Spring in Clapham

A brilliant display of crocuses out on the Common this February - last year the early Spring was so hot it killed them off early

Lambeth Council at work pruning the large Plane tree at the entrance to the Common

Very neat work!

Meanwhile, on The Pavement, Boulevard cafe life gets into swing despite Arctic temperatures

The council men cleaning up after themselves

Industrial wood chipper in action!

Bus!

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From time to time I do like this blog to live up to it's name. Therefore, it behooves me to report on Mayor Boris Johnson's announcement of the new Routemaster bus.

This was perhaps the most notable of his election promises - the revival of London's beloved Routemaster with the hop-on hop-off rear platform. The new bus will have this platform, but it will also have doors which will close it, so we shall have to wait and see how hoppable it really turns out to be.

In the meantime, Boris and London's Transport Commissioner, Peter Hendy are very proud of the new bus's green credentials:

"Entering service in 2012, the futuristic design will use the latest green technology, will be 15 per cent more fuel efficient than existing hybrid buses, 40 per cent more efficient than conventional diesel double decks and much quieter on the streets."

The new buses will be on the streets in 2012, hopefully in time for the London Olympics.

Spring hits SW!

This weekend has been spectacularly gorgeous here in Clapham, with the Common alive with thousands of Claphamites enjoying the great outdoors.

Eyjafjallajoekull's ash certainly hasn't caused any cooling around here! (yet, touch wood!)

Brrrrrr

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The photos of our garden above compare the snowfall of last February (top) with that of this week (bottom). Not impressed! Although it is definitely colder than last year (and the cold is lasting longer), we haven't had nearly as much snow. I am very disappointed.

However, the whole of Britain is covered with the stuff, as the magnificent Nasa satellite picture below shows. Apparently, our Gulf Stream has diverted to Greenland and the Jet Stream is too far south, hence the freeze. Actually, despite all the "Global warming! Ha!" comments this is exactly what was predicted by the man-made climate change model. Thank goodness for the massive extension of wind farms off our coasts - when they all come on stream they'll generate 25% of the UK's electricity needs.

This has been all over the internet and was actually trending on twitter yesterday, but it's so special I'm posting it too. Hopefully this icy scenario won't be repeating too frequently.

Trafigura again

My third post in a row about this; sorry. I have got really worked up by a company which allegedly caused 15 deaths and injured thousands of innocent people in the Ivory Coast; then attempted to subvert the reporting of parliamentary proceedings in the UK. Check out their Wikipedia entry - apparently they have also gamed the legal establishment in The Netherlands, preventing relevant evidence reaching the victims in their London suit for compensation (an agreement in this case was reached last month).

Trafigura are suing the BBC news programme Newsnight for libel.

I quote directly from Carter-Ruck's (Trafigura's lawyers) press release announcing this lawsuit, dated 15th May 2009 and currently available on Carter-Ruck's website:

"Speaking today, a Trafigura spokesman said:

“Trafigura has today brought libel proceedings against the BBC over its Newsnight broadcast. This decision was not taken lightly.

Trafigura has always accepted that the Probo Koala ‘incident’ is a matter of public interest and has never objected to the media reporting on it responsibly. However, the BBC’s one-sided reports on 13 May were wildly inaccurate and libellous, leaving us with no choice but to take legal action. There was no justification or public interest in the BBC misleading its viewers in this way.

Trafigura has always denied that the slops caused the deaths and serious health consequences presented by the BBC – a position fully supported by independent expert evidence which will be presented to the Court in due course. As the BBC is well aware, these matters are already the subject of a personal injury action currently taking place in London. It is deeply regrettable that the BBC felt it appropriate to prejudge those proceedings in this sensationalist and inaccurate way.”

The trouble is, this statement appears to be in conflict with the Minton Report. The Minton Report was commissioned by Waterson & Hicks, another law firm acting on behalf of Trafigura, in the aftermath of the Ivory Coast disaster. Basically, the company was attempting to ascertain privately whether the human tragedy in Abidjan could possibly have been attributed to the dumping of slops from Trafigura's ship MT Probo Koala. And the short answer appears to be yes (check out the link above, it's a very interesting document).

The thing is, the Minton report is dated 14th September 2006. In large part it contradicts the press release quoted above, issued 15th May 2009.

