*Alaskans slash electricity consumption

www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/alaskas-capital-goes-green-after-avalanche-cuts-power-lines-829931.html


Alaska's capital goes green after avalanche cuts power lines
By David Usborne Saturday, 17 May 2008

Residents in Juneau have set an example to the rest of the United States, cutting energy consumption by 30 per cent.

See the full article above, but "it is a phenomenon that was seen before in Brazil, when a drought starved the power grid of hydro-electric power in 2001. On that occasion, consumers were ordered to cut their use of power by 20 per cent or face fines.

It worked. In two months, the whole country cut their demand by 20 per cent, and they never really returned to the same level of consumption after that,"

*GOOD NEWS ON SOLAR PLANTS

From: Environment America, May 8, 2008


LARGE-SCALE SOLAR POWER PLANTS COULD POWER THE NATION

America could meet all of its current electricity needs with large
central concentrating solar power plants according to a report
released May 8, 2008, "On the Rise: Solar Thermal Power and the Fight
Against Global Warming" by Environment America.

Solar thermal power plants covering an area of 100 x 100-mile area in
the Southwest (slightly more than what's already been excavated for
strip mining for coal across the country), could power the entire
nation while slashing global warming emissions.

Because solar thermal energy storage allows electric generating
capacity even when the sun is not shining, it can provide "baseload
capacity," replacing traditional energy sources like coal, natural gas
and nuclear power.

"If we are going to get serious about fighting global warming and
addressing our nation's energy woes, solar energy must be part of the
solution, said Anna Aurilio, Director of Environment America's
Washington DC office. "Tapping this abundant and clean domestic energy
source must be a centerpiece of America's energy, environmental and
economic policies," she added.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has identified the potential
for more than 7,000 gigawatts (GW) of concentrating solar power
generation on lands in the southwestern United States alone -- more
than six times current U.S. electricity consumption. Other areas of
the United States, such as the mountain West, the Great Plains and
Florida, can also generate significant power from the sun.

"This report confirms what we in the industry have known for a long
time-that utility-scale concentrating solar power (CSP) has the
potential to provide a clean, reliable energy choice to power America
and help us achieve national energy security in the 21st century,"
said Rhone Resch, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association
in Washington, D.C. "We agree wholeheartedly with the report's
recommendation to provide the proper incentives to encourage
development of CSP plants. Specifically, it is imperative that
Congress follows through on passing a final bill to provide a multi-
year extension of the solar investment tax credit (ITC) -- a policy
with support from over 85 percent of the American public," he added.

Concentrating solar power development has accelerated dramatically
since the beginning of 2007. More than 4,000 MW of solar thermal
projects are in some phase of development nationwide and could be
completed by 2012. However, solar energy tax credits that are helping
make these projects cost-effective are set to expire at the end of the
year, putting their future in doubt.

"Federal clean energy tax incentives are spurring investment, creating
thousands of "green-collar" jobs, and helping reduce global warming
pollution," said Anna Aurilio. "If Congress lets them expire, clean
energy projects will grind to a halt," she added.

Concentrating solar power plants are increasingly cost-competitive
with other power generation technologies that do not produce carbon
dioxide, the main global warming pollutant. The cost of energy from
solar thermal power plants is estimated to be competitive in cost with
theoretical coal-fired power plants that capture and store their
carbon dioxide emissions and with new nuclear power plants.

The report concludes that with leadership at the state and federal
level and the right policies, that, putting 80 gigawatts of
concentrating solar power in place by 2030 is within reach. This would
provide electricity for 25 million homes, would generate between
75,000 and 140,000 permanent jobs, would and cut global warming
pollution from U.S. electric power plants by at least 6.6 percent by
the year 2030.

Electricity generation accounts for more than a third of America's
emissions of global warming pollution. "Concentrating solar power can
make a large contribution toward reducing global warming pollution in
the United States, and do so quickly and at a reasonable cost,"
concluded Aurilio.

Download the report, "On the Rise:Solar Thermal Power and the Fight
Against Global Warming."
http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/new-energy-future/new-energy-future/4qtUkxEfEee-JudPrVnxzQ

*South London Botanical Institute

Greens had a relaxing post election meet-up at the SLBI on Sunday last. It was great to meet and relax with friends and activists from the campaign.

The Institute is a hidden jewel in South and is open every Thursday.
It’s at 323 Norwood Road, SE24 just a few minutes walk from Tulse Hill Tube.
It’s said to have the most compact botanical garden in London with plants from all over the world including a section on poisonous ones like Bella Donna.

