www.everythingsgonegreen.co.uk

If you’re green and you’ve got an iPad then what better desktop accessory than a WoodPad?

The WoodPad is a solid wooden iPad stand that comes in a range of finishes – Ash, oak, cherry or maple.

Handmade in England by a traditional cabinet maker, each WoodPad is made from solid hardwood, has two viewing angles and has non-slip rubber feet.

What’s more, the WoodPad is just £20 and comes with FREE international shipping.

So hurry, get a WoodPad for christmas, whether it’s for you or for someone cool, the lovely WoodPad, the perfect green xmas present, will enhance any environmentalist’s desktop

NB: There’s also a WoodPad for your iPhone too, so if you want a stylish solid wood iPhone dock on your desktop to present your iPhone at the perfect viewing angle, grab yourself a WoodPad for iPhone too (and just £16 too!)

Photographers Sebastião Salgado and Per Anders Pettersson present a selection of previously unseen photographs from the ongoing “Genesis” project at Somerset House, London. Showing images shot entirely in the Amazon, the exhibition is in aid of the Sky Rainforest Rescue campaign, a joint venture between the broadcaster Sky and the WWF.

For the last seven years Salgado’s Genesis project has documented the life of the Amazon rainforest, capturing its breathtaking beauty. He has spent time with Amazonian natives and lived amongst them, describing their life as a very “pure” one.

Pettersson, by contrast, has recently documented the devastation to this natural wonder, and shows the affect of deforestation and the work by Rainforest Rescue to try and save a tiny area of the Amazon Rainforest.

You’ve got until the 4th of December to see these images at Somerset House, Holborn, London and admission to the exhibition is free. Visit the Amazon exhibition at:

Somerset House
Strand
London
WC2R 1LA

And see the website at http://www.somersethouse.org.uk/visual-arts/amazon

Editors comment: This exhibition must be seen. To understand the beauty in a part  of the world that most of us may never visit should bring home the sadness that the loss of such natural wonder will mean. The rainforest must be saved. No more should be destroyed and much of it should be allowed to regenerate.

The Sky Rainforest Rescue campaign is apparently just a 3-year joint venture whereas I feel it should be a permanent alliance but with the work of Salgado and Pettersson the natural environment not just at home but far away should be at the forefront of world issues. Of course, people need jobs and stable economies but none of that matters without a stable environment.

Today the UN published its Human Development Report 2011.

The report has shown, for a number of years now, how human development has raised living standards across the world. But this year’s publication highlights how a reverse to this trend is affecting poorer populations. The Human Development Report 2011 places the blame firmly on environmental degradation and social inequality as factors affecting human development.

Whilst the report argues that human development should continue for the benefit of all mankind, it points straight at the fact that sustainability needs to be taken more seriously. That’s not just environmetal sustainability but also economic and political sustainability.

The HDR focuses on the human right to a  healthy environment but also highlights then need for equity in environmental policy, pushing the point that some members of the world society may be disenfranchised by their lack of say in environmental issues which may effect their immediate environment more directly than more developed nations.

Editors Comment: Whilst the Human Development Report 2011 is very welcome, it merely puts into print what has been said on the ground for years. Most of the people I know and talk to acknowledge that the environment is pretty damned important. They also understand that the developed and developing world can’t keep using the planet’s resources at the rate they have been since the industrial revolution.

Of course, it has been noted that it’s very hypocritical of “the west” to turn around and condemn China and India for their increased use of natural resources when the west has been so greedy itself – The UK, less than 1% of the world population, apparently uses 3% of the world’s resources. The USA, at nearly 5% of the world’s population, has been using 25% of the world’s resources. So when China alone, at around 19% of the world population, is being scolded for apparently building two coal-fired power stations a week, you just have to get that into perspective.

We can always take a “been there, done that” attitude in the west and say that China should learn from our mistakes. But “we” haven’t learned from our own mistakes, have we?! That does play to the point that the HD report makes that people should be more involved in democratic processes. It’s big business, the rich and the lobby groups, the political elites who have their hand on the tiller. If we can prise their grip off the controls of power then maybe we can have true and genuine democracy at long last.

The times are a-changing. We’ve had populist movements in Egypt, Libya & Tunuisia. The riots in the UK were a wake-up call and there have been violent demonstrations in Greece. The Occupy Wall Street movement has splintered and spread across the world. Conversations between friends about inequality being the greatest threat to the world are manifesting now as public talking points.

