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Mini redundancies
Guardian, 18 February 2009
The loss of jobs at BMW’s Cowley plant in Oxford is sad news. This decision will be even more regrettable if it puts at risk production of the Mini Cooper D
Green credentials of Mini
Green credentials of Mini Cooper D
Independent, 18 February 2009
More crop per drop. Sir David King warns of new, global climate change conflicts
The Iraq war was the first ‘resource war’ of this century according to Sir David King, Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment and a former UK government chief scientist.
“I believe historians of the future will look back and see the Iraq war as the first resource war of the 21st century,” he told the British Humanist Association in a speech last night (February 11).
“The US is dependent on oil and was well passed peak oil production when the war began.
Looking at Iraq, many in the White House saw an opportunity to secure America’s oil supply by creating a friendly government which would be more amenable to providing oil to the US.”
Climate change is causing water shortages and droughts, harming food production and forcing countries to seek new sources of energy.
Sir David and his colleagues at the Smith School are working with the private sector, governments and academics to find solutions to the challenges of climate change.
His speech, which included a call for climate change to be taken more seriously, was the latest of around 600 speeches he has given in the last decade trumpeting the same message.
“Our challenges now are entirely different from those faced by Darwin and Dickens in the 19th Century,” he said. “The problems of their times have largely been resolved in the developed world, with life expectancy now 80 rather than 40 years.
“Now, we face a new set of linked challenges including producing enough food, protecting biodiversity and supplying enough energy, water and minerals. If we try to tackle these problems individually we will fail.”
Sir David warned that the world’s rapidly increasing population will make these problems far worse.
“We are currently releasing 36 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year with the Americans responsible for an average of 22 tonnes each, the British 11 tonnes each, the Indians 1.5 tonnes each and the Chinese 4.5 tonnes each.
By the time the population reaches nine billion, probably in 2050, we will need to cut carbon emissions to 18 billion tonnes a year – on average, just two tonnes per person per annum. That is the magnitude of the problem.
“We will need to produce 50 per cent more food by 2030, including 50 per cent more crops. At the same time there will be much less water. Put simply we will have to get more crop per drop.”
In 2008, the economist Josef Stiglitz estimated that the Iraq war had cost the US $3 trillion. He said that the cost to the rest of the world, including Britain, was about the same amount again.
Sir David said: “The US could have secured its energy supply without having to go to war.”
If Washington had invested one tenth of that money in renewable energy they’d have managed it.”
Ø In Victoria, Australia, where people are dying because of drought and subsequent wild fires, one third of the state’s water will soon come from desalination plants. Desertification – the drying up of land – has been caused by climate change but these plants will be powered by coal releasing huge carbon emissions.
Ø In Africa, Sir David believes that well-meaning westerners have persuaded governments from using science and technology, include GM methods, to increase food production.
Ø Sir David’s King’s lecture, Can British science rise to the challenges of the 21st century? was part of the celebrations of Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species.
Ø The Three Trillion Dollar War, by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, was published in February 2008 by Allen Lane.
Contact:
Michael Evans at Madano Partnership, 020 7593 4000
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