…a couple of interesting pieces on e-cigarettes in The Economist magazine.
No smoke. Why the fire? and E-cigarettes: Vape ’em if you got ’em
What to make of this…?
[...]
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I don’t want to do a full scale critique of biofuels – not least because that would be to enter an already crowded field [see Biofuelwatch and Global Subsidies Initiative, for example]. But it’s worth looking at how narrowly-focussed, bottom-up policy-making now means we have somehow put the most financial support into [...] Imagine your job is taking huge gambles with other people’s savings and pensions. Imagine also that the bets are arranged so that you are paid a fortune when things turn out well, but you don’t lose anything much when they go wrong. How would you behave…? I think you might rapidly develop a hog’s appetite [...] Way past bedtime on 17th December 2005, frazzled European leaders decided how to spend just under one trillion Euro. They set the EU’s budget framework from 2007 to 2013 – and committed €947 billion or just over 1% of EU GDP over the period. The chart shows the breakdown of the 2007 budget by [...] My otherwise peaceful morning slumber was disturbed by a radio interview announcing that social scientists Steve Rayner and Gwin Prins want to ‘ditch the Kyoto Protocol’. In a Nature commentary, Time to ditch the Kyoto Protocol, they have a go at the Kyoto Protocol and claim that ‘political correctness’ is inhibiting proper criticism and [...] Sometimes you can be wading through a report and hit something that abruptly tells you it isn’t really worth reading on: the report is mad and you are wasting your time. And so it happened when reading through the SDC report Tidal Power in the UK, and coming across Table 33 on page 119 [...] Once it was famous only for the ’70s Mod-revival band, The Merton Parkas. And, frankly, it wasn’t that famous even for them. But now the London Borough of Merton is famous for the eponymous ‘Merton Rule’. As the map left shows, local government across the nation [list] is at various stages of implementing [...] There’s speculation in the papers [last weekend's Guardian, earlier in the Independent] that the government is to back the Severn Barrage. This huge project would capture renewable energy in the tidal movement of water in the Bristol Channel – the tidal range is one of the highest in the world: up to 15 [...] In my last post I asked for nominations for a worse policy than the proposed ‘Health in Pregnancy Grant’. An anonymous contributor proposes the Winter Fuel Payment, which is designed to help pensioners fight off the cold over winter. I think ‘anonymous’ may be on to something… As the chart shows, this unconditional [...] One of the big questions for me is whether we devote too much land to farming and not enough to land use for wildlife, wilderness, woodland, places to walk and places to live etc. that is land for its ‘amenity’ value or for development. About 70% of England is given over to farming and only [...] Yvo de Boer, head of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) argues that richer countries should be able to buy as much as all their emissions reductions through investments in emission reductions in developing countries [see BBC / interview]. Given the global atmosphere is indifferent to where on the surface the [...] The Guardian exploded with indignation this week [Revealed: cover up plan on energy target; leader; letters], at the discovery of a leaked government memo discussing how the UK might wriggle out of a European Union renewables target – to reach 20% of EU energy consumption from renewables by 2020. In fact, the real [...] If a country wanted to reduce tobacco use to a level that meant it was comparable with other public health risks, then why not simply reduce the amount that can be sold or number of customers they can have, by allocating quotas to manufacturers and allowing trade in quotas? This proposal has surfaced [...] An excellent new publication from the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, Achieving culture change: a policy framework. It’s open for discussion until 31 August and will be finalised once they have had views in. It’s an important area because many policy objectives depend on influencing, or are thwarted by, deep-seated attitudes and entrenched behaviours… [...] Another day, another broadside against carbon emissions trading. The FT’s Martin Wolf offers advice to the new Chancellor, including: While simplifying tax, he should also take a close look at green taxation. Simple taxes that apply across-the-board are what is needed. The grant of valuable rights to big polluters through systems known as [...] Are you tired of trying to understand the 600-page Stern Review (eg. this perplexing graph showing a 13.8% loss of GDP in 193 years from now!)