He stressed there will be no major shifts in the government’s green policy plans, reiterating that the coalition is fully committed to meeting its renewable energy targets and driving rapid growth across the low-carbon economy.

“Central to our vision of responsible capitalism is a new approach, where we move to a sustainable green economy,” he said. “It is an idea that’s time has come… Although the global economy has been slow, the low-carbon sector is healthy – growth is strong.”

Citing government figures that show the global green goods and services market will grow by four per cent a year through to 2015 to be worth £44 trillion by 2015, he said the UK’s green economy was expected to grow at an average of five per cent a year through to 2015-16.

He added that despite the tough economic backdrop, other factors were driving investment in green technologies and business models, including government policies, concerns over oil price stability sparked by the Arab Spring, the continuing fallout from the Fukushima disaster, and the prospect of an international climate change deal.

While acknowledging he did not want to be “Panglossian” and that global carbon emissions were still rising, he insisted there was growing evidence that a rapid transition towards cleaner economic models could be delivered.

The potential for UK growth is absolutely massive… It is a key component for this government’s growth policy and green growth policy,” he said. “We need to make this transition as quickly as possible, and with as much determination as possible.”

Responding to a question from BusinessGreen, Davey insisted this commitment to green growth was shared across the government and had been fully endorsed by the prime minister, deputy prime minister and chancellor.

“They understand the growth potential in renewables and energy infrastructure; they know the role this can play in the growth agenda,” he said. “The prospect of green jobs and contracts for our businesses is welcomed right across the government.”

On a policy level, Davey reiterated comments made when he first replaced former secretary of state Chris Huhne, who stepped down last month to fight charges relating to an alleged driving offence, stressing there would be no major change in direction.

He also dismissed any possibility of a U-turn on renewable energy policy following a series of critical reports from right-wing think tanks and calls from Conservative backbench MPs for a deeper cut to onshore wind energy subsidies.

“We are totally commitment to renewables, including wind and solar, and totally committed to our renewables targets,” he said. “We have to get the best bang for our buck, but as we tackle those issues that does not impact our targets or our commitment to renewables.”

He also noted that while politicians had to be careful to retain public support for green policies that can impact energy bills, independent polls had shown that contrary to many media reports a clear majority of people support wind farms, solar technologies, and the subsidies that are necessary to encourage their deployment.

In addition, he insisted he would continue Huhne’s work in Europe, where the UK has been pushing for the European Union to adopt a more ambitious 30 per cent emissions reduction target for 2020.

Davey said he would again make the case for a more demanding emissions target at a meeting of EU ministers next week, while also stepping up calls for an acceleration of plans to create an EU-wide energy grid.

In what could be perceived as a slight change in emphasis from his predecessor, Davey promised “very strong support for demand-side policies” that promote energy efficiency measures.

“Energy efficiency is unambiguously good for growth,” he said. “It reduces bills, gives people more money in their pocket and makes businesses more competitive.”

He also hinted he would like to see a more robust approach to the policing of energy efficiency rules governing buildings, noting that while demanding standards were in place there had been few prosecutions.

The speech came as cabinet office minister Oliver Letwin became the latest senior government figure to reiterate support for the government’s clean energy policies.

Speaking at a debate hosted by the Telegraph newspaper, which has recently run a series of letters and stories detailing opposition to wind farms and renewable energy subsidies, Letwin said politicians would be “barmy” to scale back green energy schemes that were driving billions of pounds in private sector investment.

“[Green policy] has absolutely not fallen down the government’s priority list,” he said. “If it had, at a time when we are facing the largest fiscal squeeze in our history, we would not be spending a billion quid on CCS [carbon capture and storage] or wind farms, particularly offshore wind farms. That is an industrial policy in the making, not just an energy policy.”

He insisted the UK had the potential to become a global leader in clean technologies such as offshore wind, marine energy and CCS.

“We shouldn’t spend our time beating ourselves up about whether we are ever going to have a green economy – we should just go and get one,” he added.

