Posted by bex — 13 November 2000 at 9:00am
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Traffic jam
Saturday morning. The fuel convoy and the Greenpeace team at Ferrybridge services near Leeds.
Ironically the convoy had parked up next to a fleet of army trucks who are on route to help with the clean up of local towns and villages after the recent flooding.
Posted by bex — 10 November 2000 at 9:00am
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On the first day of the fuel protests Greenpeace volunteers met face to face with the protestors before their convoy set off for London, They explained to them the link between cheap petrol and diesel and increased flooding.
As the truckers and farmers gathered for their increasingly unpopular protest the Greenpeace activists told them that Greenpeace was completely opposed to any reductions in tax on oil based fuels. They made it clear that Gordon Brown's pledge to reduce tax on low sulphur fuels was not green but a recipe for runaway climate change since it would increase the use of oil based fuels.
Posted by bex — 10 November 2000 at 9:00am
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As many parts of Britain lie under flood water, the relationship that these bouts of extreme weather have with fossil fuel pollution can no longer be separated. With more than 3000 homes and key transport networks falling foul of the flood waters, the answer can only be to change our ways, leaving coal and oil behind. If we don't, grab those sandbags because it's going to get worse.
So what? you cry, I can whip out my dinghy and pop down the local. Fun and community spirited it may be, but what many of us don't know are the underlying costs that these climatic changes have. In 1999, insurance claims wieghed in at a hefty 860 million, and this Autumn's stormy weather has already reached 500million, just think what is going to happen to your premium!
Greenpeace will be giving away thousands of litres of free green fuel to motorists at a central London location on Monday 13th November. The Greenpeace Guerrilla Garage will be dispensing bio-diesel - a plant-based fuel that is identical to ordinary diesel but only causes a fraction of the damage to the climate. Bio-diesel is widely used in conventional diesel engines in Germany and is guaranteed totally safe for British motorists. Bio-diesel is not commercially available in the UK despite the fact that Britain exports vegetable oil to France for bio-diesel production.
Posted by bex — 10 November 2000 at 9:00am
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Bio-diesel: green fuel we can use today
Take some rapeseed, sunflower or soya oil, or recycle some used cooking oil, refine, mix with a diesel engine and voila! A non-toxic, biodegradable green fuel that can be used in any diesel engine.
Although the plant-based fuel is not pollution-free, it is significantly cleaner than its petro equivalent and causes just half the damage to the climate. Its widely used in the US, Germany and France, so why isn't the UK enjoying the environmental, economic and health benefits too?
Bio-diesel is the name for fuel made from vegetable oils. It is made either directly from crops such as rapeseed, sunflower and soya, or by recycling cooking oil.
Bio-diesel is not zero emission, but the environmental impact of bio-diesel is much lower than that of petroleum-based diesel. The impact on global climate change of bio-diesel is half that of petro-diesel. Bio-diesel produces virtually no emissions of sulphur or hydrocarbons. Emissions of air pollutants such as carbon monoxide and particulates are also significantly reduced.
Autumn 2000 brought extreme weather to Britain. Flooding was the worst and most widespread in 100 years. More than 3000 homes were flooded across Britain and our transport system was paralysed.
Extreme weather is no longer simply a natural event. The current changes to our climate cannot now be separated from the impact of fossil fuel pollution. Unless we break our addiction to fossil fuels like oil and coal we are set to experience even greater changes.
A mobile team from Greenpeace will be challenging the fuel protest convoy along the entire length of their route. The volunteers - travelling in vehicles powered by green fuels such as compressed natural gas and bio-diesel [1] - will argue the case for high taxes on oil-based fuels. Greenpeace believes that Gordon Brown was wrong to reduce the cost of oil-based petrol and diesel because of the impact they have on climate change.
