hexagonal house in the Cambridgeshire Fens. Kelly, a carpenter, had always dreamed of building an eco-friendly home that could provide a base for a new self-sufficient life, where he and Masoko could produce their own food and energy from the land. The unusual two-storey house was built around a spiral staircase carved out of an 800-year-old oak tree trunk, the centrepiece of an interior that drew inspiration from Tolkein's Hobbit. The unusual hexagonal design would have challenged the most experienced builder, and with no architect to turn to for advice, Kelly had to tackle all the problems alone. Three years later, Kevin McCloud goes back to visit Kelly, Masoko and their young son Acer to see if they are managing to lead the idyllic life they so craved; and to see whether Kelly has recovered from the sheer physical effort of building his family's home.

Leading Edge

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 21:00 to 21:30

Geoff Watts meets Lord May, President of the British Science Association, who has held many of the most senior scientific offices in the land, having been government chief science advisor and President of the Royal Society. Never afraid of speaking his mind - perhaps a product of his Australian upbringing - Bob May famously accused President George W Bush of being a modern-day Nero over climate change. His address at this year's Science Festival in Guildford will focus on his own subject of population biology and the apparent problem of natural selection; why do we do things for the common good when 'survival of the fittest' is a key principle of evolutionary theory?

Friday 4th September

Journey of a Lifetime

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 11:00 to 11:30

The 2009 winner of the BBC/Royal Geographical Society's annual competition for the most enterprising dream travel idea, Dan Box, attempts to reach the remote Carteret Islands in the South Pacific, where, with sea levels rising, the world's first mass evacuation as the result of climate change is now taking place.

Mud, Sweat and Tractors: The Story of Agriculture

On: BBC 2

Time: 19:00 to 20:00

Beef. Episode 4.

Documentary series about the history of 20th-century farming in Britain looks at how two of our finest native breeds of cattle, Hereford and Aberdeen Angus, reigned supreme before WWII and helped earn Britain a reputation as the 'stockyard of the world'. It also shows how, since then, both breeds have been transformed to a much larger size - from standing only to the stockman's waist to reaching his shoulder.

Saturday 5th September

Caroline Lucas Speech

On: BBC Parliament

Time: 21:30 to 22:00

Recorded coverage of Green Party leader Caroline Lucas' speech to the party's conference in Hove, from Friday 4 September.

Sunday 6th September

Countryfile

On: BBC 1

Time: 19:00 to 20:00

John Craven investigates whether marine conservation zones can bring sea beds back to life.

Last Chance to See...

On: BBC 2

Time: 20:00 to 21:00

Amazonian Manatee.

Stephen Fry and zoologist Mark Carwardine head to the ends of the Earth in search of animals on the edge of extinction, following the route Mark took 20 years ago with the author Douglas Adams. They set out to discover how the lugubrious Amazonian manatee, a freshwater mammal, has survived the last two decades, but Stephen breaks his arm deep in the Amazon rainforest.

Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=20818

Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

19.2%

- amount of UK honeybee colonies that died last winter

200,000

- number of African lions 20 years ago

30,000

- number of African lions today

£34 billion

- predicted cost of the proposed high-speed rail line from Glasgow to London

481

- number of whales caught by Norway this year, the lowest number for a decade

The Trouble With Ed Miliband

Photo by Christian Guthier

Having to get up for work at 2am does some strange things to your brain. Yesterday, I spent my commuting time thinking about Ed Miliband.

It's not my fault, I blame Flesh Is Grass for this blog post.

I agree with almost everything said in the post, but there's a fundamental problem with Ed Miliband leading the UK's fight on climate change.

He's too damn nice!

I can hardly find a bad word to say about him, unless I shut my eyes and think of Kingsnorth. He "gets it" in a way that so many of our elected representatives don't. He "gets it" in a way that John Prescott never did, although Prescott seems to be making up for lost time. (And by the way, listening to him on the radio the other morning brought back warm memories as I got to scream "bullshit!" as I was getting dressed.)