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Just4theplanet has always been so proud of Prince Charles’ valiant efforts in pushing forward the environmental agenda

Now the Prince of Wales’ estate, financier Jacob Rothschild, and supermarket giant Sainsbury’s are among a number of investors to back a company looking to develop a UK network of over 40 anaerobic digestion (AD) plants.

Start-up Tamar Energy has raised £65m to build the plants, which it estimates will generate 100MW of electricity from organic waste over the next five years. The biogas produced from the process can also be injected into the gas grid.

The company has purchased waste to energy company AdGen, which already has an advanced pipeline of projects that it says will allow it it ramp up its operations at a rapid rate.

Tamar hopes to exploit what it sees as an underdeveloped market in the UK, where there are just over 200 plants producing around 170MW, around one per cent of the capacity in Germany.

Chairman Alan Lovell, former chief executive of Infinis, a UK renewable energy developer backed by private equity house Terra Firma, called the project a “game-changing investment”.

“The underdevelopment of anaerobic digestion in the UK is principally driven by a historic lack of financing for the sector,” he said. “Tamar Energy will be well capitalised by investors, with a pure focus on producing energy from organic waste, rather than as an adjunct to a waste management business.”

Sainsburys, which will reportedly invest £2m in the scheme, said it would also work with its suppliers to ensure they have access to Tamar’s new AD plants in a bid to reduce waste in its supply chain. The company has a zero food waste to landfill policy and surplus food from its stores already goes to AD or charities.

The project was hailed by Ed Davey, newly appointed Energy and Climate Change Secretary, as “crucial for keeping the lights on and emissions down in the UK in the coming decades”.

“Getting new investors to come into the clean energy market is one of my priorities,” he added. “The consortium behind Tamar is a prime example of this, combining familiar high street names with big international investors.

“Energy from waste has the potential to make a substantial contribution to our renewable energy targets and so I look forward to seeing Tamar’s plans come to fruition.”

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The 102 turbines of the two connected Walney wind farms cover an area of 73 square-kilometres and were formally connected to the National Grid in a ceremony today.

With a capacity of 367.2MW, the huge project can provide low-carbon, green electricity to 320,000 homes. The generating capacity of each turbine, supplied by Siemens Wind Power, is 3.6MW, and the rotor diameter of the turbines is 107m for Walney 1 and 120m for Walney 2, with a maximum height of 150m from sea level to blade tip.

Opening the new £1 billion wind farm, new Secretary of State Ed Davey said: “Britain has a lot to be proud of in our growing offshore wind sector. Our island’s tremendous natural resource, our research base and a proud history of engineering make this the number one destination for investment in offshore wind.

“And Walney is the newest, biggest and fastest-built jewel in that crown, providing clean power for hundreds of thousands of households.

“Opening Walney during my first week in office lets me underline my commitment to continuing the Coalition’s work to make this sector a success story for the British economy, not least with the innovation it is driving and the employment it is creating.”

The wind farm took two years to complete and is made up of two projects located 15km off Walney Island, Cumbria.

The first power from the Walney 1 offshore wind farm was generated in January 2011 as turbine C05 was put into operation and its first power was supplied to the national grid through the onshore transformer station in Heysham.

The installation of Walney 2 began in March last year, and parallel installation activities shortened the construction timeframe. Crane barges, jack-up vessels and tugs worked out of ports in the East Irish Sea area, primarily Barrow and Mostyn harbours.

These vessels were positioned using state-of-the-art positioning systems for pin-point accuracy. A number of smaller vessels were used to support the work by carrying out surveys and environmental monitoring studies, they will also be used to ferry personnel to and from the wind farm.

Walney 2 offshore wind farm started delivering CO2-free electricity to the UK’s national grid in November.

The project is owned and operated by a consortium of firms including lead partner DONG Energy (50.1%), SSE (Scottish and Southern Energy) (25.1%) and OPW (24.8%), a company jointly owned by Dutch pension administrator PGGM and Ampère Equity Fund (managed by Triodos Investment Management).

