The Year In Green Numbers

With the end of the holiday period, normal blogging will resume shortly. Meanwhile, here's a pick of some 'green numbers' from 2011:

5,000

- blackbirds that dropped dead from the sky in Arkansas #

84%

- people who oppose government plans to sell off England's forests and woodlands to the highest bidder #

40%

- overstatement of Saudi oil reserves as revealed in a Wikileaks cable #

$8 billion

- fine imposed on Chevron for polluting the Amazaon #

14

- effective population of Siberian tigers in the wild #

600

- deaths in Scotland each year from air pollution #

216 tonnes

- oil that leaked from a pipe in the North Sea

60 square miles

- size of the surface slick from that oil leak

294

- oil spills per year in the North Sea 2004-2009

4.24 million km²

- minimum of Arctic sea ice this year, the lowest ever #

45%

- increase in global CO² emissions 1990 - 2010 #

590 million

- plastic bags used in Scotland each year #

£470 billion

- subsidies to fossil fuel producers worldwide #

50

- earthquakes in Blackpool caused by fracking #

£750 million

- investment in Scottish renewable energy in 2011 #

60 seconds

- time "saved" by car drivers after the government scrapped a bus lane on the M4, claiming it was a drain on the economy #

A$23 per tonne

- Australia's new carbon tax #

11th

- where 2011 ranks globally in the warmest years since records began #

2nd

- where 2011 ranks in the UK in the warmest years since records began #

40 years

- time it will take to dismantle the Fukushima nuclear plant 

Enjoy The Holidays

It's that time of year again. I swear it comes around quicker every year, although that's probably because the shops start selling Christmas stuff in September!

Enjoy the holidays, and Suitably Despairing will be back some time around New Year.

Get Your Ethical Groove On

If I hadn't been on the bus, I would have been rolling around on the floor, tears of laughter streaming down my cheeks.

This week, Radio Ecoshock has a "music special". The track which brought on my fit of snot-inducing giggles was by a German Bob Dylan-soundalike (complete with harmonica), trying to get the words 'Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant' to fit in with a one-note strumming guitar.

You can hear it and other "activist" tunes at Radio Ecoshock. Make sure you're not in public!

Make Fares Fairer

Photo by Tony Austin

And once again, the rail industry is getting a good kicking from all and sundry.

ATOC, the Association of Train Operating Companies, announced today the fare rises that will be implemented in January. My twitter timeline immediately filled up with people screaming in horror at Scotrail and other companies.

The thing is, we do this to ourselves. We announce the same fare increase multiple times a year, so that people are under the impression that fares are continually rising. The fares go up every January, usually by RPI+1%. Then last budget the government announced that for the next few years, fares would increase by RPI+3% (except Scotrail, who would stick to the +1% arrangement). So everyone had a good moan about fare rises.

Then in July every year, ATOC announces any fare rises being implemented in August. These are usually few and far between, but they give the newspapers another chance to kick the industry. Come November, the chancellor announced that actually he's going back to the +1%. And then just before Christmas, every year, the industry announces what those fare increases will be. In January, the newspapers have another easy story about "commuter misery" on the day of the fare rise.

So that's 5 headlines a year about the same fare increase, giving the impression that train fares are continually rising. They're not.

But there's an easy way out of this: petrol equivalent. The idea is simple: you charge the equivalent of what the journey would cost you if you were driving in a car. Obviously the oil price is volatile so you'd have to peg it somehow (maybe a maximum fare, or the average miles per gallon of a family car). The public would know why they're being charged that amount for their journey, and the newspapers would lay off the industry. They can hardly moan about the cost of a train ticket when the cost of filling the car with petrol is the same, can they?

Alternatively, charge by the mile. All journeys would be charged the same amount per mile, so everyone knows what they should be paying depending on how far they're going. 25p per mile would see a Glasgow to Edinburgh fare at £10, while Edinburgh to London would be £82.50.

The fare structure needs a good shake-up, to make it fairer for all.