Miliband is reasonable, thinks things through, and actually takes the time to talk to the "green lobby". If you're an environmental protester, then how can you protest against a guy who says the same things you do?

So I'm going to be nitpicky. Flesh Is Grass points us towards Ed's Pledge, where we can sign up to support Ed at Copenhagen. I was scratching my head wondering what the real aim of it was. Surely Ed doesn't need a whole load of signatures of people who are backing him? He'll be speaking for the country.

Then I noticed this line:

The Labour Party and its elected representatives may use the data you have supplied

Ed, you have my wholehearted support at Copenhagen (provided you push for as much as you can get and don't take no for an answer). But I ain't signing your pledge just to fill Labour's databanks.

Less Waste, More Recycling

Photo by andy_carter

I missed these last week, so thanks to Chris for pointing them out in a recent comment.

As I mentioned earlier in the week, Edinburgh's recycling rate has jumped thanks to the industrial action taken by the city's binmen. Residents are finding their normal landfill bin full, so they're being forced into recycling as the bin collections become unreliable.

But it seems that you don't need a strike to see your recycling statistics move in the positive direction - the Scottish Environment Protection Agency says that the recycling rate for January - March this year rose from 30.1% to 33.2%

Perhaps more remarkable to my mind is that total waste has actually decreased by 120,000 tonnes to 3.29 million tonnes.

We're throwing less stuff out, and what we do throw we're recycling more of.

This ties in with the leaflet my girlfriend received from her local council this week. Previously, the only recycling they would take was paper and garden rubbish. Anything else had to go to the local dump to be recycled there. Now, she can happily fill her recycling bin with all manner of stuff including cardboard, plastic and metal cans. Food waste can go into the garden rubbish bin for composting. it should see her levels of recycling rise substantially.

Still, we should hold the celebrations. The Scottish Government wanted 40% recycling by next year. We're a long way short.

Network Rail Gets Ambition

Photo by Kabelleger

Network Rail have finally unveiled their plans for a High-Speed rail line running from London to Glasgow.

While it all sounds good, my concern is that a future government would decide it costs too much and try to throttle it half-way. For that reason, I'd like to see them start building it from the Glasgow end! (Yes, I'm aware that in reality they'll be building all over the place at the same time).

The feeling in the rail industry is that Network Rail lacks ambition in the way that British Rail did. They're seen as happy to maintain the tracks but aren't as willing to spend money on big-ticket projects. This will hopefully put that feeling to bed, although it's soul-destroying to note that they have a completion date of 2030.

Another of my hopes for this new line is that it virtually destroys the demand for internal airline flights, as it has done in Spain and France. The UK is small enough that no one should be flying internally anyway.

Guilt-Free Whisky

Photo by sashafatcat

Because I really need an excuse to get stuck into a bottle of Laphroaig!

Scottish Power has just announced they're going to be powering the island of Islay, off the west coast of Scotland, with a new tidal scheme.

Ten turbines will be installed, generating 10MW, and will be online in 2 years time. The drinks giant Diageo has signed itself up to power their Islay distilleries from the scheme, so you can drink your whisky without feeling any guilt!

(Save your guilt till the next day when your friends gleefully tell you what you got up to whilst drinking the whisky!)

Recycling Rates Rise

Edinburgh's binmen are still on strike. I mentioned the dispute over a month ago, and it seems that nothing has been resolved, or is near to being resolved. As a short-term fix to see us through the Festival, the council brought in private companies to clean the streets but that now looks like it will be extended once all the luvvies go home.

Remarkably, there is an upside. And it's a "green" one. Recycling rates have soared.

Unable to fit all their rubbish into the normal landfill bins, the good residents of this burgh have taken to doing what I consider to be their civic duty anyway - in astonishing amounts:

Can recycling increased 81% in July

Plastic recycling increased a whopping 154%

Which just goes to show, when pushed the populace will perform. Now it remains to be seen whether they will continue to recycle with such zealousness when the industrial dispute is over.

