Webs Wonder Design

I don’t read many books. I really mean that. I read a book perhaps once every couple of years. So no-one is more surprised than me when after 3 days I’m 100 pages into a 350 page tome full of graphs, tables, lengthy footnotes and other cerebral stuff.

I first heard about David MacKay’s “Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air” on one of my favourite BBC programmes “More or Less” which does a great job cutting through the statistical misrepresentations we are routinely fed in the media, which never lets an honest examination of the figures get in the way of a sensationalist headline.

David MacKay

David MacKay’s friendly writing style and his simple presentation of the issues and clear, colourful graphics makes this book a surprisingly easy read.  It’s educational value for anyone trying to get to grips with how to modify their lifestyle to meet the challenge of living on less energy is enormous. It blows away many myths, as he explains in uncompromising  terms:

“We are inundated with a flood of crazy innumerate codswallop. The BBC doles out advice on how we can do our bit to save the planet – for example “switch off your mobile phone charger when it’s not in use;” if anyone objects that mobile phone chargers are not actually our number one form of energy consumption, the mantra “every little helps” is wheeled out. Every little helps? A more realistic mantra is: if everyone does a little, we’ll achieve only a little.”

Rebecca Willis

The “More or Less” programme also featured Rebecca Willis from the government’s Sustainable Development Commission which doesn’t like some of David Mackays sums on Nuclear Power. She commented:

“David MacKay’s approach is to boil it all down to a giant equation…it’s not about giant equations…it’s essentially about how we can lead happy lives while using a quarter of the carbon we do at the moment…for me it’s not a technical question it’s a profoundly political one.”

What’s all that supposed to mean Rebecca?  Of course our country’s energy policy is ultimately a question for the politicians to decide – that’s why we elect them. But to claim it’s not a technical question is a bit like claiming a car can run on will-power. How can politicians make informed decisions if the options they are given are not technical accurate and represent reality?

Willis’ substance-free critique seems to expose the problem the SEC is having backing its recommendations with numbers, a fatal approach which if continued will lead to its being consigned to the quango dustbin with the next change of government.

Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air is downloadable as a PDF, or you can read it online, or order a copy from a bookshop .

A page from David MacKay's book

Here is a YouTube video from David MacKay.

Here are some quotes from the 5 star reviews on Amazon – all of which I agree with.

“This book is an amazing performance: sharp, accurate, quantitative and at the same time clear, entertaining and compelling, not to mention beautifully illustrated with great photographs and informative diagrams and maps.”

“Quite staggeringly brilliant. Real science, real numbers, and real, strong conclusions, but with such a light, accessible approach that the reader doesn’t even notice how difficult the concepts are that they have just understood.”

“It’s rare to find a book that is so full of good, scientific facts and well-researched figures, and yet is so enjoyable to read….I think we should be lobbying the BBC to make this into a documentary series. It would also be a great basis for A-level physics teaching. There aren’t many books which fit both roles so well.”

“This is the book I was waiting for: someone has done the research and put credible broad-brush energy numbers down on paper, and it’s surprisingly entertaining as a bonus.”

“If you want to know the scale of the sustainable energy/climate change problems we face, and what scale the possible solutions need to be, get this book. If you’d prefer to believe that buying a Prius will save the world, don’t get this book.”

“This has to be one of the most well written books I have read in ages. Professor MacKay brings all forms of energy down to the rule of thumb, making the scale of the problem understandable.”

So if you know anyone half interested in the topic of sustainable energy, point them to this book or buy it for them. It’s a gem.

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When the BBC Trust refused to allow the BBC to air the Disasters Emergency Committee appeal for the survivors of the Israeli attack on Gaza in Jan 2009, I was reluctant to join the clamour of condemnation because I thought it possible that this BBC was being very clever. In one move it ensured that the appeal got far greater media coverage than if it had allowed the broadcast, while the BBC avoided the criticism of pro Palestinian bias which would surely have come from the Zionist lobby. This would enable the BBC to give fuller coverage of the aftermath of the Israeli assault than if it was already having to defend its impartiality.

How wrong I was. The BBC was not being clever by banning the DEC appeal, it was just being cruel and weak. The BBC appears terrified of angering the Zionist lobby even by broadcasting internationally accepted facts about Israeli policy towards the Palestinians. For instance it seems to regard UN resolutions against Israel as invalid unless Israel accepts them. A standard that it does not apply to any other country.

The Independent Newspaper on Thursday 16th April 2009 reported:

“The BBC Trust yesterday called into question the corporation’s reporting of the most sensitive news story of modern times, publishing findings that the BBC Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, had breached guidelines on accuracy and impartiality. The ruling will be seized upon by campaigners who claim that BBC News is prejudiced against Israel in its coverage of the Middle East.

“Bowen was censured for a piece which he wrote for the BBC website last June under the headline “Six days that changed the Middle East”, attempting to give context to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by analysing the events of the 1967 Six Day War. The Middle East editor referred to ‘Zionism’s innate instinct to push out the frontier’.

He wrote that Israel showed a “defiance of everyone’s interpretation of international law except its own” and that its generals felt that they were dealing with “unfinished business“, left over from the 1948 War of Independence.

The committee ruled that Bowen’s reporting partially breached the BBC’s rules on accuracy and impartiality.

“Readers might come away from the article thinking that the interpretation offered was the only sensible view of the war,” it said. “It was not necessary for equal space to be given to the other arguments, but … the existence of alternative theses should have been more clearly signposted.”

