Digging an ethical hole
The giant Ffos-y-Fran opencast mine outside Merthyr Tydfil will contribute more to climate change emissions than any other mine in Britain over the next few years. But property development group Argent, which is one half of the joint venture, prefers to talk about how green its buildings are. "We are trying to deliver lower energy, greener buildings in the right locations," it says. What Argent does not say, but which has been dug out by a rather shocked Friends of the Earth Swansea, is that Argent is wholly owned by BT's pension fund, which was voted Britain's top ethical pension fund last year.
Spying for beginners
Come in Ken Tobias, or rather Toby Kendall, the not-so-ace spy who infiltrated anti-aviation group Plane Stupid on behalf of corporate spy group C2i but made people suspicious when he always turned up on time to meetings wearing Armani jeans. It seems he had the same problem elsewhere. Eco Soundings' spies report that Ken/Toby also "joined" the anti-war group Hands Off Iraqi Oil, even dressing as a pirate. One woman recalls: "As soon as we began open meetings 'Ken' began to attend ... Activists immediately suspected him because of his militaristic punctuality in attending and departing meetings, and his absurdly suspect email alias: 'Meneleus' - the Greek king who hid in the Trojan horse sent to conquer Troy." Ken/Toby is still not answering his phones and emails.
Lecture for Lawson
Lord Lawson has promised to stop his ramblings about climate change if other non-scientific "experts" like Al Gore and Nick Stern stop too. Now a real expert, Robert Watson, the chief scientist at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, who was chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has firmly rebuked Thatcher's former chancellor in a statement that only mildly reflects his growing exasperation. Watson says that Lawson selectively quotes UN science findings; that there is no doubt that future warming is inevitable, and that inaction will lead to further destruction of the world's natural resources, land, water and biodiversity. In other words, Lord Lawson, you are wrong, please shut up!
Watch this outdoors space
Rumours that a supermarket is about to end the voluntary retail GMO moratorium and that the industry is plotting something have been fuelled by an advert placed in New Scientist magazine by agro-giant Syngenta. "With an exciting development pipeline that's set to launch 40 new products over the next three to four years, we are looking to significantly expand our fields trial team during the next six months," the company says. And if an exciting development pipeline isn't enticing enough, applicants are promised: "You'll enjoy the outdoors lifestyle." Ah, there's nothing like the smell of biotech in the morning.
Banking a cut of the carbon
The World Bank is deep into climate change, but whose side is it on? One part of the bank trades carbon and sets up funds to make it attractive to reduce emissions, while another is spending nearly $1bn a year paying large oil and gas industries to spew out emissions. Last week, the bank that likes to say both yes and no approved a $450m loan for the 4,000MW Tata Mundra coal project in Gujarat, India, which is expected to emit 23m tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. This, says the Institute for Policy Studies in New York, allows India's second largest multinational to burn lots of coal and yet make money from carbon credits at the same time. The bank claims it is neutral, if not carbon neutral.