Incidentally, this might give some succour to those local councils who want to bring in fortnightly collections in a bid to save money - they can also hit their recycling targets!

Developer Seems To Know Nothing Of Trams

Edinburgh's forthcoming new tram network isn't exactly a secret - half of the city centre has been dug up in the last 12 months. Hell, the roadworks even appear in Google Street View!

So if you were building a new hotel on Leith Walk, one of the main tram routes, then you would maybe know something about them, right?

Right?

Well, maybe not. The developer who has proposed the hotel at the Shrubhill site seems to have made a number of glaring errors in their planning application, as highlighted by the Leith Business Association.

Firstly, they expect coaches to stop outside their hotel on Leith Walk. With the trams running, this will completely block all traffic on the street, which is why the council are going to be banning traffic from stopping.

Of course, not all hotel residents arrive by coach. A lot arrive by car, so they'll be expecting parking at the hotel. They'll be disappointed. Hotel staff will inform patrons to park at Greenside, half a mile uphill. Yeah, that's going to happen. The hotel guests will just park in the streets taking local resident's spaces.

What of the railway line which runs down one side of the site? The developers seem to have unilaterally turned this into "a green, potential cycle and walkway route". News to Network Rail, no doubt.

Meanwhile, they don't seem to have allowed for the street being widened somewhat for the trams, so the shops which will be at street level will have very little pavement in front of them.

So with so much thinking having gone into this development, the hotel will look spectacular, won't it? Well, no. It's a sandstone block...

Green In The Media 24th August - 30th August

Are we guilty of focussing on climate change to the detriment of other environmental problems? Or will tackling climate change also tackle other issues at the same time? Radio 4 has an investigation on Thursday night which will probably be trailed on the BBC News website beforehand.

Meanwhile, here's a first: I've listed Songs Of Praise!

Monday 24th August

Future of Food

On: BBC 2

Time: 21:00 to 22:00

George Alagiah travels the world to reveal a growing global food crisis. In this episode, George heads out to India to discover how a changing diet in the developing world is putting pressure on the world's limited food resources. He finds out how using crops to produce fuel is impacting on food supplies across the continents. George then meets a farmer in Kent, who is struggling to sell his fruit at a profit, and a British farmer in Kenya who is shipping out tonnes of vegetables for the UK's supermarket shelves. He also examines why so many people are still dying of hunger after decades of food aid. Back in the UK, George challenges the decision-makers with the facts he has uncovered - from Oxfam head of research Duncan Green to Sainsbury's boss Justin King. He finds out why British beef may offer a model for future meat production and how our appetite for fish is stripping the world's seas bare.

Rain

On: BBC 4

Time: 22:30 to 23:30

The Victorians believed that they could master the rain, but today climate change threatens us with rain that is wilder and more unpredictable than ever.

Tuesday 25th August

Nature

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 11:00 to 11:30

Brett Westwood investigates the potential for restoring large areas of heathland that could be unlocked by the thinning of Forestry Commission woodlands. Made famous by Thomas Hardy and purple with heather in late summer, lowland heaths are some of the UK's rarest habitats and are home to some of our most specialised wildlife including sand lizards, insectivorous plants and the strange nightjar. They have steadily declined over the last century, but a new open habitats consultation could spell the restoration of large tracts of heathland from Forestry Commission woodland. Brett talks to foresters and conservationists about the possibilities that opening up our woods present for people and for wildlife.

Home Planet

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 15:00 to 15:30

Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about the world we inhabit and our interaction with it, from astronomy to geology, biology to environmental science.

Thursday 27th August

One Planet

On: BBC World Service Radio

Time: 10:32 to 11:00 (Also 1630, 2030, 0130)

Denmark's Energy Island.

The Danish island of Samso has completely eliminated dependence on fossil fuels.

