As leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan,
Russia, the USA and the UK descend on Northern Ireland for their yearly G8
jamboree, even the most conservative of bodies are calling for urgent action on
climate change.
Politicians would make terrible magicians. That’s my conclusion after reading a new proposal that sets out how Europe should meet its fuel economy targets for all new cars.
The German government’s proposal is an attempt to con the rest of Europe into playing into the hands of car companies like BMW and Daimler.
On Sunday 26 May, oil began flowing down the Kolva River through Komi indigenous land in northern Russia. For a week now, the oil has been coating the river and building up on the banks, with no reaction from Rusvietpetro, the joint venture company of VietPetro and Zarubezhneft, a state-controlled Russian oil company, and no cleanup being organised by the company or even the local authorities.
MPs are deciding whether a clean power target should be included in the Energy Bill. Will they back clean renewable power, or a costly, dirty dash for gas?
For once, we all agree. 82% of people want to see more renewable energy. Yet George Osborne is still trying to keep us hooked on fossil fuels. On Tuesday, MPs must pick a side.
Of all the shoulders to cry on, it might seem strange to pick the German Chancellor’s. But that’s what the German car association (VDA) did this week when its president Matthias Wissman wrote to her to moan that long-term targets for cleaner cars could strangle the car industry. He asked her to take a strong position against the regulations which are currently being debated in Brussels.
“I know that everything I say sounds like utter fucking bullshit,”
a top Cuadrilla PR executive told me yesterday when I asked him about the risks fracking poses to the sleepy Sussex village of Balcombe.
The Arctic Sunrise and the Esperanza intercept Cairn Energy's controversial Arctic rig
Drilling for oil in the Arctic – is it literally
crazy? Because it is driving some of the biggest companies in the world
to exhibit what can only be described as irrational behaviour. The end of
easily accessible oil from conventional sources is leading international oil
companies (IOCs) to consider ever more extreme forms of oil and gas extraction
– with the Arctic Ocean being among the last frontiers.
