News wrap
, Wed 14 May 2008
The big green stories of the week and how they were reported in the press
Carbon crunch
Global emissions are still rising fast. Scientists at the Mauna Lua observatory, made famous by Al Gore's climate change film An Inconvenient Truth, have reported that world carbon dioxide levels are now at their highest for 650,000 years. The latest figures are "renewing fears that climate change could begin to slide out of control," writes David Adam in the Guardian.
"Climate models assume that about half of our future emissions will be absorbed by forests and oceans, but the new figures confirm they may be too optimistic." If this is true, global emissions cuts may need to be tougher than anticipated.
Climate experts are blaming global economic growth, China's coal use and the weakening of natural "sinks", such as oceans and forests, which absorb carbon. But environmental group Greenpeace says we should look closer to home for positive eco-action.
"We're now witnessing a key moment in the climate change story and it's not good news," says Robin Oakley, head of Greenpeace's climate change campaign. "The last time the atmosphere was this choked with CO2 humans were yet to evolve as a species. To even consider building new runways and coal-fired power stations at this juncture in history is an unpardonable folly, but Gordon Brown seems determined to stumble forward regardless."
Ramsay gets a grilling
Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay this week lambasted British restaurants for serving up imported, out of season produce. "Chefs should be fined if they haven't got ingredients in season on their menu," he told the BBC.
"I don't want to see asparagus on in the middle of December. I don't want to see strawberries from Kenya in the middle of March," he said.
Ramsay should perhaps steer clear of his own restaurants then, which are reportedly serving such "seasonal" fare as winter squash and tropical fruit-based desserts. "Only a few weeks ago, [Ramsay's] company opened a new restaurant called Maze Grill," adds Jay Rayner in the Guardian. "Its unique selling point? Beef from America. If chefs are going to be prosecuted under these proposed new laws, I think we all know who should be first in line for the dock."
But the critics were sharpening their knives about more than a touch of hypocrisy. Gillian Bowditch in the Times says the increasingly popular local food movement, as advocated by Ramsay and the Soil Association, could be disastrous for the developing world.
This "souped-up protectionism" could ruin poor farmers abroad. "As for the so-called ‘food mile’, that concept is woollier than a Fair Isle sweater," Bowditch writes, citing studies showing that some produce which has travelled long distances can still be more environmentally friendly than food produced locally.
Oxfam’s head of research Duncan Green agrees: “There are far more effective ways to tackle climate change [than seasonal eating]. For example, if everyone in the UK switched one 100W light bulb for a low-energy one, UK emissions could be cut by almost five times as much as would be saved by not purchasing fresh fruit and vegetables from Africa. It is unfair that a Kenyan farmer – who emits as much carbon in a year as a person in the UK does in ten days – should pay the price."
Renewables need a lift
Chasing an increasingly ambitious target of 15 per cent renewable energy by 2020, you'd think the government would be making every effort to support micro-generation. Instead, it slashed the maximum grant in its low carbon buildings programme from £7500 to £2500 – a move unlikely to improve Britain's position as the third worst performer in the EU for renewable energy production.
This week, BBC News discovered that "the number of government grants made to people who want to fit solar panels or other green energy systems to their homes has halved".
In 2007, 2339 grants were made nationwide, compared with 5104 the previous year. "In comparison, Germany has 200 times as many homes fitted with solar photovoltaic power.”
Critics complain that the UK government’s low carbon buildings scheme has been “confusing and stingy”, and has “provided little incentive for people to go green”.
At least some people are taking green energy matters into their own hands. The Guardian's John Vidal calls home-brew biodiesel "the fuel of the future". Made from waste vegetable oil, it is greener than conventional petrol and, at 15p a litre, considerably cheaper too. Happily, it's also legal to make 2500 litres a year for personal use.
Vidal reports that 35 companies are currently refining recycled oil commercially and "around 20,000 individuals making private arrangements to collect and process oil from local restaurants, chip shops and food manufacturers".
Waste not
Do you sort your rubbish? According to Office of National Statistics (ONS) figures, more and more of us do - between 2002 and 2006, recycling increased by 27 per cent across the UK.
The ONS report shows that we recycle one third of our waste, just seven per cent short of the government’s 40 per cent target by 2010. Paul Vickers, deputy head of regional statistics at the ONS, was upbeat about the findings. Although local authorities have had to introduce more aggressive recycling policies, the good news is it “also reflects a change in people’s attitudes”.
Elsewhere, there were a few words of caution – Paul Bettison, chairman of the Local Government Association said: “Britain is still the dustbin of Europe, throwing more waste into landfill than any other country in the EU. It is pleasing to see our recycling rates reach a high of 33 per cent, but other countries on the continent are still recycling up to twice as much.”
And while we may be recycling more, we’re also throwing away more – £10bn worth of food a year, according to the government-backed Waste and Resources Action Programme. This amounts to a third of all the food we buy.
Worse, says Martin Hickman in the Independent, researchers found that most of our dumped food is untouched: “whole chickens and chocolate gateaux lie uneaten in cupboards and fridges [are] being discarded”. Hickman says the “staggering” findings make uneasy reading at a time of global food shortages.
A new survey from Legal & General paints an equally bleak picture of a throwaway culture. According to the report, 86 per cent of Brits admit that they replace broken or damaged household items without any attempts to fix them first.
The survey of more than 4000 adults found that 12 per cent of us would replace an electrical item just because the fuse had blown.
And finally...
California-based company Coffin Couches is taking recycling to a whole new level with a line of sofas adapted from “used” coffins. Happily, the business model doesn’t involve “disinterring grandmothers”, reports eco blog Grist. The company instead buys up coffins that are “slightly damaged after a body has been put in them”.
Used coffins are technically classed as a biohazard, but that hasn’t stopped Coffin Couches creating some pretty stylish looking sofas, or selling them for US$3500.
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