climate change

Blimey. First Al Gore, then Nasa's top scientist and now Prince Charles. Yep, Charlie has joined the clamour against new coal and, while he didn't go as far as Gore and call for "rings of young people blocking bulldozers," he did stand up in front of the European parliament and ask:

"Can we really understand the dynamics of a world in which energy and food security will become real issues for everyone? ... Can we possibly allow twenty years of business as usual before coal powered generation becomes clean? Are we truly investing enough in renewable energy?"

A new report published today undermines the economic case for building a third runway at Heathrow Airport. It shows that the Department for Transport (DfT) based part of its case for expansion on an Oxford Economic Forecasting (OEF) study commissioned by BAA, the company who own and manage Heathrow.

Unsurprisingly, the BAA funded study over- estimates the benefits of a third runway, assuming it would generate an extra 3 million business passengers contributing £400 each to the UK economy (making it worth £5billion over 70 years) - the DfT's original estimate was for half a million new business passengers spending around £120 each.

As reported in yesterday's news, London's congestion charge is being modified again to improve the capital's green credentials. From October, vehicles emitting the highest amounts of CO2 will have to pay £25 a day which gets a big thumbs-up, while the most efficient cars will get into central London free of charge.

Some commentators have pointed out that this effectively changes the purpose of the charge from reducing congestion to reducing pollution, and that's no bad thing. According to the World Resources Institute, road transport spews out around 10 per cent of global emissions (pdf), so providing incentives to move to more efficient models is going to do a lot to cut those exhaust fumes.

This combined heat and power plant in Denmark is up to 95 per cent efficient

To celebrate our launch of EfficienCity, we're starting a new, weekly column for all the closet energy geeks out there. Every week, we'll take an in-depth look at one of the technologies we feature in EfficienCity - tidal power, wave power, wind energy, combined heat and power, micro-hydro power, anaerobic digestion, biomass and the rest. We'll also be looking at issues like baseload and the regulatory context for decentralised energy.

So remember to check back each Wednesday and, if you have any suggestions for energy solutions to climate change you'd like to see us cover, just post a comment at the bottom of this page and we'll try to slot it in.

Jubilant climbers on top of the chimney at Kingsnorth power station in October

I've been so busy with the launch of EfficienCity (our blueprint for a climate-friendly town) that I haven't had a chance to update you on all the goings on in our coal campaign since we delivered our alternative energy speech at the government / industry shindig last Wednesday.

On Friday morning, listeners of Radio 4's Today programme heard a withering attack on the proposed new coal plant at Kingsnorth from top Nasa scientist (and the world's most eminent climate scientist) James Hansen. The plans for the UK's first new coal plant in 30 years were, he said, a "terrible idea" which “will destroy the efforts of millions of citizens to reduce their carbon emissions”.

If you're looking for some web-based wonders to inform, entertain or inspire, here's what's caught our collective eyes recently:

• The Story of Stuff has been doing the rounds since before Christmas but Annie Leonard's occasionally breathless but totally brilliant film about resources, consumption and consumerism is worth mentioning again.According to Annie, natural resources in the developing world are seen as "our stuff that got on somebody else's land".
• Another oldie-but-goodie is Breathing Earth, a global map that shows when someone is either born or dies, plus the CO2 emissions from each country. In real time. Be afraid, be very afraid.
• It looks like video, but apparently this evocative climate change film is composed entirely of still images by Toronto Star photographer Lucas Oleniuk
• So popular they had to get bigger servers, this video shows what happened when 200-plus people stopped moving in New York's Grand Central Station. It's not really green but it's really cool.