Greenpeace Blog

Woolworths makes no changes to light bulbs policy; campaigners not impressed

Posted by jamie — 19 July 2007 at 1:05pm - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer offers free CFL light bulbs in a Southampton branch of WoolworthsI was just about to write a piece slating Woolworths (as, after all the fuss we caused on Saturday, we still hadn't heard from them) when I got a call from Laura, one of our campaigners, to say she had a letter from them explaining what they're going to do about energy-guzzling light bulbs. I'm looking at it now and I'm sorry, but I'm still going to slate them.

It's from CEO Trevor Bish-Jones who begins by not asking for us not to stage in-store protests in future but to communicate directly with himself. So he'll be pleased about all the emails he's been getting from you (if you haven't emailed him, do it now, or you can call your local branch of Woolies and speak to the manager).

He goes on to use some well-worn arguments which I thought it would be useful to air here. Take it away, Trevor.

Ryanair tells porky pies about aviation emissions

Posted by jamie — 18 July 2007 at 5:37pm - Comments

This from the BBC News website about the judgment against Ryanair by the Advertising Standards Authority:

 

Ryanair has been ordered not to repeat an advertisement that played down the impact of aviation on the environment.

In a press campaign the airline claimed the airline industry "accounts for just 2% of carbon dioxide emissions".

The Convenient Solution - what you can do

Posted by bex — 18 July 2007 at 5:32pm - Comments

If you like our film, please help us to make sure that the UK gets a genuinely clean and efficient energy system.

The Convenient Solution

Posted by bex — 18 July 2007 at 5:00pm - Comments

Update (09/04/2008): The Convenient Solution has been chosen as an Official Honoree in the Public Service and Activism category The 12th Annual Webby Awards.


A short film about climate change and energy

We all know that, to stop climate change, we need to stop burning fossil fuels. The government says we need nuclear power to do this. Our new film explains why nuclear power can’t stop climate change – and lays down a better, cheaper, more convenient solution:



Right-click on these links and select 'Save link as...' to download the film as a Quicktime (30MB) or Windows Media (27MB) file.

Convinced? Find out what you can do to make sure the UK gets a genuinely clean and efficient energy system.

Not convinced yet? Read on.

The single biggest use of fossil fuels in the UK isn't for electricity or for transport, but for creating heat to warm our buildings and power our industrial processes. So any solution to climate change needs to contribute to heating, as well as to electricity generation.

Nuclear power contributes almost nothing to our enormous heating requirements. In fact it contributes less than four per cent to our overall energy needs. And building new nuclear power stations (as the government wants to do) won't increase that share.

So what is the solution? Well, in the same amount of time and for less money, we could implement an energy system that will do far more to stop climate change and ensure energy security than nuclear power: a combination of renewable energy, efficiency, and combined heat and power:

Woolworths and light bulbs: a bit of history

Posted by jamie — 14 July 2007 at 4:31pm - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer outside a branch of Woolworths in Southampton

It's just after 3pm now and all of the main teams of volunteers have either been removed from or left their respective branches of Woolworths after clearing the shelves of inefficient light bulbs. The management at head office seems clearly rattled as their press officers have been telling our Light Brigaders (or is that Brigadiers?) that there'll be an emergency meeting on Monday to discuss their light bulb policy. We'll keep you posted on what, if anything, transpires next week. In the meantime, there's our cheap-as-chips video and photos from the day of action on Flickr to keep you entertained.

Woolworths won't stop selling power crazy light bulbs, so we've cleared the shelves for them

Posted by jamie — 14 July 2007 at 10:20am - Comments

A Greenpeace volunteer locked on to baskets of inefficient light bulbs

It's going to be a busy day at branches of Woolworths across the UK today as the Greenpeace Light Brigade pay them a visit to ask why they're still selling old-fashioned, power crazy light bulbs. Woolworths came bottom of our new league table, ranking light bulb retailers according to their commitments to phase out inefficient bulbs, so our volunteers have decided to take matters into their own hands.

Giving a damn: a beginner's guide

Posted by jossc — 12 July 2007 at 5:03pm - Comments

As you've probably guessed by now, we here in the Greenpeace UK web team love our animations, particularly if they're funny. If they're funny and they have something to say that's relevant to our campaigns, we like them even more. If they're funny, relevant and have a surreal twist to them, then we start to get over-excited and have to go and lie down for a while. Which is kind of what happened when we saw the following during Live Earth. Made by our long-time collaborators at Airside, 'a beginners' guide to giving a damn' gently ridicules some of the more excessive aspects of the western lifestyle while pointing out the positive benefits of reining in unnecessary consumption.

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