www.everythingsgonegreen.co.uk

It looks like the deadlock at the UN Bali summit has been broken.

After two weeks of intense talks it would have been a shambolic waste of time, money and effort for the summit to end without an agreement, without a clear path, no roadmap to a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.

But which way did it go? What did the UN head, Ban Ki Moon, do to reach an agreement?

As we reported yesterday, the stalemate was between, chiefly, the US & Canada on one side, refusing to be held to strict reduction targets, and Europe & Australia on the other, keen to reduce emissions to certain targets. The second part of the issue was whether developing countries such as China & India with their burgeoning consumption and rapid climb toward the “western ways”. Whilst Europe would allow developing countries to have slimmer targets the US wished for them to be subject to the stricter curbs.

The outcome?

Apparently, right at the end of the conference, the US had signalled it would not sign to the agreement to the disdain of many delegates who jeered and booed the indication. Then at the last minute, the US agreed.

So what happens next?

The Bali Roadmap will mean that negotiations will continue over the next 2 years between the 192 ountries and hopefully we will get some commitment to actually cutting greenhouse gases. In the meantime, us citizens of the world can carry on doing our bit to cut our own emissions, live a greener lifestyle and hopefully the politicians will catch up with us soon.

Whilst debating the subject of “Global Warming is a Hoax” with some people on the Internet (note that it was a pre-loaded debate and not “Is Global warming a Hoax?”) I was kindly introduced to the following piece of footage.

Before you watch the following clip I just want to say that although we’re proponents of the green movement we encourage open-minded debate and clarity of thought and we always have a healthy dose of scepticism in our thinking, be it toward the green and non-green sides of the argument.

This allows for us to arrive at well considered conclusions and to have no blind opinions without looking at the available facts. It is with these simple default parameters that we have come to the path of promoting the 21st century green lifestyle.

But don’t let our greenisms sway you, just watch, listen and consider the content of this video…

Many thanks to GiorgosK for enlightening us with this footage.

The UNFCCC Climate Change talks in Bali are in their last day now, and although we’ve refrained from commenting on the 10 days of talks so far, the tension at the Bali summit is definitely increasing.

The whole point of the Bali Summit is for world leaders to produce a roadmap, a Bali Roadmap if you will, for environmental issues to be addressed on a global scale as a follow on to the Kyoto Protocol. Although some nations have not ratified the 1997/2005 Kyoto Protocol, i.e. they will not attempt to limit nor reduce their emissions, the Bali summit is an opportunity to get those nations onboard in, effectively, the second round after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.

So how do the world’s nations stand as far as cutting emissions is concerned? Well, Europe is strongly in the FOR camp. Australia, under new leadership, although it never signed up to the original Kyoto agreement to cut emissions to 5.5% below 1990 levels by 2012, has now joined Europe.

Currently opposed to any cuts are the USA, Canada and Japan.

Just as Kyoto became International Law in 2005 to all its signatories, Bali is looking for 25-40% cuts in emissions by 2020. Europe and Australia are keen to be committed to these cuts whereas the US and Canada in particular are not. Japan believes they cannot achieve such reductions.

On the penultimate day the EU delegation threatened to boycott the US climate summit next month if the US did not commit to cutting emissions. The progress at these talks has been so slow that there is no guarantee of any agreements by the close of play today and the head of the UN has even expressed his intention to return to Bali in an attempt to save the summit and broker deals if no agreements are made today.

The US climate change summit comes ahead of America’s refusal to commit to Kyoto under the auspices that it would cost jobs and threaten the economy of the world’s (current) largest polluter. And yet back in September George Bush laughably claimed the USA as a world leader in combating climate change. Not yet your not, but maybe someday soon.

As the county of Kent is the Garden of England, so the UK is the Dustbin of Europe. The Landfill Dustbin of Europe to be precise.

Figures out last month from the Local Government Authority show that Britain really is the dustbin of Europe, dumping more rubbish into landfill than any other European country.

The stats are for the last year of data, 2005, but it shows the following countries and the tonnage (in millions) of waste that goes into landfills each year.

• UK 22.6m
• Italy 17.6m
• Spain 14.2m
• France 12m
• Poland 8.6m

You could argue that these countries have smaller populations than the UK hence their figures are lower. Well, that may be the case, but if Spain, with a population of 45 million people is 25% smaller than the UK then why are Spain’s figures nearly half of the UK’s?

Come on Britain, recycle more. That includes the manufacturers who take no responsibility for their products once they’ve shipped… where’s the after sales care, the taking back of old goods to be recycled?

Somebody mentioned this statistic on one of those comedy TV shows last week and we though we would check it out. And sure enough we found that very same phrase in its entirety:

“Road traffic in Great Britain has grown by 84% since 1980“

That is a LOT of traffic, nearly double in under 30 years. It does add credence to the commonly held view that

“Weren’t the roads much quieter when we were kids?”

