Controversy surrounds the Chernobyl Report from the European Green Party - TORCH Report.
I take a look at the summary of the TORCH report and have read Chris Busby's "ANORAC" critique of the TORCH report on Low Level Radiation Campaign.
There are a variety of bottom lines to choose from.
James Lovelock asserted in Bristol this that nobody died as a result of Chernobyl apart from the fire fighters.
The IAEA/WHO in 2005 gave an estimate of 4,000 to 9,000 deaths.
The TORCH report concludes that Chernobyl caused 60,000 cancer deaths.
LLRC quotes three respectable reports which put the deaths nearer 1,000,000 up to a maximum of 1.8 million (Bertell).
It would seem therefore that the German Greens have been taken for a bit of a minimalisationist ride by Fairlie and Sumner, but having said that, 60,000 deaths is quite enough to be going on with thank you very much, and the conclusion is - No More Nukes. That is the work that we should be getting on with - getting the word out that 60,000 is a conservative estimate, and the full tally may be 30 times that number, and that nuclear power is a diversion from the serious task of opposing global warming, not a solution to it.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
Bush "not bird-brain" shock
Wikinews: "According to psychologists in Leipzig, Germany, apes and some birds are able to plan their actions ahead of time."
This puts them in ahead of George W Bush and Donald Rumsfeld then.
This puts them in ahead of George W Bush and Donald Rumsfeld then.
Friday, May 19, 2006
James' Gaian Paradoxical Lovelock with Nuclear Delilah
To Bristol again last night to hear James Lovelock at the Arnolfini.
He presents a picture of inevitable severe global warming turning most of the world into a waterless desert, with an enclave of "civilisation" preserved near the poles by the stop-gap means of nuclear electricity. It was unstated how the rest of the world was to be kept out of this little oasis, but I presume it would involve hurling depleted uranium at them and zapping them with bolts of nuclear electricity.
Jim's "vision" of the future contains a strange paradox. The inventor of Gaia, a planetary system where everything interconnects with everything else, seeks salvation in nuclear power, a linear process which must be kept separate (as much as possible) from the rest of Gaia. Not to mention an elite corps of "civilisation" (the same idiots, no doubt, who have led us in to this ruinous state) separated from the rest of doomed humanity.
Against this Private Frazer analysis, greens argue for a systemic approach beginning with a paradigm shift, a Green Economics, and a response to the threat using a multiplicity of means: energy efficiency, diverse modalities of renewable energy, and extensive carbon sinks.
Jim Lovelock is an intellectual Samson who got into bed with the Delilah of nuclear power. His remaining job is to break the pillars of the intellectual edifice of the cornucopian world view. IMHO
He presents a picture of inevitable severe global warming turning most of the world into a waterless desert, with an enclave of "civilisation" preserved near the poles by the stop-gap means of nuclear electricity. It was unstated how the rest of the world was to be kept out of this little oasis, but I presume it would involve hurling depleted uranium at them and zapping them with bolts of nuclear electricity.
Jim's "vision" of the future contains a strange paradox. The inventor of Gaia, a planetary system where everything interconnects with everything else, seeks salvation in nuclear power, a linear process which must be kept separate (as much as possible) from the rest of Gaia. Not to mention an elite corps of "civilisation" (the same idiots, no doubt, who have led us in to this ruinous state) separated from the rest of doomed humanity.
Against this Private Frazer analysis, greens argue for a systemic approach beginning with a paradigm shift, a Green Economics, and a response to the threat using a multiplicity of means: energy efficiency, diverse modalities of renewable energy, and extensive carbon sinks.
Jim Lovelock is an intellectual Samson who got into bed with the Delilah of nuclear power. His remaining job is to break the pillars of the intellectual edifice of the cornucopian world view. IMHO
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Bristol Festival of Ideas
Yesterday evening took bus to Bristol Festival of Ideas to hear Geoff Mulgan on Good Power/Bad Power. Ex-number 10 policy wonk, escaped with frontal lobes well intact, as evidenced by his ready endorsement of the idea of an Index of Human Rights.