Founded by Allan Octavian Hume in 1910, to encourage south Londoners to
take an interest in botany, the SLBI remains something of a sedate
Edwardian time capsule with little change in the house or furniture since it’s founding in 1907. Mr. Hume spent most of his life in the Civil Service in India and became one of the founding members of the Indian Congress Party. Indeed India has issued a special stamp in his honour.

He was also involved in something that I had never heard of – The Great Hedge of India. This was a 12’ impenetrable hedge approx. 6’ wide that ran down the centre of India for 2,600 miles! I can’t understand why I have not heard of it before. It was erected to stop salt smuggling between different parts of India and in the middle of the 19th. Century was guarded by 20,000 troops.

*GLOBAL FOOD CRISIS

By Peter Montague

Global food prices have risen 83% in the last 3 years. This spring,
as prices rose steeply, food riots broke out in Haiti, Egypt,
Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Ethiopia, Uzbekistan, Yemen, the
Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia and Italy, among other places.
Because U.S. energy policy subsidizes farmers to grow corn to make
ethanol (alcohol that can supplement gasoline), the U.S. is being
accused of feeding its sport utility vehicles (SUVs) instead of
feeding people. There is some truth to this charge, but it's more
complicated than that.[1]

The global food crisis has been created by a combination of things,
among them:

** Climate changes, perhaps related to global warming, such as the
recent large tornado in Myanmar, the epic drought going on now in
Australia, floods last year in North Korea, and years of low rainfall
in the western U.S., among other costly weather changes. Australia
used to export enough rice to feed 20 million people, but six years of
drought have cut their rice yield by 98%. Australia used to be the
world's second-largest exporter of wheat, but the drought has changed
that, too. "A big reason for higher wheat prices... is the multi-year
drought in Australia, something scientists say may become persistent
because of global warming," according to the Washington Post.

** U.S. farmers have been growing less wheat since the mid-1990s in
favor of more-reliable soybeans and better-subsidized corn. "Wheat's
biggest problem is its susceptibility to disease, which has turned
many farmers against it," explains Dan Morgan in the Washington
Post.

** Rising oil prices, caused partly by rising demand for oil in
China and India (and in U.S. SUVs), and partly by diminished supply
caused by the Iraq war. Because of rising oil prices, the cost of
transporting food has doubled in the last year alone. Furthermore,
the price of fertilizer is tightly linked to the price of oil and
has been rising for about five years. Use of fertilizer in the third
world increased 56% between 1996 and 2008.


** The demand for meat is growing in the third world as our own
meat-heavy diet is increasingly adopted world-wide. It takes about 700
calories of animal feed to produce a 100-calorie piece of red meat, so
a shift to a meat-rich diet requires large increases in grains, which
in turn requires greater use of expensive fertilizers, which in turn
raises the demand for oil.

** As the soaring price of oil has increased the cost of transporting
food, economies as diverse as Argentina, Brazil, Egypt, India, Vietnam
and the Ukraine (among others) have been feeling inflationary
pressures, and have restricted food exports in an attempt to hold
down domestic food prices. This has reduced food available on the
global market.

** So-called "free trade" policies have caused some previously
self-sufficient nations to become food importers. This occurs in
several ways. First, the World Bank and the International Monetary
Fund require loan recipients to make "structural adjustments" in the
way they do business. For example, they must open their grain markets
to competition from U.S. farmers, who are subsidized by Uncle Sam to
the tune of $300 billion per year). Competition from cheap,
subsidized U.S. crops tends to drive small local farmers out of
business and off their land. Second, "structural adjustment" often
demands a reduction of social safety nets, so when a food crisis hits
the remaining infrastructure can't manage. Third, stockpiling food is
officially discouraged (a mountain of available food interferes with
the "free market"). Thus an important cushion against hunger has been
eliminated. A classic case is Haiti, which used to be
self-sufficient for its main staple crop -- rice -- but now is a rice
importer, increasingly subject to the whims of commodity speculators
and agribusiness corporations.

** Commodity speculators. Food has become "the new gold." "Investors
fleeing Wall Street's mortgage-related strife plowed hundreds of
millions of dollars into grain futures, driving prices up even more,"
the Washington Post reported April 27. Rising food prices have
attracted hedge fund speculators, who have helped create a "bubble" in
food prices. "As financial markets have tumbled, food prices have
soared," acknowledges Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank.


** And lastly, in the U.S. at least, we spend huge amounts of money
feeding our pets. I know I am touching the third rail here, but
someone has got to mention this 900-pound gorilla in the room.