Open Country

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 15:00 to 15:27

One of the proposed sites for the new generation of nuclear power stations is farmland near the villages of Kirksanton and Silecroft on the Cumbrian coast. Helen Mark finds people there fighting the plans, but also some who support the idea. Kirksanton lies south of Sellafield, and this rural community, nestled between the most southerly fells of White Combe and Black Combe, was shocked to hear of the plans. Many villagers believe that the development would destroy the tranquility and beauty of the area they love. Others welcome the plans and the one opportunity they may bring to reinvent the Millom area as a centre for excellence in the nuclear industry, providing jobs, improving infrastrucure and ensuring young people have a future in the area. Helen considers what would be gained and what would be lost.

The Great Climate Change Hijack

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 21:00 to 21:30

The BBC's environment correspondent Richard Black investigates if climate change is diverting attention away from other environmental problems such as air pollution, acid oceans and species extinction. Talk about climate change is everywhere, from the classroom to the UN. It is undoubtedly an important issue, but has our enthusiasm for tackling climate change led us to neglect other pressing and arguably more immediate environmental concerns, such as poor air quality in our major cities? Why has climate change attracted so much political attention and the loss of plant and animal species so little? Far from being an 'inconvenient truth', could the climate change debate actually be rather politically covenient?

Sunday 30th August

Songs of Praise

On: BBC 1

Time: 17:00 to 17:35

Green Christians.

Aled Jones explores the connection between faith and the environment. He meets up with a woman whose faith has led her to keeping pigs, and visits the 12th-century Grade 1 listed church that is hiding a surprise on its roof. With beautiful hymns dedicated to the wonder of the created world, including Touch the Earth Lightly and Beauty for Brokenness.

The River Cottage Treatment

On: more4

Time: 20:00 to 21:00

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall invites a group of urban dwellers to spend a wholesome week at his River Cottage HQ living the green life. It's a clash of food cultures, as fast food-loving and convenience-obsessed non-cooks come to Hugh's farm for a taste of the River Cottage "grow your own" philosophy. Hugh's mission, of course, is to change their ways forever, but it's not going to be easy. First up is a group of finger-lickin' chicken-lovers who are living off takeaways and cheap chicken portions from the supermarket. First they've got to bond with the River Cottage poultry flock, and connect with the birds that will, at the end of the week, become their dinner. So, how do the gang cope with a week on the farm, and is River Cottage Treatment enough to cure their dodgy chicken habits for good?

Who Killed the Honey Bee?

On: BBC 4

Time: 20:00 to 21:00

With an affliction dubbed colony collapse disorder wiping out bees worldwide, Martha Kearney explores the terrifying implications of their possible extinction and the loss of their most vital service to nature, pollination, without which global food production would collapse. The threat to keepers, farmers and our food supply is acute and growing, and yet the cause of this 'Marie Celeste syndrome' that causes bees to flee their hives remains a mystery.

Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=20818

Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

8.7 million

- number of passengers through Glasgow Airport every year

24 million

- number of projected passengers through Glasgow Airport each year under BAA's expansion plans

140 miles

- the move north of wine-growing areas for every one degree rise in global temperatures

80%

- people who say they have to travel outside of their local area to meet their basic shopping needs

62.56 F

- global ocean surface temperature for July, a new record

6.1%

- amount that Arctic sea ice has decreased every decade since 1979

Dear Not-So-Green Place

Guerilla Gardening is a weird concept - find the spaces that the local council neglect, and then plant flowers and shrubs there. It sounds like a win-win concept - the residents get their area prettified and the council gets the plaudits, since the guerilla gardeners tend to operate in secret cells under cover of darkness!

But what happens if it's not a lone green-fingered secretive flower-planter? What happens if it's an entire community? And they're quite open about what they are doing? Well, in that case, they'd better be prepared for court.

Glasgow City Council are today taking a group of residents to court for the heinous crime of cleaning up a bit of waste ground. The meadow was basically a no-go area for 20 years - a dumping ground for shopping trolleys and used syringes - until some locals decided to clean it up and reclaim it for the community. Today the North Kelvin Meadow is used by dogwalkers, children and vegetable-growers. Or should I say, yesterday it was used by these groups.

