Giving up carbon for Lent

On Radio 2 this afternoon, Chris Evans had a Bishop on saying that we should give up carbon for Lent. I take it this means that my attempts at cookery may have to be somewhat more carefully prepared for the next 40 days, and that perhaps even a new toaster may be in order.

Out of interest, why can't anyone produce a toaster that doesn't cremate one side, or one corner, and leave the rest uncooked? We are doing a fantastic job of warming the planet apparently, so how come we can't evenly toast a single slice of bread? Or one into which a standard slice of bread fits? Can't the bread makers and toaster peeps get together on size of slice? (If anyone knows a good toaster, please recommend one. Preferably one of those old ones which did 4 slices, and had a little wind up timer on the side - they always worked fine).

Anyway, back to the carbon thing. Read an article today about a call to ban patio heaters patio heaters on El Reg. The EU noodles have been sitting in some over-heated, super-lit office in Brussels again pondering how to reduce the carbon footprint of the population of the EU. It seems to me that several of the suggestions made in the comments would have more of an impact on the carbon emissions than turning a few patio heaters off and sending us poor smokers to hospital with hypothermia or pneumonia to add to our woes.

So, here would be my list of things to do to reduce carbon emissions.

1) Tell all Brussels bureaucrats that their expense allowance now includes one flight per year to Brussels and the rest is going to be spent on FTTH across the whole of EU so the buggers can teleconference instead of going on jaunts. As I understand it, FTTx kit is far more energy efficient than DSL kit, or a Boeing 737.
2) Turn off lights in every single unoccupied building and room in the country/world. Especially Govt and commercial ones. Last time I passed the DTi building in London, at 6am in the morning, it looked like the proverbial Xmas tree. In New York, London, Paris etc none of the kids have ever seen the night sky - they have no chance with all those lux deafening the stars.
3) Put over every single street light a metal reflector so the light is reflected downwards. On top of the reflector put a small solar panel. I've seen these in the Canaries, and they work a treat. Not only can you reduce the wattage of the lightbulb required, but the things produce energy to supplement the electricity needed to light streets at 4am.
4) Turn streetlights off after midnight. If we build nightvision into mobile phone cameras, everyone could use those instead. Or eat more carrots if they insist on walking around in the middle of the night.
5) Allow adults to make decisions about smoking. In Spain, when the smoking ban was introduced, it took 4 days for ashtrays to be re-introduced inside bars and pubs, and not much longer to repeal the law and change it so the proprietor of the establishment could decide for him/herself what was best for his business and customers. Why? Because the Spanish (and others), unlike the Brits, don't take nanny state-ism lying down. Most bars over a certain size have more than enough room for a smoking and non-smoking area. Our local pub does and prior to the smoking ban, it was working just fine with the non-smokers in the lounge. However, now, as most of the locals are smokers, we have one or two forlorn non-smokers sitting in the bar alone, whilst everyone else is socialising outside. Next to the patio heater.

Britain is so busy trying to regulate everything and control everyone, we have ceased to teach youngsters (and dim adults) about the responsibility for their actions, and consequences of doing things wrong. Not wrong as in passing a speed camera 4 miles above the speed limit, or skiving school/work occasionally, but wrong as in knifing people, not respecting their elders, causing criminal damage, kicking shit out of people when they've had one too many etc.

Let them climb trees and fall out of them, let them play conkers, let them be kids, so they can learn to be decent adults. And let the adults work out for themselves what is right and correct behaviour for human beings.

Currently, IMHO, the UK deserves nominating for a reverse Darwin award as we seem to be doing a remarkably good job of removing certain people from the gene pool - the good guys. Those who go to try to break up a fight, stop criminal damage being caused by yobs etc and get kicked, knifed, murdered etc. The kids who don't want to join a gang. Those who speak out about Govt insanity and die in suspicious circumstances in woods. We penalise the honourable members of our society, who refuse to pay poll tax for nuclear weapons, and then let off a joyrider who kills someone with a conditional discharge.

No wonder so many people are voting with their feet and leaving this country. You don't see the French or Spanish emigrating in droves. They are in it for the long-term, and fight for the idiocies of politicians who don't live in the real world to be stopped. The British have put up with this domination for 500 years longer than many other nations (since 1066 or thereabouts) and the stiff upper lip needs to start wavering a little.



So, yes, turn your lights off. And every CEO, MP etc should be held personally responsible for any energy wastage in their business premises, and their constituency. Not just through Lent but from now on. What about a flickr site where you can post photos of any building with the lights left on, and the location, name of business, council etc and name and shame the buggers. They are wasting far more than us average human beans, posting to blogs about womble porn and keeping warm whilst we smoke with patio heaters.