The American Pet Products Manufacturers Association expects Americans
to spend about $43.4 billion on their pets in 2008, up from $41.2
billion in 2007. About $16.9 billion of that will be spent on pet
food.

Meanwhile President Bush has proposed that Congress should dedicate
$770 million for food aid to a hungry world. "The American people
are generous people, and they're compassionate people," Mr. Bush said,
announcing his new food aid plan. "We believe in a timeless truth: to
whom much is given, much is expected."

The President's gift of $770 million to the world's 100 million
hungriest people represents 4.6% of what we spend each year feeding
Fido and Kitty. (And, by the way, we are spending $770 million every
42 hours in Iraq.)

• I DIDN’T GET ELECTED!

In 2000, 180,000 votes won us three seats in the London Assembly. This time, we increased our vote to 203,465 but it was only good enough for two seats. We were just 24,409 short for my seat. Really frustrating!!

There was a huge squeeze between Labour and the Tories. The Lib Dems had a dismal night, they failed to capture the predicted constituency seats and their Assembly List vote plummeted. They dropped from five seats to three. All the other small parties got badly squeezed. The One London Party, which had two seats in the outgoing Assembly, polled only 3,430!

While I am devastated at not winning a seat, I am pleased that the Green Party, in the face of the huge onslaught, and X-Factor politics, held up so well and increased our vote.

I am proud to have been part of our best ever campaign.

Ah well, back to normal. Seeing that I will not now be a highly paid Assembly Member, I'm back to trying to earn a living. Anyone know of a job out there?

*TO-DAY'S THE DAY!

To-day we have the elections for the Mayor of London and the London Assembly. These are vital elections for the Green Party. In the outgoing Assembly we held two of the twenty-five seats and the balance-of-power. These elections are also important to me as I am number three for the Green Party on the Londonwide List. Expert predictions are that we will take the seat.

To those of you who can vote, please get out there and vote Green Party for Mayor, Constituency Member and Londonwide Member. There are three different ballot papers but the most important is the PEACH coloured paper - the Londonwide section which is the proportional part of the election. Every GREEN PARTY vote gets me nearer to being elected.

Please pass the word around to your friends, relations, neighbours etc.

I will be in my home patch of East Finchley all day until 10pm tonight, apart from short trips to the local internet cafe.

The count is not until tomorrow and we do not expect a result until late evening.

Tomorrow evening, many greens are meeting up at the Horniman Pub close to City Hall, near the Belfast.

*MAKING A KILLING FROM THE FOOD CRISIS

Big business makes record profits and the poor starve!!!


New from GRAIN
28 April 2008
http://www.grain.org/nfg/?id=565


A new report by GRAIN - http://www.grain.org/2/?id=39

The world food crisis is hurting a lot of people, but global agribusiness
firms, traders and speculators are raking in huge profits.

Much of the news coverage of the world food crisis has focussed on riots in low-income countries, where workers and others cannot cope with skyrocketing
costs of staple foods. But there is another side to the story: the big
profits that are being made by huge food corporations and investors.
Cargill, the world's biggest grain trader, achieved an 86% increase in
profits from commodity trading in the first quarter of this year. Bunge,
another huge food trader, had a 77% increase in profits during the last
quarter of last year. ADM, the second largest grain trader in the world,
registered a 67% per cent increase in profits in 2007.

Nor are retail giants taking the strain: profits at Tesco, the UK supermarket
giant, rose by a record 11.8% last year. Other major retailers, such as
France's Carrefour and Wal-Mart of the US, say that food sales are the main
sector sustaining their profit increases. Investment funds, running away
from sliding stock markets and the credit crunch, are having a heyday on the
commodity markets, driving prices out of reach for food importers like
Bangladesh and the Philippines.

These profits are no freak windfalls. Over the last 30 years, the IMF and the
World Bank have pushed so-called developing countries to dismantle all forms
of protection for their local farmers and to open up their markets to global
agribusiness, speculators and subsidised food from rich countries. This has
transformed most developing countries from being exporters of food into
importers. Today about 70 per cent of developing countries are net importers
of food. On top of this, finance liberalisation has made it easier for
investors to take control of markets for their own private benefit.

Agricultural policy has lost touch with its most basic goal: that of feeding
people. Rather than rethink their own disastrous policies, governments and
think tanks are blaming production problems, the growing demand for food in
China and India, and biofuels. While these have played a role, the
fundamental cause of today's food crisis is neoliberal globalisation itself,
which has transformed food from a source of livelihood security into a mere
commodity to be gambled away, even at the cost of widespread hunger among
the world's poorest people.

