August 2023

It’s been a record year at the Reading Festival – for litter.  If you doubt it click here. The festival made much of its strict policies on cultural appropriation – no ponchos here please – but seemed to play down environmental...

The following are the signatories to a letter in the Times today calling for a rethink of the draft Hunting Trophies (Import Prohibition) Bill which is currently meandering through the House of Lords. Professor Adam Hart, University of Gloucestershire; Professor...

It came as rather a shock to find out that the UK no longer makes ammonia after CF Fertilisers’ decision last month to permanently close its ammonia production on Teeside.  MSM has the details.  Sadly, given its economic significance, there...

A press release from the University of Bath came my way.  It concerned some environmental education research by the Milner Centre for Evolution. The headline said: Classroom environmental education doesn’t change attitudes - new research I thought this was a...

I see that Tony Blair has said that the public must not be asked to do a “huge amount” to tackle climate change.  His point was that Britain’s national efforts cannot contribute much to solving global warming.  He pointed out...

I've been reading The Conservation article by Lorraine Whitmarsh University of Bath, Caroline Verfuerth Cardiff University and Steve Westlake Cardiff University: Net zero: direct costs of climate policies aren’t a major barrier to public support, research reveals. It begins in this way:...

I cheered a little the other week when the Prime Minister said in Aberdeen that he intends to issue hundreds of new oil and gas licences for the North Sea, adding that "Even when we’ve reached net zero in 2050,...

John Barry – no not the John Barry the composer – gave the keynote address – labelled "a provocation" – on the final day of the GEEP Advisory Group Meeting.  As I noted yesterday, John is Professor of Green Political Economy in...

I last came to Queen's University in Belfast about 40 years ago.  I gave a talk on something or other and was persuaded against my better judgement to repeat the talk in the evening for a non-academic audience; that is,...

I'm in Belfast.  I was last here in the mid-1980s, somewhen.  It seems a different life, and certainly a different city.  To take around 40 years to revisit an important part of my own country seems, at best, thoughtless.  And...