Anders Eldrup, CEO at DONG Energy, said: “Walney 2 is the world’s fastest ever installation of an offshore wind farm and this accomplishment underlines DONG Energy’s position as a strong market leader within offshore wind.

“We developed our techniques for faster and more cost efficient installation methods in the challenging conditions in the Irish Sea. This is an important step in the continuing drive to reduce the cost of construction of offshore wind farms.”

Colin Hood, SSE’s Chief Operating Officer, said: “This is a major milestone in the development of the Walney offshore wind farms and it demonstrates the excellent progress being made on the project.

“As the UK’s leading generator of electricity from renewable sources, SSE is committed to helping to increase further the amount of renewable electricity generation in the UK, and the export of electricity at Walney is a step towards achieving this.”

Operation and maintenance of the wind farm is based in Barrow-in-Furness and comprises approximately 60 people, providing opportunities for partnerships with local business throughout the project lifetime and creating jobs in the Furness area.

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Pointing out the similarities (and differences) between slavery and the use of fossil fuels can help us engage with climate change in a new way, says Jean-François Mouhot, visiting researcher at Georgetown University, USA.

In 2005, while teaching history at a French university, I was struck by the general disbelief among students that rational and sensitive human beings could ever hold others in bondage. Slavery was so obviously evil that slave-holders could only have been barbarians. My students could not entertain the idea that some slave-owners could have been genuinely blind to the harm they were doing. At the same time, I was reading a book on climate change which noted how today’s machinery – almost exclusively powered by fossil fuels like coal and oil – does the same work that used to be done by slaves and servants. “Energy slaves” now do our laundry, cook our food, transport us, entertain us, and do most of the hard work needed for our survival. Intriguing similarities between slavery and our current dependence on fossil-fuel-powered machines struck me: both perform roughly the same functions in society (doing the hard and dirty work that no one wants to do), both were considered for a long time to be acceptable by the majority and both came to be increasingly challenged as the harm they caused became more visible.

The history of slavery and its abolition shows how blurred the frontier between what is considered good and evil can be, and how quickly it can shift. We have a mental image of slave-owners as cruel, sadistic, inhuman brutes, and forget too easily the ordinariness of slave ownership throughout the world. To many, slavery seemed normal and indispensable. In the US, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned slaves. Lifestyles and healthy incomes were predicated upon it, just as we today depend on oil. Similarly, many slave-owners lived with the impression that they were decent people. Obviously, there are differences between the use of slaves and of fossil fuels. Fundamentally, slavery is a crime against humanity. Fossil fuel use is not a moral evil, but burning coal or oil contributes to global warming, already causing widespread harm: it now directly or indirectly kills 150,000 people per year according to a 2004 World Health Organisation study. States and energy companies’ lust for oil also leads to wars and the toppling of democratically elected governments. Our addiction to fossil fuel is increasingly destructive.

Unlike the harm caused by slavery, the harm in the use of fossil fuels is of course indirect, long range, even unintended. It seems at first glance to be a fundamentally different kind of harm, and the unintended consequences of ongoing use of fossil fuels have only recently become understood. Initially, their use was seen as positive and progressive. But now that we know the consequences, and continue, globally, to increase emission levels, how can we still consider these consequences “unintended”? Consumers of goods made by slaves or absentee plantation owners who lived in Britain in the 18th century also benefited from the slave system without maintaining direct connections to it. Those beneficiaries can certainly be said to have committed a morally comparable sort of human transgression to that of people who benefit from fossil fuels today.

Why is all of this relevant for climate change policy? Our contemporary economies have become extremely dependent on fossil fuels, just as slave societies were dependent on their slaves – indeed far more than the latter ever were. As one scholar remarked: “That US Congressmen tend to rationalise fossil fuel use despite climate risks to future generations just as southern congressmen rationalised slavery despite ideals of equality is perhaps unsurprising.”

It should thus come as no surprise that there is so much resistance to climate science. Our societies, like slave-owning societies, have a vested interest in ignoring the scientific consensus. Pointing out the similarities between slavery and the use of fossil fuels can help us engage with the issue in a new way, and convince us to act, as no one envisages comfortably being compared with a slave-owner.