? Luckily, the government’s finest minds are rumoured to be preparing a simplified version in limerick form. Here’s my effort: [...] I ended my last post noting some recent critical commentary from the FT and Economist about emissions trading being an inferior approach to a carbon tax. Here they are again…. + FT – Undercover Economist: Emission impossible 13 April + Economist – Cleaning Up – 31 May + Economist – Business and climate [...] On May 23rd we had a new Energy White Paper and a new Planning White Paper. Both part of the government’s efforts to bring forward new nuclear power stations. The new energy policy makes a case for nuclear on energy security and climate change grounds. In fact nuclear dominates the energy white paper [...] There is emerging conventional wisdom that people are concerned about the environment as never before, but are unwilling or unable to do much about it – for example, from last week’s Independent… Britons unwilling to change despite climate change. And that’s not unusual… but how realistic is it? [...] A new system for citizens’ petitions on the Prime Minister’s web site has attracted well over 1 million signatures for a motion to: “Scrap the planned vehicle tracking and road pricing policy“. Extensive news coverage [BBC] and ministerial response [BBC] have followed. Despite a recent speech on Winning the debate on road pricing, Transport Secretary [...] I’ve already blogged on the completely dreadful economics of solar power… now it’s time to have a look at micro wind power, of the type favoured by David Cameron (see Guardian article) First the basics… underpinning the physics of wind power is a ‘cubic law’ – the power output of a wind turbine is approximately [...] Scottish independence is in the air. It’s the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union and people both sides of the border are restless with the settlement. In Scotland, partial devolution has intensified the hunger rather than quench the thirst for complete autonomy and the governing Liberal-Labour coalition is losing out to the opposition separatist [...] Here are candidates for the most troubling graphs I came across in 2006. These are from the UK Met Office’s Hadley Centre publication Climate Change and the Greenhouse Effect [PDF] with my titles. The top chart shows very different possible paths for emissions of greenhouse gases for the rest of the century – depending on [...] My favourite Xmas present this year is a beautiful shyrdak (actual one pictured) from Kyrgyzistan. A shyrdak is a felt rug originally designed for a yurt. It has a base layer of felt onto the top of which is sewn a second felt layer containing the patterning. No felt is wasted because the artisans produce [...] Time for another look at the Stern Review and what people have said about it. It’s received much critical acclaim: Stern even lined up five Nobel laureates and other notables to applaud at the launch [see here] and the BBC canvassed largely favourable expert opinions [here]. And I think it is an incredibly important [...] After the Chancellor’s omission of Stern or climate change in his speech to the captains of British industry [below], I wasn’t surprised, but I was disappointed. The Pre Budget Report environmental package [see chapter 7] was no more than tinkering-as-usual. There was absolutely no sign of the urgency that the Stern report should have inspired [...] A couple of interesting reports on R&D… firstly the DTI’s R&D Scoreboard 2006, where clearly more is better – at least one assumes that’s the purpose of creating lists and league tables ordered by the sums spent (see chart from the report showing the world’s biggest R&D spenders). Note the big spenders are not necessarily [...] The Stern Review Report on the economics of climate change is truly fascinating and an excellent contribution… it looks like the work of a small army of über-anoraks. But there’s a big difference between the tone and the tome. The launch messages are useful and politically powerful – doing nothing will cost a great deal; [...] Several interesting meetings last week… including with: the Sustainable Development Commission and National Consumer Council on their I will if you will report on sustainable consumption and production; the government’s new Office of Climate Change on reducing carbon emissions from the housing stock [see interesting 40 percent house concept]; stimulating brainstorming session on the [...] I’m looking forward to the release of the Stern Review on the economics of climate change on Monday. Sir Nick Stern has been thoughtful and eloquent on the subject, describing the problem of climate change as a complex international and intergenerational collective action problem, in conditions of uncertainty and with potentially irreversible effects. He also [...] |
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