Robert Fisk in the Independent of the same day did not mince his words in an article entitled “How can you trust the cowardly BBC?”. He began:

“The BBC Trust’s report on Jeremy Bowen’s dispatches from the Middle East is pusillanimous, cowardly, outrageous, factually wrong and ethically dishonest. But I am mincing my words.

“The trust – how I love that word which so dishonours everything about the BBC – has collapsed, in the most shameful way, against the usual Israeli lobbyists who have claimed – against all the facts – that Bowen was wrong to tell the truth.”

Fisk goes on to detail how Jeremy Bowen’s article and broadcast were not only accurate, but already milder versions of the reality which exists.

He concludes:

“I’m afraid it’s the same old story. If you allow yourself to bow down before those who wish you to deviate from the truth, you will stay on your knees forever.”

Fisk then recommends a solution to the problem. Get your news of the Middle East from more accurate and honest broadcasters. He recommends Sky TV and Al-Jazeera English.

I agree wholeheartedly with that suggestion. I made the move away from the BBC News months ago. Instead, I watch and listen to the following online:

1. Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman, the Monday to Friday 1 hour current affairs programme. Israel is always accurately referred to as “Israel and the Occupied Territories”).

2. The Real News Network with Paul Jay, which broadcasts several articles a day of up to 10 mins each.

3. Bill Moyers Journal, has wonderfully conducted lengthy interviews with very knowledgeable guests. Such a contrast to the hectoring argumentative style of Jeremy Paxman and John Humphrys.

4. GritTV with Laura Flanders. Several Interesting discussion and feature pieces each day.

5. Aljazeera English 24 hour news channel – this can also be received just as an audio feed.

6. Sky News can be viewed online but you need to be a Sky subscriber. I’m not, so I listen to the Sky News audio feed only which is usually adequate, given that the visuals on most news reports are completely unnecessary.

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In 1972 the first report from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) computer modelling group called the Club of Rome was published as a book entitled -The Limits To Growth.

“Our world model was built specifically to investigate five major trends of global concern – accelerating industrialization, rapid population growth, widespread malnutrition, depletion of non-renewable resources, and a deteriorating environment.”

Its conclusions were received with shock by a world which had seen unprecedented growth since the end of the second world war. The predicament of mankind, the Club of Rome said, was that the world would ultimately run out of many key resources. It’s main conclusions were:

• If present growth trends continued unchanged, a limit to the growth that our planet has enjoyed would be reached sometime within the next 100 years. This would then result in a sudden and uncontrollable decline in both population and industrial capacity.
• These growth trends could be altered. Moreover, if proper alterations were made, the world could establish a condition of “ecological stability” that would be sustainable far into the future.
• The world could embark on this second path, but the sooner this effort started, the greater the chance would be of achieving this “ecologically stable” success.

The Limits to Growth was published in 30 languages and became the best selling environmental book in history, selling over 30 million copies.

In 2004 the Club of Rome published an update. While the previous 30 years had shown some progress, including new technologies, new institutions, and a new awareness of environmental problems, the authors were far more pessimistic than they were in 1972. Humanity has squandered the opportunity to correct its current course over the last 30 years, they conclude, and much must change if the world was to avoid the serious consequences of overshoot in the 21st century.

The current financial crash which followed huge increases in commodity and fuel prices in 2008 can be dismissed as purely a result of the greed of city speculators and the usury of banks. Correcting it, we are told, is just a matter of tighter regulation and the baling out by taxpayers of a few hundred banks and financial institutions. I, along with many other people believe it is more than that. The capitalist model which ad nauseum we have been told has delivered prosperity and democracy to the world, has in reality only benefited a small proportion of the it’s inhabitants. More worryingly, the model for wealth creation it has used has not delivered sustainability, so even the benefits received by the minority are now in peril. The capitalist train has run into the buffers, and although it will get going again, our leaders are tying to get it back on the same rusty track which will head straight for the global resource restrictions described in The Limits to Growth.

We are all socialists now

Whether we wish to believe it or not, one of the central tenants of socialism – the nationalisation of banks – has been taking place in both sides of the Atlantic. When a government owns 80% of a bank or financial institution, our leaders may not want to use the “N” word, but nationalisation has occurred.

So why is our mainstream media not having serious discussions about the role and benefits of the nationalisation of key industries? Because the BBC for the overwhelming bulk of its output only gives airtime the spectrum of idea from Labour to Conservative. Other political philosophies are simply excluded from serious debate.

With the world desperately in need of new philosophies and business models which will incorporate the best elements of both capitalism, socialism and environmental sustainability, the mainstream media is simply failing to promote this debate. We have to look for the alternative media for proper discussion of such weighty, but vital matters.

On yesterdays edition of “Democracy Now”, Amy Goodman interviewed Marxist historian David Harvey. His dream of a “no-growth economy” might have seemed pure fantasy a couple of years ago, but today it seems no less likely to deliver a solution than the optimistic and hugely expensive policies of Gordon Brown or Barack Obama.

I believe that in less than 10 years time, after another major crash, when the current model of global capitalism will finally be recognised as having failed, the ideas of David Harvey, along with many evolving community based strategies will emerge as a coherent political movement to challenge the redundant capitalist old guard and their self-serving creed.

If you cannot see the video above, thy this Real Video Stream or listen as a Real Audio Stream. You don’t need to download the Bloatware Real Player, just download and install Real Alternative (first remove Real Networks Real Player if it is installed).

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