Time To Move The Conversation On

Photo by UggBoy<3UggGirl

It was with some trepidation that I listened to Friday's A Point Of View, with Lisa Jardine talking about climate change and scepticism. After all, one of my favourite writers and raconteurs, Clive James, has used the same platform to tell the world's scientists that they're all talking bollocks when it comes to global warming.

So I was pleasantly surprised at what she had to say, offering some advice on how to combat scepticism. Her feeling that the conversation should move on struck a chord too. How many times do we have to hear the same message about what climate change is, and that we should change our lightbulbs and recycle more?

As much as it's time for the scientists to move on in their conversation with the public, it's also time for the politicians, government and NGOs to move on as well. The phrase "we're all in this together" was coined by David Cameron in a bid to sell his cuts to the public service. But it's actually true when it comes to fighting climate change.

We're all in this together, and it's time we graduated from baby steps to big strides.

You can hear A Point Of View on the BBC iPlayer here until Friday.

Green In The Media 19th - 25th December

Monday 19th December


One Planet
On: BBC World Service Radio
Time: 12:32 to 12:50 (Also Fri 1930, Sat 0430, 1830, 0030, Sun 0630)
One Planet looks at how we use our planet.


The Year the Earth Went Wild
On: Channel 4
Time: 20:00 to 21:00
The Year the Earth Went Wild looks back at a year where almost every month was affected by a natural disaster. With a record-breaking cold winter, the tsunami in Japan, the extraordinary killer American tornado season, the floods in Australia and a hurricane in New York, 2011 has seen an onslaught of epic-scale climate and geological events across the world, all caught on camera in the most spectacular fashion. Using eye-witness footage, interviews with survivors and rescuers, and analysis from geological and weather specialists, this documentary charts the incredible natural events of 2011.

Tuesday 20th December


Home Planet
On: BBC Radio 4
Time: 15:00 to 15:30
Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about the world and our impact upon it.

Sunday 25th December


Our World
On: BBC News
Time: 12:30 to 13:00
China's Green Revolution.
News on current issues around the world. China pollutes more than any other country on earth, but now the Chinese government says it wants the country to go green. Can China really clean up its act? Justin Rowlatt goes to see the impact of three unbroken decades of economic growth.



Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from 
http://www.getdigiguide.tv/?p=1&r=20818
Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

80%

-proportion of the Danube's wetlands that have been lost to agriculture #

2.3%

- increase in UK acid rain, the first increase in 40 years #

40 years

- time it will take to dismantle the Fukushima nuclear plant #

200%

- increase in haddock quota on the West Coast #

60%

- people who think it is right to subsidise wind farms #

Meanwhile, In The Arctic...

Photo by Olga Oslina

No sooner is the ink dry on the Durban agree-to-not-agree-until-some-time-in-the-distant-future-when-we-will-agree agreement, than Canada announces that it is pulling out of the Kyoto Agreement.

In truth, that's no surprise. They've done the square root of bugger all to actually deal with their climate emissions. But make no mistake, this decision has nothing to do with not being able to afford to tackle their CO² output. It has everything to do with selling their Tar Sands oil, the dirtiest fossil fuel on the planet.

And with spectacular timing, Canada announced their intention to do nothing about climate change on the same day that a team of Russian scientists announced their discovery that methane emissions from the Arctic are, well, fucking huge.

Melting sea ice has exposed the sea floor, where huge structures thousands of metres in diameter are leaking methane like there's no tomorrow. Which there probably won't be unless we tackle climate change and reverse the melting of the sea ice.

I'm sure Canada could probably find the same problem of escaping methane in their melting permafrost, if they bothered to look further than the nearest tar sands pit.

8 More Years

I was prepared for the worst, prepared for the despairing that comes at the end of a new round of talks about a climate treaty. And yet, there's always that wee niggle in the back of your mind that gnaws away. Maybe this time, the politicians will come to their senses. Maybe this time, the world's leaders won't put their own re-elections before the planet. Maybe this time, the predictions of climatic chaos will actually spur folk into action.

