Archive for the ‘Environment’ Category
What is blue, green and grey water?
July 6th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
As part of my work as a consumer advocate, for over four years now I’ve been active in the water sector chairing a Customer Challenge Group for South East Water. So I’ve been attending lots of discussions and events about water and trying to keep up with all the acronyms and terminology in the sector. […]
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Why is there so much irrational opposition to genetically modified food?
July 2nd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
“The United Nations Food & Agriculture Program has noted that global production of food, feed and fiber will need approximately to double by 2050 to meet the demands of a growing global population. Organizations opposed to modern plant breeding, with Greenpeace at their lead, have repeatedly denied these facts and opposed biotechnological innovations in agriculture. […]
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The weather – like our politics – has gone mad
June 20th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
Technically, today is the start of summer in the Northern Hemisphere as explained in this short note. But it seems that nobody told the weather. Here in London, we have grey skies and heavy rain and a temperature of 15C. On Thursday, the UK holds a referendum to decide whether the country will remain a […]
Posted in British current affairs, Environment, My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Some good news: renewable energy smashes global records
June 2nd, 2016 by Roger Darlington
If you follow the news – and I’m a bit of a news junkie – most of it is depressing, so it’s a good idea to highlight positive news stories when they come along. Like this one: “An upsurge in new wind, solar and hydro plants and capacity saw renewable energy smash global records last […]
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The Siberian crater saga: more widespread – and scarier – than anyone thought
March 14th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
If one spends a bit of time surfing the web and looking at social media – as I do – often one comes across something new and interesting and sometimes scary. For instance, have you heard of the Siberian crater saga? No, neither had I. But it seems that across this end of the earth […]
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You learn something every day. Let me introduce you to RAMSAR
February 4th, 2016 by Roger Darlington
For the past four years, I have chaired a body – currently called the Customer Panel – for a company called South East Water. The operation and regulation of the water sector is incredibly complicated with lots of specialist terminology and a great many acronyms. This week, we had a meeting at which we focused […]
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The best news for a l-o-n-g time: we have a global deal on climate change
December 13th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
After 23 years of failure to agree a new global climate deal and negotiations in Paris that concluded with three all-night sessions, 196 nations have signed a deal on climate change set out in 31 pages of text and due to come into force in 2020. What are the key elements? To keep global temperatures […]
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A 60-second video guide to why the Paris climate summit is likely to succeed
November 28th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
At the UN 2015 Paris Climate Conference between 30 November and 11 December, governments of more than 190 nations will meet for a new global agreement on climate change. The world’s changed a lot since they last met in Copenhagen in 2009, when countries united – but didn’t seal the deal. From the rise of […]
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How many plastic bags are issued by English supermarkets?
October 5th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
The number of plastic bags handed out by supermarkets in England in 2014 rose to 7.64 billion – 200 million more than in 2013. That’s why today a charge of 5 p per bag is being introduced. So just how big us this problem and how can it be countered – see BBC feature here.
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At last, we have switched our gas and electricity suppliers
September 26th, 2015 by Roger Darlington
Although most of my work is as a consumer advocate in regulated industries, I am not a very canny consumer myself. I’ve always been so reluctant to switch suppliers, fearing that something could do wrong. So, after all the years that energy suppliers have been privatised, I have never switched either our gas or our […]
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