Achim Steiner, director of the UN Environment Programme, had this to say:

This is not ‘climategate’ it’s ‘hackergate’. Let’s not forget the word ‘gate’ refers to a place [Watergate] where data was stolen by people who were paid to do so. So the media should direct its investigations into that

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, vice-chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has said that:

If you look at that mass of e-mails a lot of work was done, not only to download the data but it’s a carefully made selection of e-mails and documents that’s not random at all. This is 13 years of data and it’s not a job of amateurs

You can read the article which appeared in The Times here.

But please, please, lets not go referring to this as ‘climategate’ anymore. That cliche is so overused and is just annoying these days. Wish they’d find something else to call scandals.

I tried it for a while a few years back, but it never stuck. I think I missed certain foods. Bacon, for example.

Daydreaming aside, I come from a family which doesn’t cook meat heavy meals. In fact, my mother could quite happily stop tomorrow. My girlfriend is a vegetarian so I’m being slowly being pushed into becoming a herbivore.

Now, if I am to live up to my eco-credentials (as aspirations of eco-friendliness), maybe it’s the only way forward.

Indeed, all this week, and in the run up to the United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen, the BBC World Service is broadcasting a series called “The Climate Connection“.

The series follows five young people as they explore an issue they believe to be at the heart of the climate change debate. The participants come from all parts of the world and they look at potential solutions to the present crisis.

The series is in partnership with the Open University and their “Creative Climate” project. I’ll leave you to discover more about that if you wish. Just click here.

Tonight’s episode was titled “Does the World Need Meat” and followed a young American student from Columbia University in New York.

Together with the presenter she criss-crossed the United Sates in search of answers to that very question.

I thought it was a really interesting programme that took a very balanced approach and examined each side of the argument in equal measure. It did not try to impose a particular view on the listener in what can be a heated debate.

In fact, the “Climate Connection” series has so far been fair to all sides as it looks at quite contentious subject matters that divide opinion.

America and the beef obsession

Why America? Well, if there was ever an avid meat eating nation, this is it. This is the country that chomped its way through millions upon millions of bison, driving it close to extinction, and continues to worship the cow, especially when it is on their plates.

10 billion animals are killed every year in the United Sates in order to feed their voracious and ever growing appetite for all things sanguine.

Of course, unashamed meat consumption is not limited to the US. Such is the demand that one third of the planet is devoted to rearing livestock and demand is expected to double by 2050.

At present, livestock accounts for 18% of global emissions. In the US, that figure is 2.8%. If you have read one of my previous posts, cows et al burp methane and this causes global warming.

The level of burping has a lot to do with the synthetic grain they are fed. Indeed, if you modify their diet, the burps decrease.

Anyway, in the States, the vast majority of cattle are raised in pens and fed on corn. Makes for a tastier animal apparently. Grass just doesn’t cut it (no pun intended).

And there are estimated to be 9.5 million cattle in such pens, or feed lots as they are also known.

What was interesting was the range of views we got in the programme. We heard from both sides of the debate, starting with the staunch defenders of the meat industry. We heard from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, the ‘voice’ of beef industry as their Chief Environmental Counsel described it. Keen to point out that livestock produce only 2.8% of the US emissions, she was defensive when the presenter put it to her that the intensive raising of cattle was unnatural.

The American Farm Bureau, the largest farm lobby group in the US, argued that the US is the most efficient food producer in the world and attempting to regulate the industry through stricter standards would only have the effect of moving production to other, less efficient, parts of the world with the net result that the methane footprint would invariably increase.

Their president declared that the war raging between the meat eaters and the herbivores in the US is a pointless one

We like our hamburgers. We like our steaks, We like our chicken. We like our bacon in the morning and I don’t see that changing in the near future

I am inclined to agree with the naysayers. Nevin Cohen, from the New School in New York, said that their is a fatal flaw in the lobbyists’ argument. They fail to account for the vast swathes of rainforest in South America that is destroyed to make way for the soy plantations that feed the cattle. This raises CO2 levels.

Transporting the grain to the US and elsewhere raises CO2 levels.

As a result, the meat industry has a carbon footprint of rather large proportions.

Changing habits

Perhaps we do, as consumers, need to change our eating habits. Perhaps policy makers need to change policies. Yet, as the economic situation of a country improves, so does its meat consumption.

