The Royal Society and fantastic and dangerous ideas of reducing climate change

There are many ways to slow down the rate of climate change by reducing emissions. We can have solar panels on every home, cover the shores of the seas with very large wind turbines, save energy use, prevent unnecessary energy use and even ration fossil fuel energy. These are the simple ways, simple but they [...]

Shipping and aviation emissions and why the climate change bill will not work

The Climate Change Bill will count count emissions from aviation and shipping; what does this mean in reality? Emissions from aviation count for around 5.5% of the United Kingdom’s overall carbon emissions. Emissions from shipping are around 4.5% of the total. Both figures are inevitable estimates because you have to allocate emissions fairly between the [...]

BP’s profits warm the ice in the Arctic

Yesterday day when BP announced its latest quarterly profits to have doubled to over ten billion US dollars based on current replacement costs. BP marketed itself as and environmentally friendly eco company -“Beyond Petroleum” at one time but these profits are all about petroleum and are very much money won by BP on the lottery [...]

The woodlands that are under threat and why this is important

England was once virtually covered in trees, mainly hardwood trees like the oak and the elm. There were once large forests, like that at Sherwood, where Robin Hood became famous, that were almost impenetrable. Now Sherwood is a sad series of truncated pieces of woodland. The mighty oaks were felled to build a navies, and [...]

The way in which trees degrade heat

As a planet we are running out of trees. Many people regard trees as a sustainable resource, because having cut one down you can grow another tree, or several trees to replace it. This, of course is true, but having cut down trees and used them, even if you replace the old trees with new [...]

The Noble Lords and Climate Change

The House of Lords is the United Kingdom’s upper chamber charged with the task of reviewing and amending legislation introduced in the House of Commons. It is an undemocratic body, largely appointed for the rest of their lives by the political parties. It arises out of the British taste for compromise and evolution of its [...]

Getting less carbon ou of energy – decentralising energy in towns and cities

Some interesting work has been commissioned by Michael King of the Combined Heat & Power Association and Robert Shaw formerly of the Town & Country Planning Association but now at Faber Maunsell about how urban communities may be better supplied with energy for a lower carbon future. It is interesting because it shows how various [...]

Looking at clouds from both sides and up and down

The Pacific Ocean is not only the largest continuous body of water on this planet but it has the largest continuous bodies of water in the skies above it – the clouds in the sky. Some of them as bigger than some of our continents and clouds are one of the many things that keep [...]

The social programmes of the big energy companies

The big six United kingdom energy suppliers have agreed  with the Government to increase their collective expenditure on “social programmes” from the current rate of £50 million a year to at least an additional £100 million next year, and additional £125 million the year after next and to an additional £150 million for the year [...]

Mature forests – the planet’s natural air conditioners

Everyone thinks of rain forests as important to the stability of the climate because they convert carbon dioxide into carbon, thereby sequestrating the greenhouse gas. So they are, but rain forests also play another equally important role in the climate of the planet, and this role is often overlooked. Rainforests are places which degrade energy, [...]