Over in Brussels on Monday night (Sep 1) Members of the European Parliament voted to delay (by three more years, until 2015) proposals to force car makers to reduce fuel consumption of new cars, despite overwhelming public support for more fuel efficient vehicles. However, although this was the Industry Committee which bent to pressure from the car industry, there Environment Committee get to vote on the issue this coming Tuesday (Sep 9).

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/inside-story-advertising-environ...

Inside Story: Advertising environmentalism - Is it just greenwash?

Last week the Advertising Standards Authority ordered car-maker Renault to stop a campaign that made false environmental claims. Ben Stewart, Greenpeace's director of communications, puts to the test other examples of products claiming to have ecological benefits

Volkswagen's 'High performance - low emissions' advertisement

Monday, 31 March 2008

VOLKSWAGEN

Opinion polls over the new £25 London Congestion Charge for gas-guzzlers have been giving seemingly contradictory results, probably in part due to loading of questions though I can't find either research report online.

1. http://www.mayorwatch.co.uk/article.php?article_id=1433

Poll: 61pc Back £25 C-Charge
First Published: Monday 17 March 2008

Mayor of London Ken Livingstone has claimed public backing for his controversial £25 congestion charge for vehicles with the highest Co2 emissions.

and both were used on TWO separate occasions to view the same property.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article...

From The Independent On Sunday

Oil and gas may run short by 2015, say industry experts

By Geoffrey Lean, Environment Editor
Published: 22 July 2007

Humanity is approaching an unprecedented crisis when not enough oil and gas will be produced to keep industrial civilisation running, the world's top oilmen warned last week.

There are many international train journey planner websites such as those run by SNCB, Deutsche Bahn and ÖBB (all nationalised railways). However they all have wrong information for British trains, specifically timetable alterations for engineering work are missing (for example that on the East Coast Main Line over the Easter weekend), and that they all show a planned direct Sunderland to London service which does not exist (yet).

Anyone seen any articles on the following idea?

Motorways and other trunk roads gain overhead transmission lines over one or two lanes in each direction, so that tall wide vehicles (lorries, coaches) can send up rack-and-pinion rigs so they can switch to electric power while continuously in one lane.

"I am one of many thousands who are self employed owner drivers of small commercial vehicles who do courier delivery work, in other words I am a white van man.

"I'd like to suggest that if we were to shoot all the accountants and material schedulers and planners many hundreds of thousands if not millions of miles could be saved by people organising the real priorities - I do deal with tissue samples, blood, xrays et cetera. But very often I am running around the country with boxes of catalogues, brochures and publicity material and stuff which isn't in the least bit urgent.

"People simply don't organise their priorities, they get bad planning, they attach a priority to something which isn't of such critical importance . I can tell you I have seen see material which I have delivered as a matter of screaming urgency still sitiing in the corner where I left it, days or a week later.

Arnold Schwarzenegger's climate advisor Dan Skopec, interviewed on Radio 4's PM programme today, said that Arnie was converting one of his many Hummers to being hydrogen powered. Given the inefficiency of hydrogen as an energy medium (and the marginal coal-fired electricity currently needed), won't that increase its emissions?

Last year the latest Hummer range was endorsed by Black Eyed Peas, who rap about "chemical gases fillin' lungs of little ones".

Can you practise what you preach?

Got me questioning, where is the love?