Newsnight's 13 May 2009 report

defence of democracy in Britain

The legal gagging of the Guardian reporting on Parliament is such an outrageous attack on our right of free speech I have written to my MP Kate Hoey, through the They Work for You website:

Dear Kate Hoey,

I was alarmed and concerned to hear that the Guardian is being legally prevented from reporting on MP's Parliamentary questions.

My understanding was that the public's right to know what is happening in Parliament was established in the 18th century by John Wilkes. It is a savage indictment on the state of our democracy today that this public right can be so casually overturned by what appear to be narrow commercial interests (The Guardian is also prevented from identifying them) who have instructed the legal firm of Carter-Ruck.

Is it possible for Parliament to prevent such legal abuses happening in the future? I look forward to hearing your views.

Yours sincerely,

Edward Clarke

From the Minton report on the toxic waste from Trafigura's ship Probo Koala dumped in landfill on the outskirts of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, in 2006 (Abidjan's metropolitan population is in excess of 5,000,000 people):

"Hydrogen sulphide (H2S) is a corrosive gas. It is highly toxic. At low concentrations the gas has a strong unpleasant odour. UK Occupational Health guidelines allow exposure to 5ppm for 8 hours or 10ppm for 15 minutes. Between 20 and 100ppm the ability to smell the gas is lost. Negative health effects, such as eye irritation may be observed as low as 20ppm. Prolonged exposure at these low levels may result in pharyngitis and bronchitis. Between 250 and 500ppm, pulmonary oedema may occur. Above these levels, other effects may occur such as vomiting, breathing difficulties, loss of consciousness and death. A single breath of 1000ppm concentration in air may be sufficient to induce a coma and death"

[UPDATE] Carter-Ruck abandoned their injunction at 13:08 today, in response to the social media firestorm reaction to their attempt to gag the British Parliament (twitter trend map above). The Guardian reports that the gag on them has been lifted. Hopefully, this episode will awaken our MPs to the need to reform libel law in Britain.

Guardian ordered not to report on Parliament

Democracy is entirely dependent on a well-informed citizenry. Free speech and a free press is vital to democracy's continued healthy functioning.

Therefore, the legal gagging order against the Guardian reporting on an MP's question in Parliament is absolutely deplorable. The Spectator speculates what the gag could be about - of course, we have no idea until the gag is lifted. Here is the key part of The Spectator's report:

"Remarkable, even by the appalling standards of our libel laws and addled judiciary. This appears to be the question in, er, question:

From Parliament.uk, “Questions for Oral or Written Answer beginning on Tuesday 13 October 2009″

(292409)
61
N Paul Farrelly (Newcastle-under-Lyme): To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of legislation to protect (a) whistleblowers and (b) press freedom following the injunctions obtained in the High Court by (i) Barclays and Freshfields solicitors on 19 March 2009 on the publication of internal Barclays reports documenting alleged tax avoidance schemes and (ii) Trafigura and Carter-Ruck solicitors on 11 September 2009 on the publication of the Minton report on the alleged dumping of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast, commissioned by Trafigura."

The Guardian reported last month on how Trafigura attempted to cover up the dumping of toxic waste in one of the worst pollution disasters in recent history

Windmill Drive

I love sitting at the front of the top deck of a bus driving down Long Road through the Common, with the sunshine filtering through that wonderful parade of London Planes and glimpses of green expanses rolling out on either side. On the other hand, I hate the way our Common is cut up by all the roads bisecting it. You never escape from the sound of traffic wherever you are, with the result the whole common feels like a giant traffic circus.

So it was with delight I read about the proposal to close Windmill Drive and return part of it to natural Common grassland, with just a pedestrian and cycle path remaining. Yeah! Four wheels bad!

meat free me

Last night I helped save the word by eating a meat-free dinner – liguine olivieto, with liquidised olives and garlic mixed with chopped tomatoes and balsamic vinegar. I love it, but just as well I was alone in the house last night as the garlic was somewhat overpowering. Even though I did stack the dishwasher before going to bed I came down this morning to lingering garlicy smells in the kitchen. Not good with oats for breakfast.

Boris Johnson hates being told what to do by the UN and insists we should concentrate on decreasing the rise in the number of humans, not cows.

I’m thinking the world probably already has more humans than it can sustainably support, so really everyone cutting back on meat again is a good idea, a well as practicing birth control.

