The strongest exhortation was for America to reject economic protectionism, but very close behind that appeal was an exhortation to focus on the perils of climate change.

Prime Minister Brown said that ‘now more than ever the world wants to work with you’ and that indifference to the environment would be fatal – suggesting that ‘… you, the nation that had the vision to put a man on the moon, are also the nation with the vision to protect and preserve our planet Earth.’ He said he came to speak of new battles, ‘a global economy in crisis and a planet imperilled’ – referring to the previous prime ministers who have addressed Congress in times of war when the special relationship between the USA and Britain was tested. And he was explicit about the need to work together, ‘There is no old Europe, no new Europe, there is your friend Europe. So seize the moment.’

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UK officials are hoping to protect genetically-modified crops from the actions of anti-gm extremists. Opponents have targeted almost all of the 54 GM crop trials since 2000. For example, recently more than 400 potato plants were destroyed on a farm at the University of Leeds in June.

Officials also hope to prosecute the groups in the same manner as they do animal rights extremists — good. While I understand and agree with their position, the action is completely hypocritical. It’s like the anti-abortionists who protest the slaughtering of babies by slaughtering doctors.

Currently, scientists must disclose the location of such trials on a government website. Awesome, whomever came up with that legislation must be an opponent to GM crops.

One site for consideration is Porton Down near Salisbury, which carries out military research and includes a science park where they could be securely developed away from the public.

But the question remains: do GM foods hold the key to global food shortages and rising prices?

Though officials are trying to protect these efforts they do want to have a new conversation about GM crops with the public. But Gordon Brown is moving cautiously because of strong opposition from previous trials.

A government source added: “We need to review the security arrangements. The rules are a charter for people who want to stop the experiments. A lot of information has to be put in the public domain and that makes it very easy for people to trash them.”

Leeds University — showing they are suckers for punishment — plans to make one final attempt. They hope a government funded fence and security cameras will thwart any attempts at sabotaging the experiment. Good luck with that.

Professor Tim Benton, research dean at its Faculty of Biological Science, said yesterday: “We need to find a way to do crop trials in a safe way and to minimize the environmental risk. We cannot carry on for the next 20 or 30 years saying it’s too scary, the public is too frightened, it is politically too dangerous. There is absolutely no way we can move towards a world with food security without using GM technology. The amount of food we need could double because the population is growing, climate change will reduce yields and we will take land out of food production for biofuels.”

Officials are trying to draw strong parallels between anti-GM protesters and those that oppose experiments on animals. In 2005 the law was changed to give police the power to prosecute such extreme actions after Huntingdon Life Sciences was targeted and attacked by animal rights activists.

Huh. Maybe there is a GM-centric division of PETA?

Source: The Independent | Image: Jams_123 on Flickr under Creative Commons

Delivering quite a blow to both Gordon Brown and Britain, BP has dumped its plans to build out wind farms and other renewable projects in Britain for projects in the United States. The US government incentives for clean energy projects provide convenient tax shelter for oil and gas revenues - something BP is looking for with an estimated $8 billion earmarked for the initiative.

Convenience is another factor. BP, which has a representative on the ruling board of the British Wind Energy Association, said difficulty in getting planning permission and lower economies of scale made the UK wind sector far less attractive than that of the US.

>>More on wind energy in Europe

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The initiative is meant to respond to the UK’s housing shortage, as well as help partially fulfill climate change commitments. It is also meant to be an opportunity for housing developers to change the way they do business, and work with the proposed site’s local communities.

The government’s vision of the eco-towns was that the eco-town should be a:

Large-scale free-standing new settlements that are exemplars of sustainable building and living, with the opportunity to design low and zero-carbon technology from the beginning.

The Government wants to ensure that the delivery of eco-towns makes as much use of the existing infrastructure as possible.

It is encouraged that some, or even many, of the initial bids have proposals for developers to invest towards rail provisions The Government said that it saw eco-towns providing a major contribution to the housing supply and increasing affordability, including up to 50 per cent of affordable housing.

However, some opponents to this initiative claim that the eco-town approach may be illegal.

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As the knives slide back into their sheaths wise old heads know this feat of double handed trickery cannot be repeated again. It’s only a matter of time, the mutterers continue to mutter.

However one rumour needs to be squashed right away: the one that this unrest is all about personality, not policy. Conference showed quite clearly that there are policy differences between Brown and his party, and their colour is Green.

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With the postponement of the 2 pence per liter fuel duty rise, fuel duty in the UK today is 17% lower in real terms than it was under the previous conservative government, who made a series of above inflation increases as part of a policy to reduce congestion, pollution and green house gas emissions. Recent crude oil prices have offset the need for tax rises to achieve these goals.

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£100bn investment (200bn USD) in renewable energy has been proposed meaning that thousands of wind turbines will be built.

The prime minister has described these plans as his “green revolution” and suggested it is to be the country’s largest energy initiative since nuclear power.

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With a tank of fuel for the average family car costing close to $150, high fuel prices have effectively acted as one very large carbon tax - and effective they have been. Britons have reduced fuel consumption by 20% during the past year, driving less, and driving more slowly at the same time. Sales of fuel efficient vehicles are at an all time high.

But unfortunately this is not politically sustainable. The aforementioned protest is hurting the government’s popularity badly as disposable incomes are eroded by fuel bills. Having previously made broad promises to reduce Britain’s CO2 output by up to 80% by 2050 in a bid to profess world leadership on Climate Change, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has been carefully avoiding any kind of statement on environmental targets during previous months. Meanwhile Britain is set to miss most of it’s legally binding and far less ambitious climate change objectives anyway.

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Events unfolded when an unusually powerful gust of wind swept along the Thames, picking up debris and in so doing, blew a hole in the face of Big Ben.

The ensuing gale caused the iconic bell to monstrously chime in the wind – a knell that shuddered and brought the capital to a standstill - the normally ignorant Londoners actually pausing from earning obscene amounts of money and contemplating their existence.

But it was a wake-up call for more than Joe Public. Realising the enormity of events, our prime minister called an emergency press conference.

The normally stoic Scot, tears visibly welling, announced he was leaving office, citing the weather as, and I quote “the wind of change.”

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And I’m tired
I’m so tired
Of a lot of people
In a lot of high places

suddenly seem to resonate within me again.

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