Round 'em Up

Roundup of stuff time, Rob Hopkins has also posted about David Suzuki over at Transition Culture and made some interesting comments as ever, well worth a read.

An unexpected guest speaker at my permaculture course this weekend was Donnachadh McCarthy , author of Saving the Planet Without Costing the Earth. He had a lot of interesting things to say. A couple of little practical ones:

1) lots of people I know have avoided getting eco-light bulbs because they don’t work with dimmer switches, well now there are some that do – made by Megaman and available through a number of retailers, another course attendee recommends lamps2udirect (thank Geralyn!).

2) Seems that there’s an increasing body of evidence of very low outputs from domestic wind turbines in urban settings. Donnachadh is a pro-renewables voice, and has his own turbine – so I think we can trust him on this. This is particularly concerning given that B&Q are making the big push now with wind, perhaps while the technology is still in its infancy. While there is a good symbolic role in people taking on this technology, it could backfire terribly if lots of middle class people buy £1500 machines and get very little out of them except vibration damage to their roofs.

A note on Energy Bulletin directed me to this promo for the ASPO film Asleep in America on YouTube.

Suzuki Speaks

There’s this horrible disconnect for me between my gut feelings regarding the direction the planet is going in (supported by frequent updates from the world’s top scientists) and a mainstream point of view represented acutely in The Daily Mail.

So in the last few weeks, while we hear on one side that we’re eating the world, that global ecosystems face collapse, that irreversible environmental damage is now inevitable on the other side the Mail group and its ilk run middle class scare stories about how the nanny state wants to fine you for recycling, or make you pay more to drive a gas-guzzling 4x4 (this and this are fairly typical). Like, HELLO – as I believe they say in the USA. While we look towards horrendous calamity for the future of life on Earth and the human race, people are moaning about dividing paper from metal, or getting shirty about not being able to pollute cheaply enough. I despair, I really do.

I’ve been saying for a while now, that the level of news on preventing eco-collapse we get in the mainstream media is focused on stuff like the Kyoto Protocol (remember that?). Lets try and get the USA and Australia to sign up to Kyoto etc. – when Kyoto itself is like some fucking decision to start talks about whether we might like to re-arrange the deckchairs on the Titanic.

Anyway David Suzuki, who has just announced his retirement, has a clearer metaphor along the same lines. In an interview with Reuters he says:

"I feel like we are in a giant car heading for a brick wall at 100 miles an hour and everyone in the car is arguing where they want to sit. For God's sake, someone has to say put the brakes on and turn the wheel."

Nice Try but No Cigar

A major flood at ‘Cigar Lake’ a Canadian uranium mine has further restricted future supplies of the radioactive poison, believed by some to be out energy saviour. Prices have increased again, after having already gone up 54% this year.

From the Bloomberg story:

"Losing Cigar Lake in the uranium world is like the oil market having to deal with the loss of Saudi Arabia,'' Kevin Bambrough, market strategist at Sprott Asset Management Inc. in Toronto, said in an e-mail. Projected full production of 18 million pounds annually at the mine "equates to just over 10 percent of current annual consumption,'' Bambrough said.

As I’ve mentioned before, Canada is the number 1 source of the world’s uranium (30% of world supply), number 2 (or 5 according to this report) is Kazakhstan. The EU is currently courting Kazakhstan to get its hands on more of its supplies of radioactive poison. Let’s hope that human rights were discussed too. How exactly is going nuclear going to increase our "energy security"?

I’m kind of hoping that all the political embarrassment around Borat will be a major factor in derailing a nuclear future.

Just to keep you up to date with the UK nuclear industry (and derailings), here's some of the last weeks goodies: Sunderland train station was evacuated on Wednesday when a train carrying nuclear waste to Sellafield broke down; Hinkley Point B Nuclear power station's two reactor may never re-open after being closed due to problems including "cracks in a reactor's graphite core, and cracks in boiler pipes"; the UK nations are getting into a bitchfest about who has to look after nuclear waste; while Environment Secretary David Milliband is trying to bribe local councils to bury the radioactive poison in their backyards.