Poor moos are a very energy-intensive food source, and moreover produce huge quantities of methane, which is 25 times more powerful than carbon as a global warming gas. Cows produce milk a well, so milk and cheese are off the menu too!

In the 70s, meat went out of fashion and all the trendy nutritionists told us to eat plenty of carbohydrates, especially pasta and potatoes. Now pasta and potatoes are BAD – the Atkins diet has pretty much proved they cause weight gain, not meat. With the rise and rise of “nose-to-tail” eating, meat has become intensely fashionable again. Personally I can’t get enough of it.

notes on plastics

My world view has been thrown into confusion. Plastics are supposed to last for ever in the oceans, landfill, etc – this really has been reiterated again and again and I’m sure it must be true.

But how do we actually know??

Here at Hedgie towers, we are very good and have our own communal compost bin. So we actually throw away very little – five flats fill 1-2 wheelie bins a week on average, but we fill loads of orange sacks of recycling, and most of us throw organic waste in our communal compost bin for eventual use in our communal garden.

I reused a thick, sturdy plastic bucket (of the type dishwasher salt comes in) as my organic waste container in the kitchen. Potato peel, banana skins, coffee grounds and tea bags are the sort of things that have been deposited in this, prior to twice weekly visits to the compost bin.

It gets a wash every now and then when it gets too yucky (the compost bin outside is absolutely yucky; the flatmate has avoided compost duty like the plague since his initial visit to the bin some months ago; he was greeted too enthusiastically by all the wildlife that has taken up residence there).

Yesterday, to my horror, I found that my kitchen container was leaking. Its bottom has eroded in two places. I think our potato peels, etc, have eaten their way through the plastic. But surely this isn’t supposed to happen?

Have I found the solution to plastic pollution? A high strength solution of teabags and potato peel will soon dissolve the toughest plastic!

let's all go nuclear

George Monbiot is the latest eminent environmentalist to come out in (qualified) support for nuclear power stations. James Lovelock of course has been vocally advocating nuclear for some time. Newsnight debated this last night, and poor George was attacked quite personally from both sides – a governmental nuclear apparatchik called him a “slow learner” on the one hand (one would think they would have welcomed his contribution – Mr Monbiot potentially can deliver millions of Guardian readers to their cause) – and on the other Jonathan Porrit castigated Monbiot for selling out. In fact Porrit seemed far keener on castigating Monbiot than on addressing environmental causes.

Newsnight presenter Gavin Esler did nothing to moderate these personal attacks (even appearing to find them quite funny). George kept his cool and came out really well, I thought, especially in the face of Porrit’s provocations. Perhaps Mr Porrit is a little envious of Mr Monbiot’s environmental star status.

Anyway, even Julie Burchill is attacking him now – he replies to her criticisms in today’s Guardian:

“The environment is inseparable from social justice. Climate change, for example, is primarily about food and water. It threatens the fresh water supplies required to support human life. As continental interiors dry out and the glaciers feeding many of the rivers used for irrigation disappear, climate change presents the greatest of all threats to the future prospects of the poor. The rich will survive for a few decades at least, as they can use their money to insulate themselves from the effects. The poor are being hammered already.

In reality, it is people like Julie Burchill – who is, incidentally, far richer than almost any green I have met – who treats the poor with contempt. So that she can revel in what she calls "reckless romantic modernism", other people must die. But at least you can't accuse her of hypocrisy: she cannot fail to live by her moral code, for the simple reason that she doesn't have one.

Sure, we are hypocrites. Every one of us, almost by definition. Hypocrisy is the gap between your aspirations and your actions. Greens have high aspirations – they want to live more ethically – and they will always fall short. But the alternative to hypocrisy isn't moral purity (no one manages that), but cynicism. Give me hypocrisy any day.”

Unknown Knowns

“We pride ourselves for living in a society in which we freely decide about things that matter. However, we are constantly in the position of having to decide about matters that will fundamentally affect our lives, but without a proper foundation in knowledge. This is frustrating: although we know that it all depends on us, we cannot predict the consequences of our acts. We are not impotent but – quite the contrary – omnipotent, without being able to determine the scope of our powers. While we cannot gain full mastery over our biosphere, it is in our power to derail it, to disturb its balance so that it will run amok, swiping us away in the process.”