==============================================

GRAIN, Making a killing from hunger: We need to overturn food policy, now!
"Against the grain", April 2008, http://www.grain.org/2/?id=39 and in PDF
http://www.grain.org/2/?id=39&pdf

*STRATEGIC VOTER.

From the London Strategic Voter website some strong support.
http://www.strategicvoter.org.uk/doku.php?id=guide_to_the_parties_standing_for_the_assembly




The London-wide top-up seats

Again, we aren't recommending tactical voting in this election, but if you
must, the key consideration in the vote for the London-wide top-up seats
is whether the party you are considering supporting is likely to clear the
5% hurdle to get one Assembly member elected. If it isn't likely to, then
in tactical voting terms (your vote's effectiveness in determining the
result), you have wasted your vote.

So which left of New Labour parties are likely to clear the 5% hurdle?
Polls are difficult to come by, as the mainstream media focuses solely on
the Mayoral race. At LSV our guess is that both the Lib Dems and the
Greens will clear the hurdle comfortably, but that Left List, Respect
(George Galloway) and Unity for Peace & Socialism will struggle to do so.

The Greens won 2 top up seats in 2004 (Darren Johnson and Jenny Jones) on
8.37% of the vote, down from 3 on 10.52% of the vote in 2000. The Greens
are going out and out to win 3 seats, which would put lovable Noel Lynch
back into the London Assembly. If they can win four, then this would put
Sian Berry into the Assembly.

The Lib Dems won 5 top-up seats on 16.5% of the vote in 2004, up from 4 on
14.05% in 2000. London Strategic Voter's view is that the trade of two
fairly anonymous Lib Dem Assembly members for Noel Lynch and Sian Berry
would certainly be an excellent, as both would be excellent Assembly
members and would make an infinitely greater positive impact on the
Assembly than the LibDems.

Respect just missed out on a seat in 2004, getting 4.57% of the vote, just
0.43% short of the threshold. If Respect hadn't split, then there would
have been an excellent chance of getting Lindsey German, their top of the
list candidate, elected. But now it is hard to see how a split vote, that
will leave both Left List and Respect (George Galloway) well short of the
5% threshold, can be avoided. In many ways this is a private battle
between the two halves of Respect to determine who has the most support
following the split. The manifesto policies of Left List and Respect (GG)
are pretty much the same as each other (whilst refreshingly different from
those of the other parties - underlining the daftness of splitting).

The prospects for Lindsey German and the Left List look bleak. Meanwhile,
Respect (George Galloway) have thrown their biggest gun, George Galloway
himself, into the fray. Can George get over the 5% threshold? Given his
huge - and richly deserved - popularity amongst the Muslim community in
London, and his very high recognition factor amongst all Londoners
(admittedly mostly as a tabloid hate figure, but increasingly as a "top
cat" Talk Radio phone-in host), it perhaps cannot be ruled out. Galloway
is asking Londoners the question, can you name a single London Assembly
member? And there is no doubt that they would be able to if he was
elected. As a former Parliamentarian of the Year, elected by other MPs
most of whom hate his views, George Galloway would bring a class of
heavyweight political talent, skill and rhetorical flourish to the task of
holding the Mayor to account that has never before been seen on the London
Assembly.

Is George Galloway worth voting for? Of course, theoretically, but the
problem is, how many Londoners know he is running for the Assembly, given
the media focus on the Mayoral race? In tactical terms, the problem for
London progressive voters is whether a vote for George Galloway would be a
wasted vote that could cost the Greens an extra seat on the Assembly.
Views and feedback are sought at lsvoter@hotmail.co.uk.

*Lost Generation

*"Message in a Bottle" The Party Political Broadcast that thinks it's a music video"

This is one of our best broadcasts ever. It went out before the 1999 Euro elections. Over 100,000 people tried to phone up at the same time and crashed the whole system.

*Academic study predicts Green gain on London Assembly.

The London Communications Agency's report on the forthcoming GLA elections was released today. Written by leading London politics academic, Tony Travers, it predicts one Green gain as follows:

"The Green Party will be looking to pick up one or both of the seats that One London will probably lose. The recent increase in environmental concerns should ensure this happens, as well as the strong performance of the Green Party on the London Assembly over the past term."