Click here for the Europe wide million signature campaign against nuclear power.

Tranquillity Base

The taste for chemical and artificial tranquilizers, be they alcohol, television, or any one of the smorgasbord of illegal narcotics available outside your local school are generally recognised to be crutches helping us to stand up in a world that’s forcing down.

A new survey by the Council for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE) may have revealed visually more evidence of what we already feel instinctually. The map above shows England coloured to indicate varying degrees of perceived tranquillity by location.

It will come as no surprise that it is easy to find London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Newcastle on this map – they all rise as hives on the skin of the country. Nor will it astound that the less populated areas were rated more tranquil. What is more worrying is the direction that everywhere is clearly going. Look at any of the regional maps and the detail clearly indicates the stress of the city leaching out like a vigorous cancer along commuter routes and suburban sprawl.

Take the regional map of the South-West for example, the West Country has traditionally been seen as a place of escape and relaxation but this plan indicates it criss-crossed with rising unease. It only takes a moment to perceive that the yellows breaking from the green are shaped about the major roads, everywhere the car goes it chases tranquillity away.

The CPRE have provided an opportunity for you to hear tranquillity, with streamed excerpts from the CD Sounds of Tranquillity produced by the Wildlife Recording Society.

Intelligent thought needs huge expansion

Keith's just pointed out a BBC story Nuclear needs 'huge expansion', where one John Ritch, director-general of the World Nuclear Association says that the world needs a 20 fold expansion in the use of nuclear power in order to prevent climate change.

The article is pretty even handed and it's interesting to see the peak uranium theory getting a BBC airing. I can't see much confidence in the "positive" view put forward in the piece by the OECD's Nuclear Energy Agency, which suggests that there is 85 years-worth of uranium in the ground at "current rates of use" and pays no attention to the energy cost of the nuclear cycle. Looking at fossil fuels has taught us that there becomes a point when the EROEI makes further extraction of an energy source counter-productive. This point is covered in the piece by comment from David Fleming.

I've touched on the relations between nuclear power and nuclear weapons here (and here) before, and its good to see that Friends of the Earth are given space to mention this in the article.

In a week that's seen confirmation of North Korea's nuclear test, Sellafield nuclear processing plant being fined for a leak of 83,000 litres of acid containing 20 tonnes of uranium and 160kg of plutonium, and the discovery of cracks in several UK nuclear power stations - one wonders how the insanity of nuclear energy still holds forth. Also bear in mind that this is just the stuff we're told about, the UK nuclear industry is notorious for its use of 25 year rule, d-notices etc. to hide its biggest fuck ups.

The Omnivore's Dilemma

My most recent read has been the excellent book "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan.

Stop Climate Chaos

Get in on the action - Trafalgar Square 1-3pm, Saturday 4 November.

Make a bigger bang than Bonfire night. Let the government know you care by packing out Trafalgar Square. By joining the thousands in the Square on Saturday November 4 you will be making your voice count.

Whether you care about the environment, global poverty, wildlife or just you and your family, climate change has become the greatest challenge we face. But together we can stop climate chaos.

With entertainment, film, performance, music, and speakers it'll be one of the biggest events of the year. Help deliver some ear bending political noise at a time when there's some serious political stuff going on.

The event takes place on the eve of critical international climate talks in Nairobi, Kenya, where we will be pushing the UK government to show real leadership. And just over a week later we are hoping the Queen will announce the introduction of a climate change bill. This could make year-on-year cuts in carbon dioxide - which is the main cause of climate change - the law.

Dreams of A Sunday Always Waiting

of Arrowe Hill surface again with dreams of a Sunday always waiting. It's more than Hexadelic, it'll put a spell on you - play it to your hex girlfriends, charmed I'm sure.

The promo film is Carrie spending her last year in Marienbad on Michael Snow's Wavelength - ominous 1970s tenebrous horror vibe. Welcome it into your life, but don’t step outside the pentagram.

(Some birthday musings on life, Jung, Dante and that over at Rubedo)

Blueberries

Planted up blueberries at the weekend, four plants, four different varieties: Chandler, Brigitta, Bluecrop and Early Crop.