Human Development will only advance and be beneficial to all mankind if we can just STOP what we are doing right now, think about it and put into place all the controls that will wrest power from the top and place it at ALL levels. People need to be educated, the birth rate needs to come down, there should be no more environmental degradation let alone devastation. we should all respect the world and know our place in it, knowing that we are all equals.

Let’s hope that the Human Development Report isn’t just another wad of expensive research and that we all finally act for the benefit of all not just our selves.

My wife found this on facebook this morning. Doesn’t this just hit the mark? Here’s a transcript of the image text:

 [Image of spoon]

It’s pretty amazing that our society has reached a point where the effort necessary to

• Extract oil from the ground
• Ship it to a refinery
• Turn it into plastic
• Shape it appropriately
• Truck it to a store
• Buy it, and bring it home

…is considered to be less effort than what it takes to just wash the spoon when you’re done with it.

Sorry, plastic spoon manufacturers, but your time is up!

I brought a car at the beginning of July. After going 21 months without driving, I decided it was time to get back on the road. (You can see how I previously fared after 9 months without a car)

The number one reason for getting a car was that my family are back in the country. We need to get littl’un to school, do the shopping and have a life where we don’t have to worry that everything takes so much longer than normal.

The first example is picking them up from the airport. Normally we have a good friend who gives us lifts whenever we need them – we’ve done him some big favours so we get a few in return. Relying on him to help us out all the time would be a bit much, besides he isn’t always available since he works. Picking up the family during the daytime would have been hugely disruptive to him.

Then there’s the convenience factor. To get to London Heathrow Airport is a 20 minute drive. Sure, there’s the joy of parking, waiting and the extortionate fees for an hour’s worth of leaving your car in a piece of “prime” real estate, but that’s nothing when compared to the alternative which is either a £50 taxi, 20 minute drive straight to your door or the £14 bus to Woking then a train from Woking to Farnborough and then either a 30-40 walk home with suitcases (!) or a £7 taxi.

It was easier to buy a £325 car, spend £25/month on insurance, £75 for 6 months tax, put a £50 tyre on it and a £40 starter motor.

But then, 6 weeks later, we were offered a slightly bigger car. An estate that I can put my mountain bikes in. 4 doors so that passengers can get in and out easier. 5 gears instead of 4 (try driving the motorway in a 4-speed Metro) and comfort. But a 2.3 litre engine as opposed to a 1.1 and insurance at £50/month (I shudder to think what the tax disc will be!) [update: The VED for six months was £118.50]

The other advantage is that business has been picking up and I’m being called out to more IT support jobs and cycling has been fun – turning up sweaty, soaking wet from the rain, even with blood and gravel rash at a client meeting one day.

So, fellow greens, I’ve turned to the dark side. I’ve got a car again and I’m biking less than I have been. I’m using less public transport and I’m walking less, so I’m contributing to the obesity epidemic (not really) and CO2 emissions! I’m sorry.

There are pros and cons to walking, cycling, public transport and driving. I’m all for all these forms of transport but in the most balanced manner. I did go out for a 3 hour off-road ride through the woods on Thursday night, so I haven’t completely turned over to the dark side, but with school coming up, business booming and a life of slavery to the wage, this has to be done.

I hope you’ll forgive me

We were watching the TV the other night, struggling for something interesting and informative to watch, when we just chanced upon back-to-back episodes of Channel 4′s Grand Designs.

Now I forget the first episode that we saw the tail end of but the follow-up was the most excellent episode with the woodsman, Ben Law. Ben was working and living in the woods in Sussex for 10 years where he earned a living from coppicing, making wooden furniture and charcoal. His dream was to hand-build a cruck-framed house in the middle of the woods.

With planning laws being tough on building in woodland, and rightfully so, Ben persuaded the planners of his needs to move out of a rusty caravan and into a more permanent structure. With a budget of £20-25,0000 Ben’s house was designed to be natural, blend into the surrounding woods and to be self-sufficient.

With no services being piped into the site, Ben is totally reliant on the sun and the wind to put power into an array of 2v, 920ah ex-submarine batteries and he collects enough water from rainfall and a spring to provide

“…enough for probably half a village..”

