News wrap

, Wed 23 Apr 2008

The big green stories of the week and how they were reported in the press

Blow to wind power

Energy saviour or eyesore? Our relationship with wind turbines took a nosedive this week as plans to build one of Europe’s biggest onshore wind farms in Scotland were shelved.

Following almost 11,000 objections from local people, Scottish ministers ruled that the £500m scheme at Lewis, in the Outer Hebrides would endanger rare birds living on the peatland. it was estimated that the scheme would have generated approximately 10 per cent of Scotland’s energy needs.

Writing in the Guardian, Severin Carrell says the conflict over the Lewis proposal “has exposed some of the most significant tensions and challenges facing onshore wind farms, between economic development and conservation”.

The difficulty is how to measure the need for new jobs and renewable energy against a commitment to protecting wildlife and environments.

The implications of the Lewis climb-down could be far-reaching, writes James Murray in Business Green. In the short-term, the decision could send a warning signal to would-be investors in UK renewable energy. On a wider scale, it “could also deliver a blow to the UK's chances of meeting EU targets to generate 15 per cent of its energy from renewable sources.”

Don’t have a cow

Could going veggie for a day be greener than buying locally? Research published in New Scientist magazine suggests that, despite our growing awareness of food miles, transportation may be a “mere drop” in the ocean when it comes to carbon emissions.

According to report author Christopher Weber, a researcher at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, transporting food to market comprises just 4 per cent of its overall greenhouse emissions.

Other factors, such as producing fertiliser for crops and methane gas emitted by livestock, have a much stronger effect.

Indeed, for certain foods, such as beef, Weber says that transportation emissions are even less significant. Final delivery food-miles make up just 1 per cent of the greenhouse emissions of red meat, he argues.

“To drive his point home,” writes Ewen Callaway, “Weber calculated that a completely local diet would reduce a household's greenhouse emissions by an amount equivalent to driving a car 1600 km fewer per year… Switching from red meat to veggies just one day per week would spare 1860 km of driving.”

Seeds of change

“When the going gets tough, the tough get growing,” quips Neil Sears in the Daily Mail. With news that vegetable seed sales are outstripping flower seeds for the first time since the Second World War, it seems we are thinking about our food more than ever.

With sales reportedly up by around 60 per cent on last spring, why do so many of us now want to grow our own? Some commentators believe it’s an early effect of the global credit crunch, but there are other explanations.

“The trend for “plot-to-pot” veg has soared in the past two years because of celebrity chefs like Jamie Oliver praising the health-giving benefits of home-grown food,” writes Padraic Flanagan in the Daily Express.

“People are [also] more conscious of where their food comes from,” argues Clare Dixey, of the Sussex seed supplier Thompson & Morgan. “They would rather have plot-to-pot runner beans than have ten-day-old ones shipped over from Kenya. So it is far cheaper and healthier."

Nappucino anyone?

Despite a funding blip, national Real Nappy Week is going ahead this week. From ‘nappucino’ coffee mornings to fashion shows, hundreds of events are being held up and down the country.

The UK throws away around three billion disposable nappies every year – estimated to weigh some 690,000 tonnes. The organisers of Real Nappy Week say that washable alternatives are easy to use, better for the environment and much cheaper.

And it’s not just environmentalists who are looking to shunthrowaway nappies. “If more parents gave the bum's rush to disposables, councils would be delighted,” writes Helen Crane in the Epsom Guardian.

“It would save them a fortune in landfill costs, in rubbish transportation charges and save council officers' hair from growing grey with the worry of what to do when landfill runs out.”

Organisers of Real Nappy Week say that washables don’t have to be a drag: parents are recommended to wash soiled nappies in full loads at 60°C using low energy rated washing machines, allowing them to dry naturally wherever possible. Washables don’t need to be soaked before washing, nor do they need ironing. They could apparently save parents up to £500.

And finally...

The award for bizarre green business decision of the week goes to courier company UPS for asking their drivers in America to avoid taking left turns.

Eco-blog Groovy Green reports that "all the saved time idling, waiting on traffic and more efficient route planning makes a big difference for both [UPS’s] bottom line and the Earth".

Surprisingly, the UPS media team appears to corroborate the story. "One of the ways UPS achieves efficiencies is through careful study of the methods used to deliver packages," reads its official press report. "Time studies led UPS to discover that avoiding left-hand turns would save time, conserve fuel, reduce emissions and reduce the potential for accidents."

According to the report, UPS route planning technology, which minimises left hand turns, shaved nearly 30 million miles off delivery routes, saved 3 million gallons of gas and reduced emissions by 32,000 metric tonnes of CO2 in 2007. That's the equivalent of removing 5300 passenger cars from the road for an entire year.