November 2015

Like the good little ecomodernist he is, Viscount Ridley (AKA Matt King Coal, science correspondent for Murdoch’s Times, owner of Britain’s biggest open-cast coal mine and the man who inherited and then broke Northern Rock) has been busy recycling old myths into comment pieces, for the Times and the Wall Street Journal.

You might have heard today that the government has announced it will 'call in' the decision over fracking in Lancashire. What this means is that, depsite Lancashire county council voting against the shale gas industry back in June, the government now intends to have the final say.

Whilst the influence of George Osborne on energy and environment policies has long been of concern, the progress made on the international stage by Blair and Prescott, and on the domestic front by Miliband’s Climate Change Act, plus the restraining influence of the Lib Dems during the coalition, have meant that that the UK’s progress on climate issues has been substantial enough to take time and effort to undo.

However, Osborne has the time, and appears to be putting in the effort.

With the UK set to wean itself off coal power over the next decade, what will take its place to keep the lights on?

Every year on the 21 November fishing communities around the world celebrate World Fisheries Day and remind us that we need to ensure a healthy oceans ecosystem with plenty more fish swimming in the sea. More than two-thirds of the world’s fisheries have been overfished and unsustainable fishing methods like bottom trawling or the use of FAD's (Fish Aggregation Devices) threaten to deplete fish stocks.