- Slavoj Zizek, The Observer 29th June

the end of green politics?

Catherine Bennett, in last Sunday's Observer:

"We are what we do. The piercing wisdom of the Anya Hindmarch bag in relation, at least, to middle-class green consumers is confirmed yet again by new figures showing a decline in sales of organic food and, outside the home, by a general apathy in the face of Heathrow's third runway and the exclusion of airline emissions from the watery I'm Not a Climate Change Bill.

Events in Crewe and Nantwich illustrate the difficulties of politicians intent on doing anything, such as carbon-taxing to avert catastrophe since a) no one really believes it's coming, b) they'll be dead anyway, c) the recession has left them much too fearful and poor to care, and d) they won't vote for anyone who tries to make them.

So Brown won't make himself more unpopular by reducing airline emissions or introducing personal carbon allowances. Neither he nor Cameron nor Clegg will, to their collective shame, unite behind an effective carbon policy which, appearing identically in every manifesto like the nasty nougat in every box of chocolates, may put the interests of future generations before contemporary self-pity. And when Cameron, versatile friend of both glacier and motorist, finally prevails, his strategy for 'green growth' has as much chance of holding back the rising seas as did the Anya Hindmarch bag.

And fair play to the bag: at least you could carry stuff in it."

Love her line about Cameron's flexibitity. So true. Sigh.

Greener than Thou

Carrier bags are potent symbols of status and taste. Gay Banker recently posted his boyfriend’s bag hierarchy theory; we’re absolutely on the same wavelength because I do the same! – But now, the age of the shop logo’d carrier may be coming to an end. The supermarkets especially are promoting the idea of ‘bags for life’ in order to save the planet.

I’m really good at home – I use my woven recycled plastic (good!) fairtrade (excellent!) carrier bags flown in from South Africa (Oops!). However, I’m struggling to train myself at work. Usually I run out at lunch and buy myself a sandwich and a few bits of fruit to last the afternoon. Working in Kingston, I am blessed with the choice of M&S, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Asda all within easy reach. In my desk drawer I have ‘bags for life’ from all of them. Somehow, and I stress not by design, I always tend to end up at Sainsbury’s and Asda with bags from M&S or Waitrose. It bothers me slightly – will people think I’m some sort of Hyacinth Bucket character? Even worse – am I??! So, picture my relief the other day when I finally found myself at M&S with an Asda bag. The glow of righteousness was truly blinding.

The End is nigh, continued

James Lovelock, maverick independent scientist, predictor of our current eco-crisis 40 years ago, and author of the Gaia theory (earth is a self-regulating super organism), tells Decca Aitkenhead in the Guardian that global environmental catastrophe is inevitable, carbon offsetting is a joke, and ethical living is a scam. Recycling is almost certainly a waste of time and energy.

“Enjoy life while you can. Because if you’re lucky it’s going to be 20 years before it hits the fan”.

Happy Monday.

Bad water

So, after last night bottled water is now on every eco-warrior’s hit-list: it’s the new Chelsea Tractor or patio-heater. BBC’s Panorama programme made a really strong case against – the transportation and (plastic) bottling of water is a real ecological nightmare and complete waste of resources. Discarded plastic harms wildlife and pollutes the oceans an will hang around for hundreds of years.

Fiji water turns out to be quite a bad deal. Originally funded by the EU to source fresh water for the islanders, the government now licenses an American company to bottle and export the water to North America and Europe. But a third of the islanders do not have access to safe water and typhoid is still quite prevalent. The Fiji water company is doing something to help this situation, but obviously as a private company doesn’t have the responsibility to supply the islanders with their water needs. One wonders what their government is doing with all the royalties from the export of their fresh water.

The End is Nigh, Part 1

Alex Renton wrote a really interesting article about food price inflation in The Observer last Sunday, speculating that the post WWII era of cheap food in the Western World is ending, due largely to 4 factors – market instability, the growing demand of the ethanol industry for crops previously grown as food, climate change resulting in floods, droughts, etc damaging crop yields, and the growing wealth of Chinese and Indian populations creating a larger demand for meat, which is wildly inefficient to produce in terms of resources.

The one thing we can change quite quickly is the ethanol factor, which is clearly a dead-end. Renton claims that faith in ethanol’s ecological credentials is “largely misplaced” - “Its increasingly voluble critics claim that growing grain and then transforming it into ethanol requires more energy from fossil fuels than ethanol generates.”