Maybe Pedro Sanchez of the Earth Institute at Columbia University is right..the American way of producing beef is sick. Through unnatural practices, the US is producing fatty beef by feeding them grain after grain. The world needs meat, but we must do it right. We have to use intelligent farming practices.

The problems associated with large scale soy farming in South America are well known. It is saddening to see hundreds and hundreds of thousands of acres of forest being cut down to feed the world’s appetite for meat and other agricultural products.

In its drive to become an agricultural giant, Brazil is plowing one of its most precious resources – the Amazon. We are talking farms the size of large English counties. They are now the world’s largest supplier of soybean and the country could soon replace the American heartlands when it comes to food production.

National Geographic covered the problem in typically excellent fashion.

So, the environmental arguments against meat eating are quite plain to see.

Will the world wake up tomorrow and turn vegetarian? No. People love their meat and will not stop eating it.

Can we modify our farming practices? Perhaps. I leave that to the experts.

More importantly, could alternative methods meet the ever growing demand for meat. Maybe only intensive farming would satisfy it.

I do believe that governments would be reluctant to do away with existing practices, if only for economic reasons. As we have seen, cattle farming in the US is a gargantuan operation with powerful lobbyists supporting it all the way up the steps to Capitol Hill.

Likewise, as much as Brazil would like to increase their eco-standing in the world, soybean farming will continue regardless. Why stop? There is a worldwide demand for the commodity.

If you would like to listen to the programme, click on the link below.

P.S. If you have read this far, well done. Note to self: rant less and keep the posts short.

- Rainforest Alliance

- Rainforest Concern

- The Living Rainforest

- The Prince’s Rainforests Project

- World Land Trust

- WWF

Of course there are many, many more, but it’s a small selection of my favourite.

If there are any others you feel deserve a mention, then get in touch!

It sounds like something you’d hear about on April 1st, but it’s November and the story is entirely true.

Forget planes, forget oil hungry America and most certainly forget those Chelsea tractors. Farting and burping sheep and cows are the real reason why we’ll all be sunning it in England very soon.

Joking aside, gasey livestock is a serious problem apparently.

According to Australia’s department of climate change, 16% of the country’s greenhouse emissions come from agriculture. And Australia’s Sheep Cooperative Research Council says 66% of agricultural emissions are released as methane from the the bellies of livestock.

New Zealand have a similar problem, where scientists estimate that a massive 43% of the country’s greenhouse gases come from livestock.

Globally, 28% of all methane resulting from human related activities comes from agriculture. Who would have thought that grass would have such a stomach rumbling effect, causing sheep and cows to burp and fart in symphony after each and every one of their meals??

Methane is considered the second most important gas produced by human activity after carbon dioxide, yet has far more impact on global warming than its much publicised cousin.

Scientists now believe that we have seriously underestimated the gas’ impact on global temperatures and that this is about a third higher than previously thought.

The Australian researchers in New South Wales are trying to discover the genetic link that means some sheep burp less than others and have been conducting experiments in special pens where they measure how much gas sheep emit when eating (not a job that had many volunteers I’m sure).

The problem is not a new one. It has already been a few years that scientists have been studying the problem and have been hoping to invent foods that reduce gassiness.

Anyway, if you think I’m making this all up, check out the incriminating evidence in this video. Very rude sheep indeed.

improve scientific understanding in:

- past climate history and its impact on humanity

- the course and causes of climate change during the present century

- prospects for the future

They are now at the centre of a scandal that threatens to undermine the credibility of their work as well as destroy the arguments in favour of man-made climate change. Skeptics must be rubbing their hands with glee.

Those accused of massaging data to bolster their argument that man-made global warming is genuine have rejected the claims saying that the emails have been taken out of context and have denounced skeptics for selectively picking emails.

“It does look incriminating on the surface, but there are lots of single sentences that taken out of context can appear incriminating,” said Bob Ward, director of policy and communications at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics. “You can’t tell what they are talking about. Scientists say ‘trick’ not just to mean deception. They mean it as a clever way of doing something – a short cut can be a trick.”

1000 emails as well as 3000 documents were stolen, so it could take some time for the complete truth to get out, but early reports do not make for a comfortable read.

The documents also suggest that climate change scientists from both sides of the Atlantic deleted particularly sensitive communications in an attempt to escape Freedom of Information requests from climate change skeptics.

Lord Lawson, the former Chancellor, has called for an independent inquiry into the affair and has denounced the apparent deception. He quite rightly states that it jeopardises British science’s reputation.