Next seminar was a look at What Happens to Ideas? with Carmen Cahill (Virago publisher) Geoff Mulgan again and Lesley Chamberlain, author of book on the intellectuals banished by Lenin (for their own good, Lenin said. If they stayed, they would have to be shot. Nice man.)
I said the emergent big idea is the green view of the world. Last year would have been howled down. This year respectful acceptance.
I love intellectuals. They are quick to recognise that they have been hit in the face by a rake they have just stepped on.
Then out into the rainy streets to gravitate to the sound of brassy jazz music to find the Ambling Band consecrating the rainfreshed air with happiness, and find Ralph Hoyte, Bristol poet and sculptor listening too and we agree together that this is really all that humanity needs - food, drink, ideas, and music in the streets.
Next seminar was a look at What Happens to Ideas? with Carmen Cahill (Virago publisher) Geoff Mulgan again and Lesley Chamberlain, author of book on the intellectuals banished by Lenin (for their own good, Lenin said. If they stayed, they would have to be shot. Nice man.)
I said the emergent big idea is the green view of the world. Last year would have been howled down. This year respectful acceptance.
I love intellectuals. They are quick to recognise that they have been hit in the face by a rake they have just stepped on.
Then out into the rainy streets to gravitate to the sound of brassy jazz music to find the Ambling Band consecrating the rainfreshed air with happiness, and find Ralph Hoyte, Bristol poet and sculptor listening too and we agree together that this is really all that humanity needs - food, drink, ideas, and music in the streets.
And these are the people that Bush is preparing to bomb.
email today from Justice Not Vengeance (though you may find that their website is blocked in some way).
all over Isfahan are gardens of paradise - the streets are like green corridors of sycamore and mulberry and cypresses and the scent of thousands of roses drift through the warm air.
You can tell that this is an ancient civilization because they have had three thousand odd years to make cities work. The pavements and roads are polished and smooth, clean drinking water is available from public fountains and the city is designed for pleasure. In the day people wander along the park lined river eating ice cream, lovers sit in couples among the honeysuckle arbors, families take swan boats out on the river.
Men and women sit on the steps of the bridge catching the breeze as the cool water rushes through arches just below their feet and swallows dart over their heads. For four hundred years since the bridge was built people have come here to sing to the acoustics of the stonework.
As we walk along the bridge we can hear a song coming through the arches. A young man holding a plastic bag of books, perhaps returning from college, is alone in the shade singing close to the wall to use its resonance.
Passersby stop very quietly to hear him finish his private song - "When my heart is broken I will take my grief from my enemy to my friend, but when my friend is gone to whom will I take my broken heart?" A beautiful voice mixing with the cool shade and the golden syrup sun.
On the far side of the bridge people gather to hear a recital from the Epic of the Kings by the great Persian poet Ferdowsi. The balladiers tell a story of a king who has sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for being king of the world. Two snakes enter the king's ears to eat his brain and the only way he can stop them is to feed the snakes with the brains of young people.
A young blacksmith resists and calls on the young people to act together - so they rise up and dethrone the king.
The Persians have had millenia of practice at dethroning unjust rulers and poetry has been a powerful tool in those revolutions.
At night there is a young woman rollerblading round a statue of Ferdowsi. She is wearing pink.
In the square of mosques under a golden moon families picnic in the warm air. The square is illuminated by low lights among the bushes. Young men are playing cards. The intimate velvet darkness wraps a thousand conversations among the roses.
In the streets and parks and shops people stop us and talk to us about peace and negotiation. (c) Emily Johns
all over Isfahan are gardens of paradise - the streets are like green corridors of sycamore and mulberry and cypresses and the scent of thousands of roses drift through the warm air.