Glasgow is wanting to build flats on the land and therefore is trying to evict the residents so that the Meadow can be returned to it's previous derelict state. Glasgow in gaelic means "Dear Green Place". Well, not so much with this decision.

Here's a video of the locals getting to know their neighbours during a picnic in the meadow at the end of last month. You can sign their petition on their website.

57 Channels And...Still Switched On

Photo by dailyinvention

My old TV finally gave up at the tail end of last week. It's sobering to note that in these days of planned obsolescence in electronics 15 years is a good age for a telly. It started showing some wavy lines last year which have gradually got worse over the last 12 months, until last week when the picture became unwatchable.

I did briefly consider living without a TV completely. I've done it before, most recently last September when I first moved into this flat and had no working TV aerial. But those TV-less times have shown me that I'm not really that kind of person, while I admire others who do it.

So I picked up my new LCD TV on Friday, and it'll be interesting to see what the effect on my power consumption is between this TV and the old one. I never use 'standby' so the only power will be when it is switched on.

Or so I thought. I very rarely read the manual for electronics but I was flicking through this one when I noticed a small sentence buried on Page 17:

To power down the TV completely, unplug the power cord from the mains socket

In other words, even when you use the on/off switch on the side of the TV, it is still using power! How many of those who think they are doing good by not using 'standby' are still using power on a TV they're not watching?

My Solution For Fairer Fares

Photo by JasonRogersFooDogGiraffeB ee

Sorry for going quiet this week, work intervened. So while I'm thinking of work, firstly let me say that it's about bloody time this happened.

Okay, I'll stick to railways, with the news yesterday that train fares will actually fall next year.

I have to admit that there are times when I inwardly cringe at the fares I quote people. I had two examples yesterday. One woman wanted to upgrade to first class from Edinburgh to Cheltenham. I thought I would have to pick her up off the floor when I told her the price was £187. Another (foreign) guy had dutifully looked up the price for Newcastle to Stratford online the night before - £88.60 - so had gone to the cash machine and withdrawn £90 before hopping on my train. Except £88.60 is the off-peak fare and only available if you buy your ticket at the station. If you buy on board the train, the price I have to sell at, it's £163. He got off at the next stop and caught a later train.

As railway professionals...well, okay, as railway workers...we sometimes lose sight of how casual travellers see the industry. People like Jeff of SNP Tactical Voting, who wonders what can be done about the fares. And just why are they so high in the first place?

So here is my solution to high train fares. Forget about renationalising the network. It's never going to happen. And neither is making all public transport free, as attractive as that sounds. Instead, peg the fares at the previous year's average petrol prices. So, for example, 2008's average petrol price was £4.72 per gallon. With 40 miles between Edinburgh and Glasgow, and a modern car getting about 40 miles to the gallon, this means that it costs a car driver £4.72 to do that trip. So the train fare between the two cities would be £4.72.

This means that the train is immediately competitive with the car and can use it's other attractions as selling points - chiefly that it's faster than the car for the same price.

But could the railway survive with these fares in operation? Of course not. So the government should pay staff wages. Nothing else, just staff wages. The train companies can then run their railway with higher levels of customer service without having to worry about the labour costs, and with the increase in the number of passengers they should be getting more revenue despite the smaller fares. Since the number of staff is more or less fixed, the government will know what "subsidy" they are paying every year.

I'm sure that there's an economist somewhere rolling about on the floor laughing his head off at this, but it all seems simple to me!

Of course, when the reality of Peak Oil hits home then we'd have to come up with a new system.

High Rise Hopes

In the mid-1970's my maternal grandparents lived in one of the high-rise buildings in the Gorbals area of Glasgow (above), concrete edifices that seemed to have been thrown up on the cheap to house the city's booming population.