"Noel Lynch returns to the Assembly as Green member, four years after he lost his seat, alongside Jenny Jones and Darren Johnson, whose influence in the Assembly will depend hugely on whether Ken Livingstone wins a third term."

A similar report for the 2006 Local Elections correctly predicted six Green gains in Lewisham. It says the mayoral race is too close to call. The full 2008 report is available at http://www.londoncommunications.co.uk/html/hello.lasso

In 2000 Tony Travers was the first to predict that the Green Party would gain seats in the Assembly.

*WELCOME TO THE CRAZY WORLD OF GM AND BIOFUELS

Or how to profit out of a crisis you yourself created

QUESTION: Who kicked off the "biofuels" boom that's triggered soaring food
prices and a whole host of other unintended consequences?

ANSWER: George W. Bush.

QUESTION: Who lobbied for this disastrous policy?

ANSWER: Big agribiz, the biotech industry, big oil and the motor industry.

QUESTION: Who have been the principal beneficiaries of this disastrous
policy?

ANSWER: Big agribiz and Monsanto.

QUESTION: Who warned against such a policy and predicted the consequences?

ANSWER: Many in the environmental movement. GM Watch started publishing
warnings about the dangers of the GM industry's promotion of so called "biofuels"
as far back as 2005. Groups like Friends of the Earth warned about the
dangers of biofuels right from the start.

CONCLUSION?

The obvious conclusion that governments should be drawing from the
"biofuels" debacle is that there are very grave dangers in being swept away by
industry lobbying and adopting policies based on hyperbole about simplistic
technofixes *ahead of the evidence*. This has very clear implications for GM.

BUT pro-GMers are trying to exploit the current crisis to argue exactly the
opposite by totally inverting the truth.

THE CRAZY WORLD OF THE GM PROMOTERS

QUESTION: Who's responsible for the "biofuels" fiasco?

ANSWER: "The greens" who "joined forces" with George Bush to create a food
shortage that today threatens millions in poor countries with hunger and
starvation."

QUESTION: Who paved the way for this disastrous policy?

ANSWER: "The greens" who "demonized the consumption of petroleum and
genetically modified foods, and crusaded against carbon". (Both Bush and Greens Fuel
Food Shortage)
_http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/swaminathan_aiyar/2008/04/both_
bush_and_greens_fuel_food.html_
(http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/swaminathan_aiyar/2008/04/both_bush_and_greens_fuel_food.html)

QUESTION: How do we deal with this disaster?

ANSWER: GM is "the swiftest path to higher productivity" and solving the
problems of hunger andf starvation. (The cost of green tinkering is hunger and
starvation)
_http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/16/biofuels.alternativeenerg
y_
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/16/biofuels.alternativeenergy)

CONCLUSION: "Environmentalists are now the biggest threat to the environment
and the hungry."

COMMENT: The quotes above may be particularly extreme but there are a
disturbing number of opinion pieces appearing that attempt to associate "biofuels"
(read: agrofuels) with environmentalism, and/or hail biotech as the solution
to all possible crisies - based on unsubstantiated claims that GM crops
increase productivity, provide drought-resistance and can solve a myriad of other
problems.

The current crisis atmosphere, in other words, seems to be actually boosting
the promotion of policies based on hyperbole about simplistic technofixes
ahead of the evidence.

If so, those who stand to gain most from this mess could be the very people
who created it.

Green Party election broadcast

*GROUNDBREAKING GREEN BROADCAST AIRS TONIGHT

ITV - 18.25 || BBC - 18.55 || View it now - online at www.votegreenparty.org.uk

Advance stills attached, and at http://www.flickr.com/photos/votegreen/


The Green Party's visually stunning broadcast for the local elections
airs tonight at 18.25 on ITV and 18.55 on both BBC1 . The film,
produced by Contaminant Media and animated by sought-after Shroom
Studios, uses no actors; instead real people were invited to discuss
their concerns, making a compelling argument for Green solutions for a
more affordable and fairer society.

Recent polling has suggested that the Greens could continue to
increase their representation on councils throughout England,
including Norwich Greens moving to within a handful of seats of the
ruling Labour Party. Green councillors have been able to introduce
ideas and policies that put communities first, that support local
businesses and campaigns for affordable housing, that provides free
insulation that saves householders money - wide-ranging policies
reflected in the broadcast that the Greens are delivering and changing
lives for good:

-- Free insulation for every home
-- More affordable housing
-- Free School Meals
-- Safer speed limits
-- Low-cost loans for renewable energy devices like solar panels, and
council led renewable energy and energy efficiency drives