The right to remain silent
I was disappointed to read the news story yesterday of pre-emptive arrests for the protest at Eon’s Ratcliffe-on-soar (Nottingham) power station which is the third biggest single producer of CO2 in the UK. Arrested on charges of conspiracy to commit aggravated trespass and criminal damage, a large number of police arrested the protesters in what sounded like a full on anti-terrorist raid. Although they were released this morning
Now, far be it from me to question the police and their methods (I’d rather they did their jobs than not) but it does fill me with dismay that the people who are willing to stand up for what they believe in have to face this kind of treatment, when really every person in the country (and the planet) should be taking responsibility for the damage CO2 is doing to the earth. In particular, I’d like to question David Porter, Chief Executive of the Association of Electricity Producers, who the BBC reported saying that “campaigners’ calls to stop burning fossil fuels made no sense”.
Surely, and this may just be me with my limited knowledge of business and making money at the expense of everyone else on the planet, but surely, he could have come up with a better response than pooh-poohing the environmental implications of using up the last of the fossil fuels. I’m not denying that simply shutting it down would be disruptive and would possibly have economic ramifications but isn’t it just a little bit more important that the continuation of burining fossil fuels won’t only speed up our demise but could be the very reason for impending extinction? Or am I just stating the obvious here?
It seems to me that the only way to make people listen is to go to dramatic lengths (such as closing down the power station even if only briefly) particularly when people like David Porter, who are in positions to actually do something about the energy crisis are ignoring the science.
On my hitlist of so-called experts is the Professor Emeritus of Newcastle University, Ian Fells who reported back in September 2008 that energy security is ‘more important’ than climate change. Allow me to roll my eyes a few times before continuing. I’m not dismissing the importance of energy security and the massive detrimental effects any power cuts would have on our economy, but to dismiss climate change as an important factor, is short sighted and irresponsible.
I’m tired of listening to people dismiss climate change, saying that it doesn’t exist or that it isn’t important. It doesn’t take much for people to sit on their backsides and let others do the protesting or anything that takes effort. So it really irritates me when the ‘experts’ fail to give us any incentive to act immediately. We should be investing money into renewable energy, into sustainable ways of living and not focusing solely on the economy. What will the economy matter when the planet becomes uninhabitable for human life? Surely it would make more sense to prepare for the worst and then anything less than that is a bonus.
Tags: climate change, David Porter, Energy security, Fossil fuels, Ian Fells, power station, Ratcliffe-on-soar, Renewable energy
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