Although I can see their problems now, as a kid I loved them. I seem to recall my grandparents living on the 21st floor, but Wikipedia claims there were only 20 floors so perhaps my memory is playing tricks on me. Or maybe it just seemed like 21 floors when the lift was out of order!

There were two parts of the building in particular that fascinated me. The first was the "drying green". Each floor had an area for hanging your clothes to dry, open to the elements. Large cinder blocks with holes in them stopped you from flying down the outside of the building whilst they also let the wind into the "green". And at that height, there was plenty of wind! For a 5 year old boy, this was a brilliant playground. You could hold the back of your parka over the top of your head and fly backwards the length of the green, taking Mrs McShoogle's clean laundry with you.

The other part of the building to hold my fascination was "The Chute". This was where all the rubbish went - a hole in the wall of each landing where the residents would put their bin bags. On closing the chute door, you could hear it sliding away. I couldn't understand why kids couldn't play in The Chute, it sounded like great fun. Until my dad pointed out that there wasn't really a giant slide in there, the rubbish simply plummeted 21 floors into a skip at the bottom.

So why all the reminiscing? Germaine Greer had an essay in yesterday's Sunday Herald in which she advocated building more high-rises as "sustainable places" for the 21st century. The current model of 3 bedroom houses in car-lined cul-de-sacs is no longer fit-for-purpose, she claims. In a globally-warmed world, suburban sprawl should give way to inner-city condominiums.

The problem is, she seems to be imagining Manhattan-style apartments while the UK population will see, well, the 1970's Gorbals.

I already had a ticket to the Festival of Politics event on Friday where she will be making her case, so I'll see if she's more persuasive in person.

Green In The Media 17th August - 23rd August

There's a few documentaries on TV and radio this week, looking at food production, lithium mining and noise pollution.

Monday 17th August

Why Do the British Love Wildlife?

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 21:00 to 21:30

Francesco Da Mosto leaves his native Italy to explore the apparent special relationship between the British and the natural world. From buzzards to hedgehogs or dormice to snails, we seem to love them all, but why? Francesco discovers that the answer seems to lie in the 19th century.

Future of Food

On: BBC 2

Time: 21:00 to 22:00

George Alagiah travels the world to reveal a growing global food crisis. With food riots on three continents recently, and unprededented competition for food due to population growth and changing diets, there is a looming problem. George joins a Masai chief among the skeletons of cattle he has lost to climate change, and the English farmer who tells him why food production in the UK is also hit. He investigates what is wrong with people's diets and talks to top nutritionist Susan Jebb, DEFRA minister Hilary Benn and Nobel laureate Rajendra Pachauri to uncover what the future holds for our food.

Tuesday 18th August

One Planet Food

On: Community Channel

Time: 08:30 to 08:55 (Also Thu 0830)

Three young secret agents are on a mission to discover the true impact of food and farming on the environment and investigate where food actually comes from.

Home Planet

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 15:00 to 15:30

Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about the world we inhabit and our interaction with it, from astronomy to geology, biology to environmental science.

Wednesday 19th August

Afternoon Play

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 14:15 to 15:00

Hudson and Pepperdine Save the Planet.

Comedy about climate change and how to combat it. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has set up a working party from within the broadcasting industries to brainstorm solutions to the current crisis. Hudson and Pepperdine are on the list. With Felix Dexter, Samantha Holland, Rupert Degas, Dave Lamb.

Thursday 20th August

One Planet

On: BBC World Service Radio

Time: 10:32 to 11:00 (Also 1630, 2030, 0130)

Banking on Life.

Richard Scrase looks at the largest seed store in the world.

In Business

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 20:30 to 23:00

Battery Power.

The world may soon need huge supplies of the lightest metal, lithium, if plug-in cars really are a future replacement for the internal combustion engine. Half the world's supplies of lithium are high up in the Andes in the landlocked country of Bolivia. Peter Day asks if Bolivia really could become what experts are calling 'the Saudi Arabia of lithium'.