Hopefully with time an innocent explanation will emerge. Nevertheless, it is a painful episode for the climate change camp and comes at a rather awkward moment, just three weeks away from the United Nations climate change summit at Copenhagen. In fact, some are seeing it as an attempt by the hackers to destabilise those talks. Whether this happens remains to be seen. What is certain is that it will no doubt be spoken of in the corridors of the conference center.

If you’re interested, the Telegraph also published some of the most contentious quotes.

Oh, and here’s an article that appeared in The Guardian. And here too. Don’t want the post to be too Telegraph heavy

It’s called ‘Melting Pot’ and it’s part of their Green TV section. It’s all about green activism and features members of groups such as Plane Stupid and Greenpeace.

It was an extremely enlightening video, exploring and exposing the lengths to which the authorities (chiefly the police) go to undermine environmental protests and activists, in effect attempting to curtail citizens’ right to freedom of expression.

And so, the police send undercover agents to infiltrate various organisations to spy on, and discredit and disrupt, their operations.

In one bit of the film, a Greenpeace activist spoke about when he, along with the members of his protest group, were labeled terrorists. At the time they were protesting against the growth in the short haul market (deemed particularly damaging to the environment) and had camped out on one of the taxiways of Nottingham’s East Midlands airport (chosen because it specialises in short haul flights). This prevented planes from leaving. They called it ‘Sermon on the Runway.’

OK, that is a pretty extreme demonstration of green activism and they did breach security, but I don’t think it warranted them being labeled as terrorists all the same. I mean, they had apparently notified the police in advance of this peaceful protest and by positioning themselves on the taxiway, rather than the runway, had taken steps to ensure the public’s safety by allowing planes to land in case of an emergency.

Other parts of the film featured politicians and lawyers talking about how police tactics push the use of terrorism legislation to the extreme and into a grey area. It is being used to stop and search any protester, for example.

Journalists who participated in the film explained that they are routinely arrested and held without charge after covering a protest. And they are held until news deadlines pass. Clearly an attempt at news management.

A section showed a freelance journalist being questioned by police at a protest. He was following the event and police began quizzing him on what he was doing. When he told them that he was a freelancer, the police said ‘oh, so you’re not really a member of the press then.’ He was eventually told to turn off his camera. It all seemed pretty fascist if you ask me.

Activists claim that the press is biased in favour of big business. The Evening Standard was indeed slapped on the wrist by the Press Complaints Commission for fabricating a story about climate change campaigners at Heathrow in what activists have called a blatant attempt to smear their activities.

What was interesting was hearing, from a journalist, that environmental activism reporting is not exactly professional. Journalists are simply reading from press releases that are sent to them by corporations and simply regurgitating it. They don’t even bother going to the protests to see the other side of things.

Firstly, that’s plane lazy. And secondly, and far more importantly, it’s just shocking how bad that sort of journalism is. In fact, it’s not even journalism, it’s PR. It just contributes to the negative spinning against environmental campaigners.

We, as journalism students, are quite rightly taught about the ethics and professional standards we must uphold when we enter the real world. We are the voice that brings the news into the living rooms of people around the country. As such, there is an unquestionable need to be impartial and objective in order to inform in the best and most effective manner.

Just last week, a guest lecturer told us that journalists have never enjoyed the public’s trust, and that it is getting in fact getting worse. I think one of the stats we were presented with showed that print journalists are considered less trustworthy than estate agents. Enough said. Shoddy reporting of any kind just undermines the profession’s credibility and needs to be addressed.

Portions of the press are playing a significant role in pushing activists to the extreme and fringe of environmental debate.

I personally may not agree with the manner in which environmental protests are carried out, but you can bet that should I be called upon to cover an event at some point in my career, I will be out there getting the other side of the story and not just sitting behind my desk, relying solely upon the PR machine of big business to report what is happening.

If you’re interested, check out the video. Just click here. I found it be an informative watch and it certainly raised question in my head on how environmental protests are dealt with by the police and how the press goes about the reporting of such news.

Here’s an interesting video with David Attenborough in which he speaks about what it means to lose so much of our rainforests. Enjoy

It was my gap year and I travelled to Peru to teach English with an organisation called Teaching and Projects Abroad.

As well as arranging teaching placements, TAPA also had ties to a jungle lodge where you could spend time volunteering to help catalogue the wildlife in the surrounding area and generally lend a hand to maintaining the property as well as caring for animals that they had rescued from poachers.

