Time to re-sole me Guats?

The tread on me 6+ year old Guat hand made boots (made in Sheffield) is looking a bit smooth.
Will probably get new soles stuck on this summer.

Interesting interview with the CEO of Fareham's Isentropic

Here's a link to an interview with James Mcnaughten, CEO of energy storage company Isentropic.

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/interviews/interview/1000709/

Isentropic are developing a revolutionary method of storing large amounts of energy using relatively common materials. The idea being to store energy produced by renewable energy when the ouput is higher than the demand, thus smoothing out the variability when renewables are used on a larger scale. Because the materials used are not exotic, the costs are predicted to be similar to hydro-electric pumped storage systems.

Richard Noble test drives the latest Nissan Leaf

Richard Noble (world land speed record until 1997) joins Robert and test drives the latest version of Nissan Leaf:

Waterlooville the building site

As previously mentioned, Waterlooville has been turned into a big building site this year. Here are some of the other projects...

The old BAe/Marconi office block has almost completely gone, after a number of weeks of demolition work. Thankfully this time it looks like the trees will survive??
Let's not forget (like we don't forget those that fell in wars) that the land behind that fence was once farm land.

Hambledon parade is also getting a makeover, with new shops being built on the opposite side of Hambledon road on the Taylor Wimpey Wellington Park development.
Again the land where the new shops are being built was once farm land, another fallen victim.
More concrete!

Sainsburys chop down trees for a petrol station

As Waterlooville is being turned into a building site (thanks to the Conservatives dumping any ideas of being environmentally aware) Sainsburys is duplicating Asdas actions by chopping down green things so that they can build a petrol station. This time it is trees that were originally a part of an old and established hedgerow that ran along the original path of Hambledon Road.

As a part of the plan to build a big store, Sainsburys is 'upgrading' the roundabout, thus allowing more cars to interfere with the pedestrian route into Waterlooville. Both the petrol station and roundabout developments have resulted in numerous trees being felled and ground being laid to waste.

Both Asda and Sainsburys seem to have plans for increasing green house gas emissions in the area, supported by the Brown party, namely The Conservatives.

Robert investigates the oil refining industry

Robert Llewellyn compares energy use in electric cars and fossil fuel powered cars and the oil refining industries use of coal fired power stations:

Asda put fuel sales before plant life

In the race to supply fossil fuels to the public and with the prospect of Sainsburys building a petrol station to compliment their new store, Asda has built a petrol station in the car park near the Asda store.
The car park has had thick vegetation and trees planted around the perimeter to visually hide it from public view and this has worked for many, many years. The West of Waterlooville has been quite green with vegetation for a long time now, but it seems that marketing, bad planning and profiteering is overriding common sense.

The 'hedgerow' that once surrounded the car park has now been thinned out, but not thinned all around the car park, just the bit that was hiding the Petrol station from public view. From the photo you can see the vegetation at the back is thicker than in the forground. To the right you can see the roof of the petrol station, the vegetation has been cleared so that cars approaching Waterlooville along the dual carriageway can see the Petrol station.

It's sad, but this imitates the larger picture we have today, where the environment is not integrated into economic, community and political thinking. A large American corporation is putting petrol sales and the production of green house gas emissions above wider community interests and the environment.

The silly thing is that it is far more noticeable because they only thinned out a section that was clearly blocking drivers views of the Petrol station!

It's a pity that Asda can find the money to chop down bushes and other vegetation, but can't find the money to pick up the garbage dropped by it's shoppers and is a direct result of their operational policies.

But then their corporate mentality and the people they employ at the top are not interested in integrating nature into their business model.