Also by jamie

Oil to burn in the Arctic?

Posted by jamie - 1 August 2007 at 3:28pm - Comments

After twenty years out of fashion, the term 'cold war' has become the hot favourite in Fleet Street once more. Not just because diplomatic relations between Russia and the UK distinctly frosty at the moment, but Russia's current Arctic adventures are lowering the temperature even further.

ASDA and Morrisons make a move on light bulbs

Posted by jamie - 26 July 2007 at 5:30pm - Comments

We're beginning to see the first positive results from the light bulb retailers league table we published nearly two weeks ago. Both ASDA and Morrisons have just announced they will improve their game plan and phase out those power-crazy incandescents by the end of 2010, which moves them a couple of places up the league table, leapfrogging several other retailers.

A little light relief from India

Posted by jamie - 25 July 2007 at 5:20pm - Comments

I've been meaning to write about these videos for some time but somehow it never seemed the right moment (and all our Woolworths work kept getting in the way), so apologies if you've already seen them elsewhere. Yet in the lull after the hard launch of our light bulbs campaign, it's worth pointing out that it's not just in the UK that a shift to energy-efficient bulbs is being sought.

Amazon soya moratorium celebrates first anniversary

Posted by jamie - 24 July 2007 at 4:13pm - Comments

A Greenpeace plane flies over the Amazon rainforest

Memories of the giant chickens that invaded branches of McDonald's last year might be fading fast, but it's one year since a moratorium was agreed on buying soya from the Amazon rainforest. It was our chicken-led campaign that helped spur McDonald's and UK supermarkets into putting pressure on the soya traders in Brazil, who were trading in beans grown in newly deforested areas of the rainforest.

Woolworths makes no changes to light bulbs policy; campaigners not impressed

Posted by jamie - 19 July 2007 at 1:05pm - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer offers free CFL light bulbs in a Southampton branch of WoolworthsI was just about to write a piece slating Woolworths (as, after all the fuss we caused on Saturday, we still hadn't heard from them) when I got a call from Laura, one of our campaigners, to say she had a letter from them explaining what they're going to do about energy-guzzling light bulbs. I'm looking at it now and I'm sorry, but I'm still going to slate them.

It's from CEO Trevor Bish-Jones who begins by not asking for us not to stage in-store protests in future but to communicate directly with himself. So he'll be pleased about all the emails he's been getting from you (if you haven't emailed him, do it now, or you can call your local branch of Woolies and speak to the manager).

He goes on to use some well-worn arguments which I thought it would be useful to air here. Take it away, Trevor.

Ryanair tells porky pies about aviation emissions

Posted by jamie - 18 July 2007 at 5:37pm - Comments

This from the BBC News website about the judgment against Ryanair by the Advertising Standards Authority:

 

Ryanair has been ordered not to repeat an advertisement that played down the impact of aviation on the environment.

In a press campaign the airline claimed the airline industry "accounts for just 2% of carbon dioxide emissions".

Woolworths and light bulbs: a bit of history

Posted by jamie - 14 July 2007 at 4:31pm - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer outside a branch of Woolworths in Southampton

It's just after 3pm now and all of the main teams of volunteers have either been removed from or left their respective branches of Woolworths after clearing the shelves of inefficient light bulbs. The management at head office seems clearly rattled as their press officers have been telling our Light Brigaders (or is that Brigadiers?) that there'll be an emergency meeting on Monday to discuss their light bulb policy. We'll keep you posted on what, if anything, transpires next week. In the meantime, there's our cheap-as-chips video and photos from the day of action on Flickr to keep you entertained.

Woolworths won't stop selling power crazy light bulbs, so we've cleared the shelves for them

Posted by jamie - 14 July 2007 at 10:20am - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer locked on to baskets of inefficient light bulbs

It's going to be a busy day at branches of Woolworths across the UK today as the Greenpeace Light Brigade pay them a visit to ask why they're still selling old-fashioned, power crazy light bulbs. Woolworths came bottom of our new league table, ranking light bulb retailers according to their commitments to phase out inefficient bulbs, so our volunteers have decided to take matters into their own hands.

Rock with Live Earth, take action on climate change

Posted by jamie - 6 July 2007 at 6:38pm - Comments
Save the planet

With 2 billion pairs of eyes expected to be firmly clamped on the Live Earth concerts tomorrow, the word about climate change will be spread far and wide. Although, as George Marshall argues, perhaps enough people already know and they're just waiting to be forced into doing something about it through new laws introduced by their government.

We don't have to wait, though - in fact, we can't wait. Even the most optimistic predictions about the effects of climate change say that we need to take immediate action. So if watching Madonna cavorting around has spurred you on, what can you do here and now? Funny you should ask...

Congo timber ship blocked

Posted by jamie - 6 July 2007 at 3:16pm - Comments

Greenpeace volunteers climb a crane at La Rochelle port in France

Right now, a group of Greenpeace climbers are perched on top of a set of cranes in the port of La Rochelle on the French Atlantic coast. They've been there since Wednesday night and as well as admiring a no-doubt magnificent view, they're also preventing a ship unloading its cargo of timber which has come from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

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