Well, maybe next time.

There was an agreement of sorts signed, but it's far from what anybody wanted - even those that wanted nothing. It's an agreement to disagree, an agreement to keep talking and disagreeing in the hope that some time in the not too distant future, when this generation of politicians are living off their fat pensions and their lecture circuit fees, someone else can face an electorate and say "this is going to cost us so much more than if we had implemented a new treaty way back in 2012, 2011, 2010."

It's an agreement to not legally bind a legally forceful non-agreement. An agreement to produce something, anything, in 2015 that can be implemented in 2020, and that way we can have 8 more years of pollution. 8 more years of rising CO2 levels. 8 more years of despairing.

8 more years of hoping that someone, somewhere, is going to grab the world by the hair and repeatedly bash it's face off a desk until it realises how stupid it is being.

8 more years of being stupid.

Green In The Media 12th - 18th December

Monday 12th December


One Planet
On: BBC World Service Radio
Time: 12:32 to 12:50 (Also Fri 1930, Sat 0430, 1830, 0030, Sun 0630)
One Planet looks at how we use our planet.

Tuesday 13th December


Home Planet
On: BBC Radio 4
Time: 15:00 to 15:30
Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about our world and our impact upon it.

Sunday 18th December


Expedition Alaska
On: Quest
Time: 21:00 to 22:00
In Alaska the scientists witness the effects of global warming - from displaced polar bears to retreating glaciers and thawing permafrost. What will save this fragile wilderness?



Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from 
http://www.getdigiguide.tv/?p=1&r=20818
Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

165mph

- wind speed recorded in the Cairngorms during Hurricane Bawbag #

£11 billion

- estimated cost to Scotland of tackling climate change #

?

- estimated cost to Scotland of NOT tackling climate change. No one has bothered to work it out.

25%

- proportion of the world's land which is "highly degraded" and unsuitable for agriculture #

¥2.28 billion

- money intended to help tsunami victims which the Japanese government has diverted to spend on security for it's whaling fleet #

Power Line Stays Above Ground

The Scottish Government have just announced that the proposed new Beauly-Denny power line will not be buried.

If you recall, this is the section of the national grid running the spine of Scotland, from Beauly in the north to Denny in the central belt. The transmission lines will be higher-powered than the existing lines, in order to bring renewable energy from the north of the country to the places where it is needed most.

It's one of those issues which has split the environmental movement. On the one hand, it makes remote renewable generation more attractive. On the other, the electricity pylons will be larger and therefore unsightly.

I've always argued on the side of the line being built. Electricity pylons are one of those things that you fail to notice after a while, that merge into the background. There is also an existing transmission line there, which the new line will merely replace for the most part. And we're talking about a relatively small section of the country having pylons placed on it, to benefit a larger section of not just this country, but the wider world through a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.

But lastly, and it's the same thing I think about wind turbines on our hills, if we don't tackle climate change then the Scottish landscape will not look like it does just now anyway.

Acceptable In The 80s

The worrying thing is, someone at Friends of the Earth Scotland comes up with these video ideas. And then choreographs them!

Incidentally, having lived through the 80s I don't recall these things being all that acceptable even, ahem, way back then. And neither were the clothes.

Green In The Media 5th - 11th December

Monday 5th December


One Planet
On: BBC World Service Radio
Time: 12:32 to 12:50 (Also Fri 1930, Sat 0430, 1830, 0030, Sun 0630)
One Planet looks at how we use our planet.


The Material World
On: BBC Radio 4
Time: 21:00 to 21:30
Quentin Cooper hears about the impact of thawing permafrost on climate change

Tuesday 6th December


Home Planet
On: BBC Radio 4
Time: 15:00 to 15:30
Richard Daniel and the team discuss listeners' questions about our world and our impact upon it.

