News
Sunday, June 22nd, 2008
We had a very positive meeting on Wednesday 18 June, where Simone and Kristin from the Transition Bristol team came and updated us on progress and plans. All of us agreed that the aims of the Transition movement and the aims of Sustainable Redland are in effect identical. The unique gap that Transition Bristol can fill is that it creates a hub through which the growing number of local groups can communicate, learn from one another, share skills, experience, knowledge and resources. Also, there is value in having a central organisation that can, for some issues, achieve things which small local groups cannot. We agreed to ratify at our next AGM the formal adoption of Transition Bristol, within our constitution, as one of the organisations that we work with. In effect this makes us one of the many Transition Neighbourhood Groups.
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Tuesday, June 17th, 2008
How many times have you heard it said that ideas about using less energy, emitting less carbon, or introducing rationing are just not realistic? As David Fleming says in this excellent interview “at present we are wandering in a fog of unreality: there is a sense that we shouldn’t really take climate change, peak oil, conservation, etc, too seriously: they are just tedious clichés of no interest to grown-ups who have real lives to live and real mortgages to repay” . Yet as David explains, we’ll get a real dose of reality if we don’t develop a system of energy rationing before crisis hits us. The oil market is a complex system, and when it breaks down it will do so chaotically.
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Thursday, June 12th, 2008
The Dept of Transport used to be only about cars and roads, but there is some evidence that they have heard of walking, cycling and carbon emissions. Research carried out for the DfT by the University of the West of England found that although people have now heard of climate change, their understanding is still limited. This isn’t surprising really given the misinformation in most of our newspapers.
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Thursday, June 12th, 2008
NASA’s National Snow and Ice Data Centre monitors the rate of melting in the Artic, and it appears to be as bad as last year. It’s hard to see how this is just a great hoax to make us pay more taxes - as some people maintain. Meanwhile petrol prices are causing outrage, but does anyone ask how necessary are all these extra journeys? Knocking a few pence off the price won’t solve our long term energy needs, as Adam Grubb explains in this article in Energy Bulletin. Now that Private Eye has printed its first Peak Oil cartoon it’s definitely time to start planning for life without cheap oil. The cartoon by the way is the child in the back of the car looking at a Peak Oil headline and saying ‘are we there yet Dad’.
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Tuesday, May 20th, 2008
| July 9, 2008 |
| 7:30 pm | to | 9:30 pm |
Chris Vernon is editor of the Oil Drum Europe website, is an expert on fossil fuel supply, demand and markets, and is usually found addressing international audiences on the subject. He is speaking in Bristol on 9 July at the Friends Meeting House 126 Hampton Road, opposite the Clyde Arms Pub. This will be a really informative evening, not to be missed. The title of his talk is “Climate Change, CO2 and coal” Please bring £2 to £3 to cover room hire.
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Tuesday, May 20th, 2008
An innovative proposal that looks set to harness the desire for local food in a way that will stimulate local farming, has made it through the first steps for support from the Big Green Challenge. Find out more here, and join the meeting in the afternoon of May 29 if you want to be part of the discussions or to get involved.
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Tuesday, May 20th, 2008
Crude oil today, in May 2008, is $128 a barrel. Market analysts at Goldman-Sachs predict that $220 a barrel may not be far off. This price is the result of market forces, supply and demand, the bedrock of our market economy. This means that national and local Government, and businesses, and all of us, need to rethink our notions about what is economically viable now and in the future. Yet the UK government is utterly refusing to see what is ahead. See this entry in Hansard giving the 12 May 2008 answer to a Parliamentary Question on Oil Prices. The Govt still maintains that in their ‘high price scenario’ the oil price in 2020 will be $80 a barrel.
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Sunday, May 18th, 2008
Susred had an evening outing to Bristol Port to see the three giant wind turbines from right up close. Our verdict? They are strangely beautiful, remarkably silent, pose far less threat to birdlife than buildings do, and unless we want a world where all power comes from human labour then we definitely need more of them. Here are some photos.
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Sunday, May 18th, 2008
Until June 9 at the Architecture Centre on Narrow Quay BS1 4QA (just by the Arnolfini and the Youth Hostel) there is an exhibition about Transition, meaning the changes that will be needed in our cities to enable low carbon and low fossil-fuel living to be viable. Do go along and have a look. Entry is free. It is part of a Spring Green series by the Architecture Centre.
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Sunday, May 18th, 2008
The market on Saturday was absolutely buzzing. There is now a solid core of regular customers, and our traders say there is a definite ‘feel’ to the Whiteladies Market - with Fridays and Saturdays each having a slightly different character. The traders tell us that what they love Read more…»
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