You can tell that this is an ancient civilization because they have had three thousand odd years to make cities work. The pavements and roads are polished and smooth, clean drinking water is available from public fountains and the city is designed for pleasure. In the day people wander along the park lined river eating ice cream, lovers sit in couples among the honeysuckle arbors, families take swan boats out on the river.
Men and women sit on the steps of the bridge catching the breeze as the cool water rushes through arches just below their feet and swallows dart over their heads. For four hundred years since the bridge was built people have come here to sing to the acoustics of the stonework.
As we walk along the bridge we can hear a song coming through the arches. A young man holding a plastic bag of books, perhaps returning from college, is alone in the shade singing close to the wall to use its resonance.
Passersby stop very quietly to hear him finish his private song - "When my heart is broken I will take my grief from my enemy to my friend, but when my friend is gone to whom will I take my broken heart?" A beautiful voice mixing with the cool shade and the golden syrup sun.
On the far side of the bridge people gather to hear a recital from the Epic of the Kings by the great Persian poet Ferdowsi. The balladiers tell a story of a king who has sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for being king of the world. Two snakes enter the king's ears to eat his brain and the only way he can stop them is to feed the snakes with the brains of young people.
A young blacksmith resists and calls on the young people to act together - so they rise up and dethrone the king.
The Persians have had millenia of practice at dethroning unjust rulers and poetry has been a powerful tool in those revolutions.
At night there is a young woman rollerblading round a statue of Ferdowsi. She is wearing pink.
In the square of mosques under a golden moon families picnic in the warm air. The square is illuminated by low lights among the bushes. Young men are playing cards. The intimate velvet darkness wraps a thousand conversations among the roses.
In the streets and parks and shops people stop us and talk to us about peace and negotiation. (c) Emily Johns
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Blair's mind is set on Nuclear Power, but...
Potential Energy asks: Can anyone here tell me how committing to building new nuclear power plants within the next 20-30 years will help lower CO2 emissions enough so that we can halt climate change?
My reply:
Storm and Van Leeuwen suggest that the high grade uranium ores are sufficient to meet the world’s total electricity (not energy, note) needs for 3-5 years. That process will emit CO2 at a rate of 1/3 of gas. After the high grade ores are used, the low grade ores would need more energy to refine them than they could produce.
I believe that 3-5 years is equivalent to a saving of 2.4% of CO2 emmissions over the next thirty years.
However, all figures in this area have to be treated with caution, with huge variations available, depending on source.
Read all about it here.CO2
My reply:
Storm and Van Leeuwen suggest that the high grade uranium ores are sufficient to meet the world’s total electricity (not energy, note) needs for 3-5 years. That process will emit CO2 at a rate of 1/3 of gas. After the high grade ores are used, the low grade ores would need more energy to refine them than they could produce.
I believe that 3-5 years is equivalent to a saving of 2.4% of CO2 emmissions over the next thirty years.
However, all figures in this area have to be treated with caution, with huge variations available, depending on source.
Read all about it here.CO2
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Helping solve London's water shortage
Today's letter to John Penrose MP (Con) Weston Super Mare
Dear John
Would be so good as to ask the Mnister with oversight of the provision of drinking water in the South East why the Government will not request the water companies to order the use of water pumps in London's high rise buildings in order to allow them to reduce water pressure overall, and therefore the unacceptably high rate of leakage from Londons mains water supply system.
The background to this is that London's mains are in a chaotic state as a result of the hasty repairs made after bombing in the 1939-45 war. There are a huge number of leaks, and the water companies claim that there is a skill shortage, as well as a money shortage (although the latter is debatable, given the level of profit returned by water companies) to repair the leaks.
On the other hand, the rate of leakage is proportional to mains pressure, which has to be kept high in order to keep the water flowing from taps on the upper floors of high rise buildings. It is already the practice for very high rise buildings to have their own pumps in order to meet this problem. If these pumps were fitted to lower rise buildings in an orderly way (that is, prioritising the highest buildings in a given water supply sector), mains pressure could be lowered progressively.
