When I talk to people about the need to tackle global warming, a great many still say that it is going to be very difficult to reduce our carbon footprint. In the eyes of many, one of the easiest wins in reducing emissions is to convert to electric vehicles. Given that private cars account for at least 20% of our total energy footprint, IF they were all electric, and IF the electricity all came from renewable sources, clearly there is a big prize here.

But like many, I have to say I have been sceptical that electric cars will ever be an attractive alternative.  There is a wonderful website I know called “ugly electric cars” which demonstrates clearly the problem.

However, my attention was caught by a tweet I picked up a month or two back with a link to Robert Llewellyn (Crichton in Red Dwarf) and his Carpool series of Internet TV interviews. He had been given a new fully electric Mitsubishi i-MiEV to test and I was immediately struck by how practical a car this was. And by its low running cost - roughly £1 per 100 miles, which was also its approximate range. Now for me, most of my car journeys are short, around Hertfordshire, so this could be a very viable option. He now has a series of internet TV videos called Gearless which will track his experience with the i-MiEV.

Read the rest of this entry.

Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.

Kenneth E. Boulding
Economist and co-founder of General Systems Theory

So, this week’s big news is that we are finally “out of recession” - even if it is by the smallest of error-prone margins. But is it perhaps a timely reminder that whilst GDP growth may still be a valid measure of our economic well-being, it is by no means the only one, and there are many economists who question its continued relevance, and some are brave enough to point out the bleedin’ obvious - that continued growth is neither sustainable nor desirable.

I’d like to share with you the latest report from the New Economics Foundation (nef) which puts forward the case for a new macro economic model “that allows the human population as a whole to thrive without having to relying on ultimately impossible, endless increases in consumption.” Read the rest of this entry. .

What a load of rubbish!

Seriously, the waste strategy that Hertfordshire is preparing to adopt is fundamentally flawed, and this is an issue that affects us all - it’s not just NIMBY objections to waste facilities in electorally inconvenient spots.

What is happening across the country, and indeed across the rest of the world, is that mass burn incineration is on its way out. It is yesterday’s technology, and is a dangerous addiction, relatively easy to take up, but very difficult to get rid of. The world of waste treatment is a rapidly changing one, and there are many new ways being found to reduce our past reliance on landfill. But not, it seems, in Hertfordshire. Read the rest of this entry.

I have recently had a number of people emailing asking me my position on the fox hunting ban.   When the ban was introduced I was sceptical of the motives (Labour metropolitan class versus rural areas) and its effectiveness, and I was very conscious of the very strong opposition to the ban by many I knew who lived and worked in rural communities across the country.  But I think on balance it has succeeded in curbing unnecessary cruelty without completely ruining the rural way of life as was predicted by its opponents. If it was brought to a vote again I would be inclined to suport its continuation.

One of the best pieces of evidence of people’s attitudes to this now was an e-poll conducted by one of our MP’s, Tom Brake, who represents Carshalton and Wallington - here is his summary: Read the rest of this entry.

Yesterday the Liberal Democrats called on Parliament to back the 10:10 campaign on climate change. Sadly, the Labour Government applied a three-line whip (why did they have to do that? - doesn’t that just make politics even more pointless to real people?) to vote down any specific action and the motion was defeated.  It was heartening to see local Conservative MPs speaking and voting in support of this initiative, although not surprisingly our own MP, whose views as a denier of climate change are well known, did not see fit to attend the debate.

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I was back in Hitchin Market last Saturday helping Climate Justice with their campaigns to raise awareness of the countdown to Copenhagen.  Generally a very positive response from the public; the last time I was handing out material of this sort for the World Development Movement - when we were campaigning (successfully!) for a stengthening of the climate change bill - only a small proportion of the shoppers showed any interest at all.  This time it was only a minority who walked on by, so the message is getting through. Many were delighted with the opportiuntiy to send a postcard to the PRime Minister, or to their MP, to strengthen the government’s resolve on this issue.

Great news for green campaigners as EON has now announced it will not be proceeding with plans to develop Kingsnorth coal fired power station.

Allegedly this is as a result of the recession, but it would be nice to think that it is also due the massive level of protest from diverse environmental and community groups, and of course the Liberal Democrats, who were appalled by the potential for this plant to add massively to the UK’s carbon emissions. Read the rest of this entry.

I’ve recently started attending the Green Drinks meetings in Hitchin - held at the Millstream pub on Cambridge Road the first Tuesday of every month from 8.30pm.  A small but dedicated crowd of people interested in improving our environment and a chance to discuss what is happening and spread ideas. Read the rest of this entry.

Am writing this as we wait for our speaker to arrive.

The fringe meeting I am attending is about The Green New Deal. Watch this space as this is something you will be hearing more about and not just from me.
This is an idea whose time has come. It puts forward the premise that to address the linked triple crunches of credit, energy and climate change, we need a new deal on the scale of that in the thirties.

More later I hope, our speaker has arrived.