Furthermore, “the maize to fill a tank for a 'Chelsea tractor' would feed a family of four for three months. In October the United Nations' spokesman on famine, Jean Ziegler, called the biofuel boom 'a crime against humanity'.”

Ditch ethanol now!

This is clearly a watershed moment, where we are seeing the first effects of global warming on our food supply, mixed up with a clearly mistaken strategy to combat climate change. The imperative is to think cleverer.

Quote London

Rosie Boycott, in ES Magazine, 4/1/08:

“Cities use up 75 per cent of the world’s resources and London alone uses the environmental resources of an area 120 times its size – equivalent to all the productive land in Britain. Londoners spend £11 billion on food a year and 80 per cent of it is imported from abroad.”

half-term with the brainiacs

My bother's idea of a half-term break treat for the children is pretty jaw-dropping stuff: he took them to an evening lecture at The Royal Society. Professor Ottoline Leyser was addressing the question of 'Thinking Like a Vegetable'.

Ottoline is the 2007 recipient of the Royal Society Rosalind Franklin Prize. My brother said her work on X-ray diffraction images formed the framework for Watson and Crick's hypothesis on the double helical structure of DNA (Watson and Crick won the Nobel Prize: she didn't), that she was controversial, and that Watson (he of recent racist-comment notoriety) had apparently bad-mouthed her.

This riled me up considerably. "That bastard", I thought. "Stealing credit and denigrating women as well as making racist comments." It inspired me to come along too just to show support.

Well, I thought Ottoline looked surpringly young to have worked with Watson and Crick. My brother explained this was because Ottoline didn't, his comments were about Rosalind Franklin. She didn't get the Nobel, but at least they named a prize after her. Oh, I see.

Anyway, how can you not love a city which offers, amongst all its exhaustingly multifarious entertainment options, a free public lecture on Vegetable Thinking by a top scientist?

Ottoline's lecture brilliantly explained the basic concepts of plant hormonal systems in a very clear, memorable and entertaining way.

One of her basic points is that in studying plants it is desirable to attempt to achieve a plant-centric viewpoint rather than our more natural animal-centricity, as this creates the correct mental atmosphere for the right questions to emerge.

For example, a picture of a bee visiting a flower can more correctly be viewed as a flower manipulating a bee to help it have sex with another flower somewhere else. All the energy in the transaction is supplied by the flower - it supplies all the bee's energy needs as well as reproducing itself.

The hormonal systems of plants which regulate growth and growth options and patterns became quite complex quite quickly, which temporarily lost me and the children, but then Ottoline brought it back on track with a ringing condemnation of our modern cult of the 'natural'.

Nothing we grow is natural - all of it has been artificially developed over thousands of years.

She took the example of a can of organic sweetcorn. "This a can of sweetcorn babies. The sweetcorn does not want you to eat its babies".

Compared with 'real' sweetcorn, our cultivated sweetcorn is a massively engorged freak. 'Real' sweetcorn is tiny, brown, and bristling with unappetising fibres - it evolved this way to avoid being eaten. South American farmers used the technology they had to develop the sweetcorn we have today over many years - by implication, GM is just a souped-up version of what we as a species have always done to the plants we cultivate. The plants scientists want to genetically modify are artificial to begin with.

So I think Ottoline is a GM-supporter. I wanted to ask her if she felt there was absolutely no value in the Organic movement's philosophy, but the chairlady stopped taking questions from the hippies at the back of the room after a magnificently hairy French hippy asked about plant consciousness. Ottoline took the question in her stride, however.

My brother wanted to ask how the hormonal systems evolved, but he looks even more like a hippy than me so stood no chance.

The Royal Society's intellectual generosity did not spill over to offering us a glass of wine (invited reception only), so we spilled out into the crisp autumn evening in search of dinner. I think the children were moderately amused. It was a visit to London, after all.

ban bags now

Everyone in London can register their opinions on the control of plastic bags. I prefer banning them outright, but I think the councils see another opportunity to make money and so want to introduce a levy. Banning them will make more of a real impact on the environment. Currently London gets through 1.6 billion plastic bags a year (not counting ones tourists use, apparently. Don't know how they got to that conclusion.)

Make your voice heard here - closes Friday.