A Problem With Noise

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 21:00 to 21:30

Wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson investigates the man-made noise pollution which is becoming increasingly invasive in our lives and in our environment, affecting both humans and wildlife. He explores what noise is, the impact of man-made noise and the possible long-term consequences if we don't turn the volume down.

Friday 21st August

Any Questions?

On: BBC Radio Four

Time: 20:00 to 20:50 (Also Sat 1310)

Eddie Mair chairs the topical debate from Middle Wallop, Hampshire. The panellists include environmental campaigner Jonathon Porritt.

Sunday 23rd August

Countryfile

On: BBC 1

Time: 19:00 to 20:00

John Craven investigates the campaign to get consumers to eat less meat, and finds out if it could really make a difference to climate change.

Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=20818

Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

17%

- number of people who wouldn't get up from their seat to change the channel if their TV remote control broke

16 million tonnes

- the emissions reductions from homes in Germany since 2004 thanks to an energy efficiency loans scheme

11,539

- number of protesters involved in animal rights protests in 2004

1,604

- number of protesters involved in animal rights protests today

£420 per year

- amount that an average household spends on food that they then waste

12,000

- number of independent shops in England & Wales that have closed so far this year

230mpg

- alleged mileage of the Chevy Volt

Could It Be...?

Way back in the mists of time, late 2007/early 2008 to be precise, some graffiti sprang up on Leith Walk and the surrounding areas in Edinburgh which I started documenting and speculating who was behind it.

It started with a BT advert which was altered from 0 pence per minute to CO2 pence per minute. Subtle, without being in-your-face.

Then the wall of the local Tesco received a scrawled "Demand Carbon Rationing Now".

Quite wittily, an advert for the Bank Of Scotland which used a picture of a giant sunflower had "no to GM" written next to the flower.

Then came what was perhaps the high point of the graffiti campaign, an advert for Next. The poster had a woman reclining, to which had been added a thought bubble of her thinking of money, and the words "Boring Cow". This became quite famous, even reaching the hallowed pages of The Scotsman!

After that, in what must have been an interesting brainstorming session, the advertising company who owns the billboards decided to put up a poster for Hummer. Yes, Hummer. It didn't survive the weekend. Obviously the graffiti artist was so flabbergasted at this turn of events that all he/she could think to write was "piss right off" underneath the photo of the abomination.

To make matters worse, this ad revolved with another one with cheap flights to Oslo, or lala land as it was dubbed...

...and the next billboard in the street was for a shopping centre. The words "Be bad. Buy nothing new this xmas" joined the picture of a pair of jeans.

After that, though, everything went quiet. No new graffiti appeared. What had happened to the mystery tagger? Did they get caught? Or did they move on to pastures new?

I moved out of the area last year, so there is virtually no chance of me spotting if the local ethical graffiti artist resumes their campaign.

Or so I thought. On Flickr the other day, I noticed one of my contacts had posted a new photo of some graffiti. From near the same area. On a billboard.

They're back! Even the colour of the writing is the same! This is an advert for the Scottish Government's Go Greener campaign. It says "For a nicer atmosphere, leave the car when you can" to which someone has added: "Not enough". I couldn't agree more!

Photo by bisonbison

How NOT To Recycle Your Mobile Phone

Photo by Milica Sekulic

There's estimated to be an incredible 90 million mobile phones lying unused in homes in the UK. One of them sat next to my computer for the last three months.

I kept looking at it and thinking that I should do something about it. I even researched websites that pay you for the old phone. But it took me until yesterday to actually do something about it. And if someone with my level of understanding of the toxic waste problem can take so long to recycle his phone then it goes some way to understanding that 90 million figure.

I should now have a cheque for £58 winging it's way to me, thanks to mobile phone recycling, a price comparison website for all those cashback websites. Just put your make of phone and it's working state into the relevant boxes and it will tell you where to get the best deal for your phone.

I should also point out that there are some charities that will also take your old phones for free.