This is a logical and economic solution to the problem that could be tested as a pilot scheme in one sector if desired.
Thank you for asking Government if this is happening, and if not, why not.
Best wishes
Richard Lawson
(so let it not be said that contry dwellers care not for the feckless Londoners. Not only do we supply them with food, but now we are helping them with their water problem)
Dear John
Would be so good as to ask the Mnister with oversight of the provision of drinking water in the South East why the Government will not request the water companies to order the use of water pumps in London's high rise buildings in order to allow them to reduce water pressure overall, and therefore the unacceptably high rate of leakage from Londons mains water supply system.
The background to this is that London's mains are in a chaotic state as a result of the hasty repairs made after bombing in the 1939-45 war. There are a huge number of leaks, and the water companies claim that there is a skill shortage, as well as a money shortage (although the latter is debatable, given the level of profit returned by water companies) to repair the leaks.
On the other hand, the rate of leakage is proportional to mains pressure, which has to be kept high in order to keep the water flowing from taps on the upper floors of high rise buildings. It is already the practice for very high rise buildings to have their own pumps in order to meet this problem. If these pumps were fitted to lower rise buildings in an orderly way (that is, prioritising the highest buildings in a given water supply sector), mains pressure could be lowered progressively.
This is a logical and economic solution to the problem that could be tested as a pilot scheme in one sector if desired.
Thank you for asking Government if this is happening, and if not, why not.
Best wishes
Richard Lawson
(so let it not be said that contry dwellers care not for the feckless Londoners. Not only do we supply them with food, but now we are helping them with their water problem)
Monday, May 15, 2006
For all the Greens in China
Start the day with a letter to the european contact for the China Green Party, who set themselves up in august last year, and are facing opposition from the Government, and are now joining the Global Greens.
I have an enormous respect for Chinese history, civilisation, inventions, philosophy and poetry. I also have great hopes for China, because the wish for democracy cannot be held back indefinitely, and we must all hope that China will become a democracy at the same time as it moves into the position of being the world's No 1 economic power. This assumes that American economic dominance is about to cease. If this is the case, then the China Green Party will play an important role in leading the new China (and the world) into the Way of harmony with nature.
I have an enormous respect for Chinese history, civilisation, inventions, philosophy and poetry. I also have great hopes for China, because the wish for democracy cannot be held back indefinitely, and we must all hope that China will become a democracy at the same time as it moves into the position of being the world's No 1 economic power. This assumes that American economic dominance is about to cease. If this is the case, then the China Green Party will play an important role in leading the new China (and the world) into the Way of harmony with nature.
Sunday, May 14, 2006
We do have a choice
I was woken this morning by the thought
"We do have a choice. Humanity does not have to come to a miserable dwindling end, fighting over increasingly scarce resources."
It is physically possible - just - for us to learn how to live within the physical and biological constraints imposed by the real world. It is an enormous challenge, but it is economically and humanly possible. Green Economics here.
Then today I get an email from Vera Gottleib who quotes President Eisenhower
I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.
"I like to believe.." is th operative phrase. We can choose to believe that the current political and economic stupidity will continue to prevail, ending in generalised resource wars, or we can choose to believe that reason and good sense will reassert itself. There have been times in history when people just got on with winning a good living in harmony from nature. It just doesn't get into the history books, thats all.
"We do have a choice. Humanity does not have to come to a miserable dwindling end, fighting over increasingly scarce resources."
It is physically possible - just - for us to learn how to live within the physical and biological constraints imposed by the real world. It is an enormous challenge, but it is economically and humanly possible. Green Economics here.
Then today I get an email from Vera Gottleib who quotes President Eisenhower
I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it.
"I like to believe.." is th operative phrase. We can choose to believe that the current political and economic stupidity will continue to prevail, ending in generalised resource wars, or we can choose to believe that reason and good sense will reassert itself. There have been times in history when people just got on with winning a good living in harmony from nature. It just doesn't get into the history books, thats all.
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