News wrap
Ruth Harwood, Tue 01 Jul 2008
The big green stories of the week and how they were reported in the press
Eco-town showdown
Campaigners staged a protest outside Parliament this week as the first round of public consultation over eco-towns came to an end. The voices against the government’s plan seem to be getting louder.
"Eco-towns are now dead and buried, Grant Shapps, shadow housing minister, told the Telegraph. “We have supported the principles underpinning them,” adds the newspaper’s home affairs editor Chris Hope. “[But] it is becoming clear just how poorly thought through and unworkable the whole scheme is.”
The government hopes to build five of the 15 potential eco-towns by 2016 and a further five by 2020. They are meant to set new green standards in house building and meet the need for an estimated three million new homes. The 10 sites for the eco-towns will be finalised later this year.
The Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) is calling on the government to focus on one or two "truly exemplary" schemes, which are sited in the right place to be sustainable and could be developed to the best green standards. CPRE head of planning Marina Pacheco said that ministers should examine alternative plans, such as eco-quarters and redevelopment sites.
“We are urging the government to go back to the drawing board. Many of these shortlisted schemes are recycled, failed proposals.”
But the government has hit back to criticism. "It is a shame that CPRE are preferring to perpetuate myths rather than engaging in the debate about how we build the houses we need," a spokesman for the Department for Communities and Local Government told BBC News.
Caroline Flint, the housing minister, is pushing the government's argument that eco-towns will help to meet the target of three million new homes by 2020 and is hoping for a balanced debate: “Responding to weeks of rising criticism, [she] said: 'All voices should be heard, not just those who shout loudest,” reports Juliette Jowit in the Guardian.
North pole meltdown
Polar scientists have revealed that there is now a 50-50 chance that ice could disappear entirely from the North Pole this year. “The polar regions have been the first to show the critical changes brought by global warming and it will be a hugely symbolic moment if the North Pole is left surrounded by water,” writes Paul Eccleston in the Telegraph.
The disappearance of the ice would make it possible to reach the Pole sailing in a boat through open water, something that The Independent’s Steve Connor describes as “one of the most dramatic and worrying” examples of the impact of global warming."
The Arctic is an important indicator of the changes that many believe will come as the planet warms. “Scientists fear that as more sea ice is lost, the darker, open ocean will absorb more heat and raise local temperatures even further,” explains Connor.
It would be the first time in 20,000 years that this has happened. Prof Peter Wadhams of Cambridge University, professor of ocean physics and head of the Polar Ocean Physics Group, expressed his concern: "These are the big changes that have been predicted happening before our eyes. This is perhaps the first sign of what we are in for."
Halt on humpback hunt
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) have refused Greenland’s request to increase its hunt of humpback whales. Greenland claimed the decision would deprive its indigenous Inuit communities of much needed whale meat.
“[But] many countries were unconvinced that Greenlanders need the extra meat that catching 10 humpbacks would provide, and believe the hunt is too commercial,” explains BBC News environment correspondent Richard Black.
Amalie Jessen from Greenland's fisheries ministry regretted the decision, claiming that Greenland had met all the requirements laid down by the IWC.
But laire Bass of the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA), told the Telegraph: "This is fantastic news as fewer whales will be cruelly killed.”
Regardless of the Greenland case, however, it appears that the fundamental tensions between pro- and anti-whaling campaigners remain unresolved. “The spat is not likely to affect the biggest material issue facing the commission - whether a compromise deal can be found between hunting and anti-hunting nations,” explains Black on BBC News.
Faking it
China has sacked 13 government officials for publishing a set of fake photographs that local authorities had said proved the existence of the very rare and endangered South China tiger.
“In October, forestry officials in Zhenping county, in northern Shaanxi province, published photos of a tiger in a forest setting, saying they were proof of the existence of the South China tiger,” reports the Telegraph. Now the officials have admitted the photos were faked.
“After identifying plants in the photos,” writes Jeremy Page in the Times, “[officials] concluded that if the tiger had been real it would have been only 27 centimetres long.”
The forestry officials allegedly wanted to use the photos as justification for building a new South China tiger nature reserve.
And finally...
Prince Charles has converted his Aston Martin to run on bioethanol from local vineyards. In the annual review of HRH’s income and activities published this week, it was revealed that Charles has been slashing his petrol use and carbon emissions.
Writing in the Sun, Duncan Larcombe says the Prince has also bought office bikes for his staff at Clarence House, London. Beneath the headline, ‘Prince Charles is drink driver’, he adds that Charles’s wine-propelled classic car now travels even faster than before.
Bolstering his green credentials, the Prince has also installed rainwater systems to flush toilets and woodchip boilers in his homes. “Even the cows on his Home Farm estate are playing their part,” reports Stephen Bates in the Guardian. The animals are apparently release less methane than last year because of improvements to their feed.
Despite the Prince’s eco-ambitions, cynics may note that the heir to the throne clocked up 77 overseas official engagements last year – even if he did spend £23,000 on carbon offsetting projects.
In true Sun style, Larcombe suggests some alcoholic tipples the Prince could put in his tank. Besides “cabriolet sauvignon” and “carva”, he says the Prince “might prefer Rio-car or the house favourite, Aston Spumanti”.
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