I’ve always been fascinated with nature and in particular rainforests. As a young boy, I remember watching David Attenborough explore some of the farthest reaches of the Amazon and immediately knew that I had to go and see it for myself. So when I found out I could travel out to the lodge once my teaching placement had finished, I jumped at the chance.

I still vividly remember flying into Puerto Maldonado, looking out the window and seeing the jungle unfold beneath me. Then there was the intense, wet heat that hit you as soon as you left the plane. It was very much like stepping into a greenhouse on a hot summer’s day – the humidity and the clamyness of the air.

And then there’s the rain. I was there at the beginning of the rainy season and it would pour at around four each day for about an hour. Always on time, never ever late. I remember the first time I was caught in one of the downpours. The rain was so warm. Like nothing I’d experienced before. Not at all like the spine chilling cold rain that we get in the UK. This stuff was like taking a shower.

When the rainy season really started to kick in it would rain and rain. In one afternoon, all it took was a couple of hours for the river to rise about a metre. After a particularly stormy night, we woke to see huge trees floating down the river, uprooted by the force of the rain.

Anyway, I spent a pretty interesting two weeks working out there and came away in love with the Amazon. The sights and the sounds. Seeing parrots fly overhead was a daily occurrence. Monkeys swinging from tree to tree each day…check. Caimen..check. Piranhas..check. The list goes on and on.

So, I’ve always found it to be very depressing opening up the papers to find yet another story about the deforestation and destruction of such an amazing and magical place. We are cutting down one of the planets most precious resources.

The ‘Lungs of the planet’, as people call the Amazon, it is home to countless animal and plant species making it the most diverse and bio-active natural phenomenon on the planet.

Yet each year we are losing an estimated 50,000 plant, animal and insect species. Rainforests used to cover 14% of the planet’s surface. This figure now stands at a mere 6%. 150 acres are lost every minute.

The rainforests are also home to a considerable number of medicinal plants. Currently, 25% of Western pharmaceuticals are derived from rain forest plants. Yet, it is estimated that scientists have tested a tiny 1% of tropical trees and plants. Scientists have identified 3000 plants that are active against cancer cells. 70% of these plants are found in the rain forest.

Add to this the impact deforestation has on tribal populations and you have a cultural and environmental genocide. There were around 10 million Indians living in the Amazonian rain forest five centuries ago. Today, there are fewer than 200,000.

It is agreed that by leaving the rainforests intact and harvesting it’s many nuts, oil-producing and medicinal plants, the rain forest has far greater economic value than if they are cut down to make way for grazing land or for timber.

So, news that deforestation is at a record low is extremely welcoming. Indeed, the BBC reported this week that the rate has dropped by 45% and is at its lowest since records began 21 years ago according to figures released by the Brazilian government. Just over 7,000 square kilometres was destroyed from July 2008 to August 2009. It must make President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva very proud. He has put green issues at the top of his government’s agenda as he seeks to boost his country’s eco-credentials. The government’s attempts to stem Amazonian deforestation are at the heart of their climate change strategy.

Lula da Silva’s government wants an 80% reduction in destruction by 2020 so these latest figures are a sign that the country is moving the right direction.

Next month, Copenhagen welcomes delegates to the climate change conference. It is thought that the event will see the Brazilians pledge a 38% to 42% voluntary reduction in their greenhouse gas emissions. Half of those cuts will come from the reduction in deforestation. Their chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff, says that this is about sending a political message. They want to press developed nations into making similar pledges. Will the pressure have an effect? So far, offers of greenhouse reduction fall well short of the required amount to have an impact on climate change. We shall see.

Anyway, back on topic. I have my doubts that the fall in deforestation is completely the result of Brazilian governmental efforts. I suspect that it is mostly, if entirely tied to the dismal economic climate which has seen world manufacturing and industrial output fall over the past year or so. Demands for raw materials has declined. I wouldn’t be surprised if the rate of deforestation was to rise again once we come out of the recession. Hopefully I’m wrong. Only time will tell.

I was shocked last week. I managed to get some casual work in the kitchens of a cafeteria in one of the University departments. And so, I spent three hours scrubbing and rubbing pots and pans. Not exactly glamorous, but at least it pays for my weekly shop at Tesco’s (should I be corporate name dropping in my blog?)