Ben also grows a lot of his own fruit and vegetables to, but how much we don’t know.

That’s enough of our praise for the moment, if you want to see it for yourself go to 4oD and watch the original 2003 Grand Designs series 3 episode 5.

What was particularly nice about the show we watched was that it was actually an edition of Grand Designs Revisited. I’d thought for 8 years that it would be great to visit Prickly Nut Woods in West Sussex some time, and Ben now provides occasional tours of his lovely woodland house. 2011′s dates are all fully-booked but there are slots upon for a visit next year.

Ben has also branched out and written a number of books and is involved in a number of schemes to teach skills and pass on his expert knowledge. For more information have a look at Ben’s personal website.

Infographics seem to be all the rage at the moment and here’s one we’ve been sent about power consumption facts for the US.

America consumes more electricity than any other country in the world but China is fast catching up!

However, the surprise fact is that Canadians reportedly consume more electricity per capita than any other nation. I didn’t know that!

Anyway, here’s the infographic, power consumption facts for the US…

Source by Power SuperSite

…at least that’s what I think it said…

Many years ago there was an editorial piece in the catalogue of howies, the ethical activewear company.

Underneath a typical photo of a scene in China where hundreds of people were on bicycles, the caption read;

“One day they’ll all want cars”

Or something like that.

In the years since that was said, the prophecy came true. China industrialised on a massive scale and people wanted cars.

And yesterday’s Guardian newspaper reported that China has now overtaken the USA as the world’s biggest consumer of automobiles.

That means there are no more than 1 billion cars in the world, roughly one for every 6-7 people alive.

The worrying thing is the other statistics in the Guardian story, take this for instance:

According to a report by the trade journal Ward’s, 35m new cars and lorries were sold worldwide last year – the second-biggest increase ever recorded. That is 95,500 extra vehicles being added to the global traffic jam every day.

Nearly 100,000 new cars sold every day, worldwide – that’s not going to save the planet.

For the car manufacturers this is good news – they believe there is plenty of room for greater consumption of their products. More consumers equals more sales equals more turnover equals more profit.

For the environment this is clearly worrying. In just ten years between 2000 and 2010 the number of cars and motorbikes on Chinese roads increased by a factor of twenty. In the next two decades that number will double again.

The motor manufacturers would love to shift another 900 million units, but is there enough resource to do so? With the price of scrap metal, nearly a billion more cars is not sustainable is it? Let alone the amount of polution to be pumped into the atmosphere.

For the full story read China’s love affair with the car shuns green vehicles

It’s been reported today that the cycling industry is worth some 3 billion pounds to the UK economy.

With cycle-manufacturing, cycle accessory manufacturing, retail and other cycle-related employment all thrown into the mix, that’s a healthy figure and a good sign of the state of the cycling industry in this country.

As many as 23,000 people are employed in these UK cycle and cycle-related industries and they contribute some £600 million to our economy in wages and taxes.

Last year 3.7 million cycles were sold in the UK, that’s up 28% on 2009′s figures, and apparently manufacturing accounted for £51million worth of revenue in 2010.

The total number of UK cyclists is now estimated at some 13 million, although not all of these cyclists are full time bikers.

Why?

Well, motoring is getting more expensive. I recently had to buy a car and was shocked that in the 18 months I’ve been out of driving a car, fuel has rocketed to around £1.45 a litre. £20 in the car doesn’t get us much above the quarter tank full and that only lasts some 80 miles or so

And when you hear stories that youngsters are being charged thousands for car insurance, like this 20 year old apparently being given a £53,000 insurance quote (on a Vauxhall bloody Corsa!), you can see why people would rather walk or cycle.

A few of my friends have been involved in, for instance, the Cyclescheme and had discounts of around 33% on some decent cycles (Specialized and Giant cycles – both good brands) and they’ve certainly added to the ranks of cyclists in this country. We’re especially lucky around here, having some great cycle paths in Farnborough and some really excellent off-road tracks in the surrounding MOD land.

What’s more, cyclists apparently have o7.4 sick days a year less than their non-cycling counterparts who take off 8.7 sick days per year, so that’s further proof that cycling is good for you.

So, rising fuel and insurance costs, improved cycle networks and concern for the environment are all factors influencing Brits to get out on their bikes and skip using the car…

…long may the cycling revolution continue