by David Steven | Jun 25, 2007 | Climate and resource scarcity
Paul Golby, CEO of power major, E:ON, is hot under the collar about the lumbering nature of the British planning system.
Case-in-point: the London Array, an offshore wind farm which will produce enough power to supply quarter of Greater London’s needs – 750,000 homes.
The scheme got all its planning permission, apart from for a small substation where the power comes ashore. Swale Borough Council, acting against its own officers’ advice, wasn’t having any of that.
According to the Council’s CEO:
“Of course we need to be more self-sufficient in energy and Kent needs the jobs that such a major investment would bring, but members of our Planning Committee were right to put the interests of our constituents first over the undoubted national and regional advantages, because the people of Graveney will have to live with the adverse consequences of this investment for a considerable period of time. The Committee was not reassured that London Array had done enough to ease those negative impacts on the local community.”
by David Steven | Mar 19, 2007 | Climate and resource scarcity, Influence and networks
In the Sun – the UK’s leading tabloid in a shrinking market – Jeremy Clarkson, professional motormouth and patron saint of petrolheads, is having fun.
Clarkson is sceptical about the theory of global warming. Actually, that doesn’t quite catch it. He thinks the idea is “bonkers, idiotic, a complete fairy story.” He blames the usual suspects (politicians, the media, “scientists on the climate change payola”) – plus a few less familiar ones (Margaret Thatcher, who created global warming to allow her to close down Arthur Scargill‘s coal mines).
But Channel 4’s documentary, The Great Global Warming Swindle, has convinced him he’s right. After all, it had “proper scientists” arguing the case. “Global warming started off as a lie and became an industry,” he writes. “Now it’s a fashion statement and that, ultimately, is what will kill it off.”
Of course, no-one listens to this rubbish (even American climate sceptics hate Clarkson)… apart from all the people who believe every word of it. And it’s them that we should be paying a lot more attention to. (more…)