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Shipping noise causes chronic stress to whales, scientists have shown for the first time, after using the halt in marine traffic after the 9/11 terrorist attacks to conduct a unique experiment.

The effect on whales of propeller noise, military sonar and explosions set off in the search for oil and gas is highly controversial. Environmental campaigners claim the noise interferes with the singing of whales, or even kills the animals, and are currently suing the US government over the navy’s use of sonar.

The research, published on Wednesday, provides the first evidence of physical harm, according to Rosalind Rolland, a researcher at the New England Aquarium, in Boston, US.

“We showed whales occupying oceans with high levels of ship noise have a chronic stress response,” said Rolland, who led the study. “We knew whales changed the frequency of their calls to adapt to the ship noise, but this work shows it is not merely an annoyance – it is having a physical effect.”

She had not originally set out to study the effect of noise on the animals. The hormone data was part of a study of the whales’ health and reproduction but Rolland realised many years later it could be combined with data on noise levels from shipping to draw conclusions about how the whales are being affected.

Whales use sound as their primary sense, just as humans use sight, and their singing enables them to find food, mates and to navigate. They are believed to be able to communicate over hundreds of kilometres. But the frequencies they use largely overlap with the frequencies generated by human activities in the oceans, which have increased tenfold in volume since the 1960s, disrupting their ability to communicate.

A separate study published in January showed the singing of humpback whales was disrupted by sonar noise caused over 200km away while measuring fish stocks.

Rolland was at sea in the Bay of Fundy on 11 September 2001: “There was a dramatic reduction in ship traffic that day. It was like being on the primal ocean.” The noise levels from shipping fell by half, as transport was shut down in response the terror attacks. Rolland’s team also collected faecal balls from the whales, which float, and analysed the levels of stress hormones present. They found a “highly significant” decrease in stress hormones coincided with the drop in shipping noise.

“Instant responses to stress – like running away from a tiger – can be life-saving,” said Rolland. “But if it becomes chronic, it causes profound depression of the immune system, making them vulnerable to disease, and it depresses reproduction.”

The northern right whales Rolland studied are one of the most endangered whales, with 475 in the world and a population growing at just 1% a year. In contrast, the southern right whale numbers 8-10,000 and a growth rate of 7-8% a year, as they recover from the decimation of whaling. Rolland dubbed the northern right whale “the urban whale” in a book she co-authored, because its territory is close to the busy eastern seaboard of North America. She said damage caused by noise is very likely to be a factor in the population’s slow recovery, and may also affect other whales. Beaked whales, which Rolland is now studying, are particularly sensitive to sonar she said, and are frequently the species involved in mass beachings.

“The positive aspect to this particular issue is that it is a solvable problem,” Rolland said. The noise is largely down to engine inefficiencies, she said, which is possible to remedy and doing so would reduce fuel consumption in return for upfront investment. The International Maritime Organisation and the European Union are both investigating how to reduce marine noise. But with 50,000 large ships travelling the oceans on any given day and a ship lifespan of about three decades, changing the fleet will not occur overnight.

Danny Groves, at the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, said: “Not enough is being done to reduce noise in our oceans Very little is known about its long-term effects and more research is needed.

“Amazingly, there are currently no accepted international standards regarding noise pollution in our seas.”

Asked how the whale faecal balls were found, Rolland said: “We find the pellets opportunistically, but we do also use trained scent-detection dogs. They are phenomenal. They work off the bow and can detect the scent up to 1km away.”

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Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg today announced that Davey would take up the cabinet role, moving from his current position as minister for employment relations, consumer and postal affairs in the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS).
Clegg said the MP for Kingston and Surbiton would be the “right man for the job”, maintaining Davey had a “lifelong commitment to environmental and green issues” and that he had shown a formidable grasp of government policy”.

He paid tribute to Huhne’s “groundbreaking policies” and left the door open for him to return to “a key government position” if he avoids prosecution.