So why is this post entitled How NOT To Recycle Your Phone? Well, I had packaged my old phone up in a jiffy bag (recycled, of course!) to take to the post office when I noticed how much of my recycling had built up in the box in the corner. No problem, I thought, I'll do two things at once. I'm a man, I can multitask...

I shoved all my packaging and old envelopes into a bag to take to the recycling bin, then put my old phone in the same bag. Can you guess what happened next?

I've never been dumpster diving before. It was...interesting.

H 2 Oh No

Photo by Jason Pratt

Last year, the water cooler in our mess room in Edinburgh ran dry. There was a contractual dispute involving a flight of stairs and a lazy delivery guy, so no delivery was made for over a month. I have to admit I don't like our water cooler - firstly because it's bottled water, and secondly because the water is supplied by Nestle. And I have my problems with Nestle. But it's amazing how much you miss water when you're "deprived" of it!

In common with all other railway depots seemingly in the entire world, there was a big red sign next to the sink saying that the tap water was not for public consumption. Note the past tense there - in the middle of the "contractual dispute", and with the unions complaining about the law-breaking lack of drinking water, a big green sign saying "Drinking Water" replaced the previous red one overnight. Does anyone trust it? Would you?

I thought I would seize the chance to ask about replacing the cooler with a plumbed-in version, but that was apparently a non-starter since we were tied into the Nestle contract, even though they weren't delivering. That was eventually resolved with one of the women in the office carrying 20 large bottles of water up the stairs while the delivery guy stood and watched her!

The BBC seems to have a water problem too - the Guardian reports that they spend £406,000 a year on water coolers alone. And that's not to mention the smaller bottles of water provided at "events" or meetings. For any organisation, half a million pounds is an incredible amount of money to be wasting but I'm surprised that one of their accountants didn't do some investigating after discovering that BBC Wales only spent £1,489 on water.

The reason? Their water coolers are plumbed in. Surely someone at the BBC would have had a lightbulb moment over that one? Or, indeed, a water-cooler moment.

Another Contender For "Worst Green Product"

I've been pissing myself laughing at this for a good ten minutes or so.

Here we have the "Pillet". It's a toilet roll holder. But not just any toilet roll holder, oh no. It's a toilet roll holder with a built-in lamp.

Yes, a built-in lamp.

Can you guess how the lamp works? That's right, pulling the toilet paper turns a dynamo which charges the light.

Quite how much toilet paper you have to use to light the whole room, the article doesn't say. And neither does it say just who finds they suddenly need some light on the subject when they're sitting on the loo.

Although it does recommend that you take it into the garden with you and have a party. Presumably with all your guests desperately pulling out toilet paper so they can see.

By the way, this product is brought to you by the same guy who invented the Axixa.

Fed up with people peeing against your wall? Then install the Axixa, and give them something to pee into! When it's full, you can easily drain it so it's ready for the general public to use again...

Lulling And Soothing

Photo by CarbonNYC

I'm back to work today after a fortnight's holiday. Nothing unusual about that.

It's an early shift, so my alarm clock is set for 4am. Nothing unusual about that.

As I write this, it's almost 3.30am and I haven't slept a wink. Unfortunately, nothing unusual about that.

I'm not the only one at my work who gets screwed up every time they change from a normal sleeping pattern to early shifts. It's the curse of the shift-worker. I put myself in full wind-down mode last night - early dinner, no coffee in the evening, not too much tv, reading a bit before bedtime.

Still, it was 11pm when I crawled under the duvet and I knew almost immediately I wasn't going to sleep. The rain started outside and it soothed me into one of those states where your body is completely relaxed yet your mind is wide awake.

I lay there for four hours, pondering life and all it's little foibles, thinking that some people pay good money to feel this relaxed! Ideas come to me, certainties form and dissipate, barriers break down, possibilities spring to life. The world at 2am seems a much more hopeful place.

Unfortunately, feeling relaxed and getting sleep are two different things. I'm going to be a zombie when I get home around 4pm, when the world will once again seem oppressive and the sound of rain will be grating.