Anyway, at the end of the night a massive dish of lasagna was left over and was promptly thrown out. I know restaurants can’t exactly keep all of their food and reheat it the next day, it was nevertheless pretty bad to see it disappear into the bin, still piping hot.

Surely there’s an alternative? Actually, I’m surprised there aren’t charity vans going round restaurants each night, picking up the leftovers and then handing them out to the homeless. It makes sense to me. Clearly, I’m not saying that restaurants should be scraping the plates of their customers and recycling it. But, if there is an untouched dish left over, then why not give it away?

Funnily enough, an article has just been published in one of the national newspapers here in the UK that really highlights the scale of the problem of food wastage. Apparently £12 billion worth of food and drink are thrown out each year by Britons. £12 billion! That’s immense. And it seems to be growing. In 2008, it was £10.2 billion. That’s quite a jump in just one year.

A new report released today by WRAP, a agency set up to advise the government on reducing waste and packaging, has all the figures. It show that whilst food wastage has stabilised, the addition of liquids (soup, milk and soft drinks) into the equation has seen the waste mountain rise from 4.1 tonnes to 5.3 annually.  It’s really quite obscene. Especially when you consider that just over 1 billion people are considered undernourished.

There are environmental considerations to take into account too. It is estimated that greenhouse gas emissions associated with the wastage equate to 20m tonnes of carbon dioxide per year. Sure, the trees are happy. The Ozone is not. The majority of the food ends up in landfills where it produces methane as it rots. So add that to cows farting and you’ve got one hell of a methane cloud over the UK. Not good.

Yet, it is not all bad news. People are starting to take initiatives. According to WRAP, composting is booming.

There are campaigns out there to get people to stop throwing away half their dinners. The Love Food, Hate Waste is one of them. They provide stats a well as tips on what to do with food and leftovers.

Hopefully people will wake up to the problem and realise that we cannot go on wasting as we do. It’s time to love our food and make sure it ends up in our bellies and not in the local tip.

P.S. Check this out. If we were to eliminate all our wastage, it would lift those 1 billion people out of hunger. Campaigners say that the amount of food we buy and consumes takes surplus off the market and drives up prices to levels developing nations cannot afford.

The idea is the brainchild of a property developer who has built homes for a few Premiership footballers so he’s used to more garish and tacky builds. Apparently only the entrance will be above the surface and it will be disguised as a garden folly, whatever that means. Maybe be he will try to replicate Versailles or have monkeys swinging from tree to tree.

He maintains the property has strong eco-credentials with hot water coming from solar panels (has no one told the guy that the UK gets half a day of sun a year??). The house will even harvest rain water.

It is true that underground houses have traditionally been viewed as an eco-friendly solution to living. After all, the earth around you acts as a giant insulator, keeping the heat in thus saving you lots and lots of energy. Additionally the house is protected from earthquakes (lots of those in the UK), does not suffer from condensation, is not a blight on the landscape, in unaffected by wind or weather and there are no draughts.

This isn’t the only underground house I’ve heard about. The first earth-shelter house (as underground dwellings are officially known) in Britain was called ‘Mole Manor’ and was built by an architect for his family. Apparently strict conservation rules and lack of available land is forcing many a rich homeowner to build cavernous basement extensions to their already large properties (it’s cheaper to burrow underground than it is to buy a new house). This is especially true in London were people live like sardines and can barely move an inch without bumping into their neighbour. People are installing pools, tennis courts and enough parking space for their fleet of Rollers. Kensington and Chelsea council received a staggering 212 applications for extensions last year. I suppose they are all quite keen emulate their favourite Bond films and plot world domination from their caves.

With news of multi-million pound extensions, one could be forgiven for thinking that earth-sheltered dwellings are the preserve of the rich and famous. Not so. I remember watching an episode of Grand Designs in which an underground house was built into a Cumbrian hillside. Total cost of the project – £240,000. And it looked really nice. Even Kevin McCloud was impressed.

There’s even a British Earth-Sheltering Association proving that the idea is quite popular and mainstream. They say that:

The first principle to learn is that going underground DOES NOT mean living in dark, damp or dingy caves. That idea went out with the cave man. In contrast, earth sheltering means using combinations of light, space, and landscape to their full advantage, both inside and out. Most importantly earth sheltering means working with nature, either by covering the building in earth, so that the roof can be turned into a garden, or by sinking the main structure below the skyline so that the countryside above is unspoiled.

For those looking for a green alternative to the concrete and steel society, underground could just be the way to go.