Davey has in the past voted strongly for laws designed to tackle climate change, including backing plans to bring aviation and shipping into the Climate Change Act. He also backed a law that would cap emissions from power stations.

He is seen to have done a good job in his current role, one that has been described by some onlookers as a “poisoned chalice” for requiring close dealings with the Royal Mail and Post Office.

Green businesses are now hoping Davey will show willingness to engage with industry to help drive the low-carbon agenda. He will also be expected to show the same determination and passion as Huhne demonstrated to tackling climate change both at a national and European level.

He will be responsible for confirming the package of Electricity Market Reforms, overseeing the start of the Green Investment Bank and the launch of the Green Deal. He will also be expected to lead climate change negotiations at the United Nations conference of the parties in Qatar at the end of this year.

Speaking at one of his last public appointments as energy secretary on Tuesday, Huhne said he was optimistic that EU member states would this year agree to more ambitious emission reduction targets – something that Davey will be expected to champion.

David Symons, director at environmental consultancy WSP Environment and Energy, said he was optimistic the new minister would support green industries.

“Ed Davey has previously stated the importance of immediate action on climate change. These beliefs, coupled with his experience in BIS on consumer choice, bode well for DECC’s key policies, such as the Green Deal,” he said.

James Cameron, founder and vice chairman of Climate Change Capital, said the UK needed a strong advocate of green policies to help boost the economy and cut global emissions.

“We hope Chris Huhne’s successor continues his good work in pushing for credible, long-term and cost-effective policies able to make the UK cleaner, safer and more competitive.

“Chris was a staunch advocate in Cabinet of the changes Britain needs to make to be competitive, and a world leader in new green technologies.”

Simon Birkett, founder and director of Clean Air in London, said he expected Davey to be a strong advocate of green policies.

“Ed Davey’s appointment is excellent news for Londoners worried about air pollution as he really ‘gets it’. Let’s hope he starts by reforming the Renewable Heat Incentive and insisting Defra reforms the Clean Air Act for modern technologies and fuels,” he said.

A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change confirmed the appointment and said he expected the new energy secretary to make a statement in due course.

In other reshuffle changes, Norman Lamb MP will become parliamentary under secretary of state at BIS, and Jenny Willott MP became an assistant government whip.

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There are some very successful diets on the market - but weight lost doesn’t always equal health gained. That new diet that took inches off your waistline could be harming your health if it locks out or severely restricts entire food groups, like carbs, or relies on supplements with little scientific backing, or clamps down on calories to an extreme.

“People are so desperate to lose weight that it’s really weight loss at any cost,” says Madelyn Fernstrom, founding director of the UPMC-University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Weight Management Center and author of The Real You Diet. And when that desperation sets in, says Fernstrom, “normal thinking goes out the window.” Who cares if the forbidden-foods list is longer than War and Peace? Pounds are coming off. You’re happy. But your body might not be.

You can check the nutritional completeness and safety of 25 popular diets ranked by U.S. News, from Atkins to Jenny Craig to Weight Watchers, in a detailed profile crafted of each one. (The profiles also cover scientific evidence, typical meals, and much more.) And U.S. News’s Best Diets for Healthy Eating rankings give each diet a “healthiness” score from 5 (best) to 1 (worst) for safety and nutrition, with safety getting double weight; while you can modify a diet to some degree to adjust for nutritional imbalances or deficiencies, mere tweaking won’t make an unsafe diet safe.

Behind the healthiness scores are ratings by a U.S. News panel of 22 experts in nutrition and diet. They assessed the 25 popular diets in seven categories, including the safety and nutritional completeness categories, for a series of rankings released last June.

The Best Diets for Healthy Eating and Best Diets Overall rankings overlap significantly. Both give especially high marks to DASH, TLC, Mediterranean, Mayo Clinic, and Volumetrics. “The ones that get high scores in safety and in nutritional value—they’re very similar to each other,” says Andrea Giancoli, a registered dietitian who serves on U.S. News’s expert panel. The recurring theme across the diets that excelled in healthiness is adequate calories supplied by a heavy load of vegetables, fruits, and whole grains, a modest amount of lean protein, nonfat dairy, healthy fats, and an occasional treat. Plants are the foundation and the menu is always built around minimally processed meals made from scratch.