They’re in containers for two reasons: 1) they’re ericaceous like me, and that’s easier to accommodate in pots; 2) it’s not my garden – so I’m limited in what I can do, and I guess this way I can take them with me when I go (without digging ‘em up).

You will notice the surface mulch of tree bark, beneath that there is a sheet layer of newspaper pages. I guess that’s about as far as I’ve got with this as any kind of ‘permaculture’ project. Although engagement with food production at all creates a shift in consciousness. It’s all organic too. But I fucked up with the compost and its got peat in it, which I didn’t really want – and how sustainable is it growing something that requires different soil conditions to what you’ve got anyway?

I chose to grow blueberries first, because I like blueberries – and I suppose they’re a ‘super-food’ if that means anything at all. I perhaps should have approached choosing plants from a sustainable point of view first – but I figured choosing something you don’t like is never going to be very sustainable is it? So let’s see how we get on with the blueberries.

What's Chosŏnmal for "Nein Danke"?

So while the west continues to piss about in the desert, chanting "it's not about the oil" like some mediaeval penitent making a prayer between each strike on the head with a plank of wood, mumbling between times about the "weapons of mass destruction" etc. etc. - North Korea just goes and does it.

North Korea has announced that its made its first nuclear test, an underground explosion in Gilju in the Hamgyong province. The more nuclear we have, the more nuclear will spread. The more this shit will end up in the hands of people who go "You say mutually assured destruction like it's a bad thing". It really doesn't help when ichiban superpower is high on rapture rhetoric too.

Saw Keith and Helen on Saturday and got an early birthday present, cd single of Roy Harper's "The Death of God". One could quote so many of its lines, but how about for today:

Hoping and praying
And praying and hoping
Praying and hoping to die
Blowing my life away
Taking some others
A new kind of old passer-by
But I won't be passing you by
'Cos I'm the Samaritan
With a bomb in my eye
And my finger on the trigger
Of goodbye

What's Farsi for "Nein Danke"?

I'm against pretty much all the nuclear industry - weapons, energy the whole lot. I just don't think we have the right to go on producing poisons that will last millennia after our deaths, or that it can ever be right. It's not essentially a spiritual point of view, or a personal philosophical point of view - it's a pragmatic acceptance that creating elements, not seen before on Earth, that have the power to kill for hundreds of centuries is likely to be a bad idea.

That said, I don't really see that the "West" has come up with any reasons good enough to stop Iran from developing nuclear technology. If the rest of the world was retreating from nuclear energy and nuclear weapons there would be a clear global moral argument against any new development. Also there would be fewer atomic scientists, less atomic material, less nuclear expertise and technology to "go astray".

In fact the opposite is the case - the "west" and other countries in the favour of the "west" are gung-ho for new nuclear energy developments. It is increasingly seen as a solution for avoiding global warming, and for assisting in energy security (i.e. dealing with all the oil running out, and what's left mostly being owned by people who don't like us). Now if you were a country whose whole economy depended on fossil fuel exports and you had already passed your own peak oil production point wouldn't you want to join this new energy bandwagon before it was too late?

In terms of nuclear weapons, the "west" similarly shows no sign of retreat. The US military pushes for the development of "tactical" nuclear weapons, atomic bunker busters et al. The UK government gets ready to spend billions on a new nuclear weapons system to replace Trident. Meanwhile countries like Israel, India and Pakistan are allowed nuclear weapons without censure. Iran looks on and sees that while a country without any evidence of WMD (Iraq) is invaded and turned into a pit of chaos, a country that clearly does have WMD (North Korea) is pussyfooted around. Doesn't this indicate that you bloody well better actually have WMD if you want to avoid the USA coming a shit kicking?

So we have an opportunity to stop Nuclear madness here and now, stop nuclear development in the first world and export the moral argument (and the supporting details on peak uranium). Simultaneously we restrict the number of people who possibly could create nuclear industries, and the technology to allow us to do so. Our Atomic scientists will have plenty of exciting work left to do, working out how to make all the crap 50 years of nuclear activity have generated safer for the unborn generations who will share the planet with it.