Wednesday 7th December


Frozen Planet
On: BBC 1
Time: 21:00 to 22:00 (Also Sun 1800 BBC2)
On Thin Ice.
David Attenborough journeys to both polar regions to investigate what rising temperatures will mean for the people and wildlife that live there and for the rest of the planet. David starts out at the North Pole, standing on sea ice several metres thick, but which scientists predict could be open ocean within the next few decades. The Arctic has been warming at twice the global average, so David heads out with a Norwegian team to see what this means for polar bears. He comes face-to-face with a tranquilised female, and discovers that mothers and cubs are going hungry as the sea ice on which they hunt disappears. In Canada, Inuit hunters have seen with their own eyes what scientists have seen from space; the Arctic Ocean has lost 30% of its summer ice cover over the last 30 years. For some, the melting sea ice will allow access to trillions of dollars worth of oil, gas and minerals. For the rest of us, it means the planet will get warmer.

Thursday 8th December


Kevin's Grand Design
On: Channel 4
Time: 20:00 to 21:00
As part of The Great British Property Scandal season Kevin McCloud embarks on an epic battle to build his very own Grand Design. Britain needs more homes, but fed up with the poor quality of the country's identikit new houses, Kevin aims to prove that it wouldn't cost any more to build homes that are a lot nicer to live in. This first episode of the two-part series follows Kevin over five years as he sets out to prove that we can all have beautiful, affordable eco homes for the same price as low-cost social housing. Despite spending a decade watching other people build their own homes, Kevin has never built anything before.





Sunday 11th December


Countryfile
On: BBC 1
Time: 17:55 to 18:55
John Craven investigates our insatiable appetite for water - and asks whether, in the future, there will be enough to go around. 


Expedition Alaska
On: Quest
Time: 21:00 to 22:00
A team of world renowned scientists and filmmakers explore Alaska. Their aim is to document the impact of global warming, but will they be able to handle the extreme conditions?



Excerpts taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from 
http://www.getdigiguide.tv/?p=1&r=20818
Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The Week In Green Numbers

43.6%

- Scottish Recycling rate for Apr-Jun 2011 #

11th

- where 2011 ranks in the list of warmest years since records began #

$187 billion

- investment in renewable energy in 2010, the first time renewables beat fossil fuel investment #

33%

- proportion of the world's uranium which comes from Kazakhstan #

£2 billion per year

- cost to the UK of keeping used plutonium from nuclear reactors #

Vote For Porty And Leith

As I've mentioned before, the communities of Portobello and Leith want to build a wind turbine at Seafield sewage works, midway between the two. The idea is to power homes in the area and share the revenue that the turbine will bring in.

There's a long way to go before the dream can become a reality, though, and for that they need funding. That's where you step in.

No, don't worry, you don't have to put your hand in your pocket. All you have to do is vote on the Energyshare website for them to receive up to £100,000 of funding. With only 24 hours to go, they are neck and neck for funding in the Medium Project category.

Please, if you haven't already done so, take 2 minutes out of your day and vote now.

Glasgow Incinerator To Get Go-Ahead?

Photo by Ole Poulsen

It looks like Viridor have had more luck hoodwinking Glasgow City Council than they have East Lothian Council so far, with the Herald reporting that a new incinerator is about to be given the go-ahead within the city limits.

Glasgow is, of course, hailing this as a great "green" thing to do. In actual fact, it's the cheap thing to do. Burning your rubbish removes landfill costs, and removes recycling costs because less trash goes into the recycling stream. Once the beast is up-and-running, the beast needs to be fed.

Look at it this way. The Glasgow incinerator will process 200,000 tonnes of rubbish. The Dunbar incinerator could take 300,000 tonnes of rubbish. Scotland as a whole produces 2.8million tonnes of rubbish (based on the latest figures). So Viridor's two massive incinerators will need almost a fifth of the entire country's trash, easily outstripping their host area's waste piles.

How many Councils will see it as easier and cheaper to fulfil their "green" commitments by sending their rubbish to Glasgow and Dunbar, rather than recycling it?

(See why incineration is a very bad idea here)