Very few diets in the Healthy Eating list are overtly unsafe or severely deficient nutritionally. The only plans to receive healthiness scores of below 3 were the Paleo, Raw Food, Macrobiotic, Dukan, and Atkins diets. They’re simply too restrictive, say our experts, which calls their nutritional qualities into question. The meat-heavy Paleo diet bans grains and dairy, so getting adequate calcium and vitamin D isn’t easy. Atkins, by severely curbing carbs, blows past recommended caps for total and saturated fat. Depending on your personal approach to the Raw Food Diet, you may shortchange yourself on calcium, vitamin B-12, and vitamin D; its restrictive cooking rules also could put you at risk for eating raw or undercooked ingredients.

If you have reservations about a diet’s nutritional content or safety, listen to your body. Fatigue, sleeplessness, dizziness, aches—they’re all red flags. Says Fernstrom: “Losing weight is for good health, so you should feel more vital—not bad.”

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Religion may be defined as a system of belief and ethical orientation which are premised on an understanding of human beings as other – or more than their purely physical identities.  Religion  and  its rituals – acts of prayer, meditation and celebration awake or reinforce a personal and communal sense of our connection to Ultimate Truth.

In various and complex ways religion has been both an agent of environmental domination and paradoxically repositories of ecological wisdom.

Historically Monotheistic religions (i.e. those that believe in a Creator God) have emphasised humanity over nature. And yet at the same time religion has also represented the voice of nature to humanity celebrating and consecrating our ties to the non-human world.

There is little doubt that texts in the first book of the Bible (Genesis) which emphasise mans “mastery over the earth” can be seen as a source for the havoc that has been wreaked by Western Societies upon the planet. Other texts praise the Creation and mans stewardship of nature. Overall, one must argue however that the Judeo- Christian tradition of the West have regarded nature – animals, plants  or the land – as something humanity owns – given by the Creator – and therefore of little or no inherent moral standing.

However the environmental agenda of religions is continually set and reset by their adherents. Also ancient traditions could not have foreseen the scope of modern technological power. No past empire was able to to threaten the earth’s climate.

There has been an extensive range of religious responses to environmental problems.

One approach has been a move by theologians to reinterpret old traditions – finding and stressing texts that help us face the current crisis. In the Old Testament for example there is a passage that tells us not to live in a city without trees and in the Christian tradition Saint Francis is shown as a Deep Ecologist. Nature becomes the Body of God. More creative thinkers have sought to synthesize elements from different traditions. Taoist images of humanity’s integration into a natural setting and ideas from native peoples who lived in harmony with nature are often introduced. Finally spiritual thinkers are creating new ideas, practices and organisations.

But why do we need religion? Why cant governments and people save the planet and leave religion as a private matter of personal faith?

The answer to this is that to many people – religious belief is of primary importance regarding our place in the universe and our obligations to other people and animals. Also we have historical examples from the US civil rights movement to the non violent campaign for independence led by Gandhi in India. There are many instances of creative and successful merging of religion and social action. Also one might say that purely secular politics have been rendered doubtful by the economic failures and totalitarian political excesses of communism. Despite the beliefs of the secularists the reality is that spiritual perspectives can be a source of social direction as well as personal inspiration. From Christian creation theology and Buddhist teaching about compassion for animals, from Native American images of the sacred “hoop” of life – to indigenous people’s political resistance to the environmental desecration of their sacred lands- religious practices are bound up in humanity’s on going struggles to live in harmony with an increasingly threatened planet.

One could argue that our response to the environmental crisis is in the broadest sense, “spiritual” – as it involves our deepest concerns about what is of truly lasting importance.  One might even say that what humanity has been doing to the planet has been an enormous sacrilege, of which we are all, to some extent guilty.

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