Absolutely, and there is the proof - half as much traffic when we were young and the population increase doesn’t justify that increase in road traffic. The dramatic increase in traffic is due to the fact that motoring costs have remained fairly stable during the last 30 years and disposable income has increased. Also more women are driving than ever before.

And as for our much-maligned public transport system (in private hands), there isn’t much change except that train use is up by 50%. More people use the bus in big London now, the elderly have subsidised travel and there has supposedly been significant investment in the buses and railways. Although how bus & train companies can make their owners into millionaires at the expense of passengers is fascinating reading. Must have something to do with plans to extort 20% from some rail users.
For more detailed reading look at the Department for Transports Transport Trends 2007 edition (1.48Mb PDF)

10 months ago the Confederation of British Industry set up a Climate Change Task Force to identify and assess climate change and its affect on British Business.

Last Monday the task force published its findings and it says that it’s not just the realm of government and consumers to be doing their bit to go green but business should be actively involved too.

The team, headed up by the chief exec of BT, comprised a number of bigwigs of British Industry and their findings were not driven by simple treehugger philosophies but by the unavoidable fact that climate change will impact upon business unless something is done urgently.

In addition, the task force sees opportunities to generate more business with the onset of global warming with those companies that invest in alternative energy and more efficient heating & cooling technologies as being the ones who help to abate the effects of climate change [We also reckon there’s a few quid in it for them too, especially seeing the recent Google go green move - Ed]

If big business and the voice of business, the CBI, can come to these conclusions then it’s good news. Let’s hope the CBI can lobby the government for more assistance and direction in going green. They could kickstart funding the the new green revolution by taxing those stupid big 4×4s off the road.

Be sure to see the CBI’s Climate Change Report and video.

Even the FSB, the Federation of Small Businesses, are on our green bandwagon, but unlike the greenwash brigade they’re genuinely into the “go green, shop local” mantra.

Joining forces with Friends of the Earth, the FSB are urging shoppers to shop local. As Christmas approaches, many people will be embarking upon out-of-town shopping sprees and the wisdom behind the FSB/FOE campaign is to cut down on unnecessary car journeys, cut carbon emissions, get that local service and keep the local high street thriving.

Local shops are far more likely to stock local produce and focusing on local retailers will help to keep local communities more sustainable.

John Wright, the FSB National Chairman, is hoping shoppers will support their local small shops to ensure that they are still in business this time next year, especially with the decline of many small independently run retailers in the last few years.

Richard Hines, Real Food campaigner at Friends of the Earth, added that the supermarkets are “putting the squeeze” on independent retailers. By shopping local first he’s hoping we can go green and support our local communities.

As John Wright said:

“Even if we don’t have a white christmas, there’s no reason why we can’t have a green one.”

Yes, you read that right, we said Carbon Footyprint. There’s an online text ad doing the rounds at the moment that caught our attention…

“Make the beautiful game a greener game”

…and it clicks through to CarbonFootyprint.com

Now Carbon Footyprint is an interesting website as it’s all about getting football fans to go green and reduce the carbon footprint of the FA Cup. How do you reduce the carbon footprint of the FA Cup? Well, you get a coach to the match, you catch a lift with friends or you watch the FA Cup on the TV at home or in your local pub. So no change there then.

So why all the fuss about reducing your carbon footprint for mainly the FA Cup when there are so many more league matches? Well, the FA Cup is sponsored by the energy company E.ON and E.ON, “the power behind Powergen”, are right on the green bandwagon at the moment with their other campaign Business Energy Green. (Make sure you check out where Powergen come in the Green Energy League Tables)

To give them their dues, E.ON ARE promoting car sharing and watching football on the TV for all matches, but the promotion is heavily focused on the FA Cup (sponsored by E.ON… oh sorry, we already told you that)

It’s all a nice gesture to encourage football fans to go green and but shouldn’t it be E.ON that’s going green? Well, they’re “one of the leading green generators in the UK” and intend to invest £1bn (yes, that’s a whole £1 billion) in renewable energy over the next five years, or as much as £200m every year, with £53 million spent on energy efficiency in 2006 alone.

It’s a cute attempt to urge everyone else to go green but we sense this all to be a big public relations drive to drum up more business. After all, E.ON has shareholders to answer to and has targets to meet, already with success in their nine month sales up by 7% this year with targets of between 5% and 10% for the 12 months.

What’s more, E.ON’s net profit for the year so far is nearly £3b so their £1b pledge to invest in renewables over 5 years is a pretty paltry sum.

Carbon Footyprint? Greenwash anybody?