This week: Sky Ride Bath, cycling expenses, curry, krill, and JR Ewing…
SKY RIDE BATH
Details of Sky Ride Bath, one of a series of Sky and British Cycling-backed cycle rides through British cities, have been announced. The traffic-free and also hill-free event takes place on Sunday 25 July from 10am to 3pm. The route begins at the Crescent and ends at the Circus. Entertainment in Victoria Park includes coaching for youngsters and there will be stunt displays going on in Southgate shopping centre. If you want to raise money, you could do worse than support the Rainforest Rescue campaign, Sky and WWF’s three-year project to help save one billion trees in the Amazon.
http://goskyride.com/location/bath
http://rainforestrescue.sky.com
UNIVERSITY STRAW HOUSES
As you may have read in GBN, a team from Bath University has been developing prefabricated straw houses – which have now been subjected to 1,000C flames… "You always want a bit of drama, but we didn't get it!" pronounced a pleased Dr Katharine Beadle.
http://tinyurl.com/very-hot-property
BRISTOL CYCLE RATES
Bristol City Council is under the spotlight for paying its staff 40p a mile to cycle to business meetings – the same rate it pays employees in cars (and the same rate B&NES Council pays its cyclists). Spluttered Hugh Bladon of the Association of British Drivers: "To pay them the same as drivers is simply outrageous.” No Hugh, what you’ve just said is outrageous …
http://tinyurl.com/driver-drivel
2010 SOUTH WEST GREEN ENERGY AWARDS
And the categories are… Sustainable Energy Photo of the Year (community focus), Most Proactive Local Authority, Best Renewable Energy Scheme, Installer or Supplier of the Year, South West Sustainable Energy Champion, Best Business Innovation, and Best Community Initiative. To find out how to nominate, visit:
http://tinyurl.com/green-energy-awards-2010
YES, JUNE WAS HOT
Green news from further afield. June 2010 was the warmest June ever recorded. It joins March, April and May in the record books. The 20th century average global temperature has now been exceeded 304 months in a row...
http://tinyurl.com/phew-june
Meanwhile, Russia has been suffering its worst drought in more than a century…
http://tinyurl.com/russian-drought
GREEN INVESTMENT BANK IN DOUBT
A green investment bank appears to slipping down the Government’s list of priorities. “We are not pursuing it,” said one treasury official.
http://tinyurl.com/green-investment-bunk
CURRY THE ANSWER TO ANIMAL METHANE
Feeding sheep and cows coriander and turmeric can reduce the amount of methane they produce by up to 40 per cent, say researchers at Newcastle University…
http://tinyurl.com/onion-bahhhji
WHAT GREENCAR AWARD
According to a panel of transport and environmental experts at the 2010 WhatGreenCar awards, the 74.3mpg Toyota Auris hybrid is the UK's best new green car.
http://tinyurl.com/top-green-car
TORIES SCRAP OVER RUBBISH
Eric Pickles, the Communities secretary, is understood to have angered the Environment secretary Caroline Spelman by announcing plans to scrap bin taxes and fortnightly collections. Both departments claim territorial rights over waste and recycling and one source has described the arrangement as “a complete xxxxxxx nightmare.”
http://tinyurl.com/binfighting
CHINA PLANS KRILL HARVEST
Mankind has already consumed 95 per cent of the large fish in many seas and some species are on the brink of collapse. And now China is turning its attention to krill… Greenpeace has called the project "just wrong".
http://tinyurl.com/in-for-the-krill
VOYAGE HIGHLIGHTS PLASTIC MENACE
"When you get into the sea, and under the water, you realise that it is all like a soup, millions and millions of tiny fragments of plastic, suspended in the water.” David de Rothschild aboard the Plastiki, a recycled catamaran kept afloat by 12,500 plastic bottles in its hulls.
http://tinyurl.com/message-in-a-plastic-bottle
GREENWASH OF THE WEEK
This week’s award goes to David Cameron. According to Johann Hari in the Independent, he’s planning to open the oceans off the Shetland Islands to deep-sea drilling and is promising Big Oil tax breaks.
http://tinyurl.com/vote-blue-get-black
GREEN INVENTION OF THE WEEK
It’s a 20km pipe, tethered by balloons, designed to spray a shield of sulphate particles into the stratosphere. The brainchild of Bristol University’s Matt Watson, it’s been dubbed the ‘garden hose to the sky’…
http://tinyurl.com/hose-pipedream
JR GOES GREEN…
Larry Hagman is starring in a TV ad for solar panels. And apparently TV’s most famous oil baron has got green form – in 2003, his mountaintop home in California was fitted with America’s largest residential PV system. “Shine, baby, shine,” he says in the ad, showing his pearly teeth.
http://tinyurl.com/solar-baron
The weekly Green Bath News digest is compiled by Gideon Kibblewhite. Let Gideon know if you've seen a story you think he should cover. To subscribe visit greenbath.org/og, create a user id if you don't already have one and subscribe to Bath Green News.
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