Green on the screen: cinema as if the world mattered

"The Age of Stupid" is the first film in Alnwick Friends of the Earth's Green films season.

Directed by Franny Armstrong (left), Peter Postlethwaite stars as a man living alone in the devastated future world of 2055, looking at old footage from 2008 and asking: "why didn’t we stop climate change when we had the chance?"

Runaway climate change has ravaged the planet by 2055. Pete plays the founder of The Global Archive, a storage facility located in the (now melted) Arctic, preserving all of humanity's achievements in the hope that the planet might one day be habitable again. Or that intelligent life may arrive and make use of all that we’ve achieved. He pulls together clips of “archive” news and documentary from 1950-2008 to build a message showing what went wrong and why.

28th January 2010 - 7.30pm at St James Church Centre, Pottergate, Alnwick

The event also includes:

• homemade ice cream
• a free booklet - "I saw a movie and the world collapsed"
• first in our series of silent, occasionally dodgy B-movies: The Over-Incubated Baby, directed in 1901 by Robert Paul, inventor of the portable iron lung.
• programme notes by the Met Office
• No obligation 10:10 10 point checklist
• a £3 admission charge - sorry

"Every single person in the country should be forcibly made to watch this film".
Ken Livingstone, former Mayor of London

What, even, Ray Farnsworth? Well, maybe. Alnwick Friends of the Earth plan to run more Green films as part of the Green on the Screen series until we run out of films, money or audience.

• Coming up next: Encounters at the End of the World - Thursday 25th February.
  A funny, visually arresting, dreamlike glimpse into the Antarctic
• Coming up later: End of the Line, Sleep Furiously, McLibel, Manufactured Landscapes

Peaking too early: the oil beneath our feet

STOP PRESS: We have had to postpone this talk due to bad weather. We hope to rearrange for the summer of 2010.

Dr Roger Bentley of Whitfield Solar and Reading University challenges the conventional wisdom of ever-increasing oil supply at 7.30pm on Wednesday 13th January 2010, at St James Church Centre, Pottergate, Alnwick.

Roger has studied peak oil for many years. He is a visiting Research Fellow at the University of Reading, Head of Research & Development for Whitfield Solar, and a former Secretary of The Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas, and Secretary of the Oil Depletion Analysis Centre. He has also given evidence several times to House of Lords select committees on economics and energy.

Roger says: “The world's supply of conventional oil is close to peaking and may already have peaked. What is economically significant is the possible sharp decline once the peak has passed. A 3 or 4 per cent reduction per year will quickly cause large price increases, and possibly rationing. And any large scale switching of supply from oil to gas for things like electricity generation, transport or heating, will simply bring forward the date of the supply peak for gas.”

Why does this matter now? Wasn't the oil price bubble caused by cloven-hoofed bankers buying up the stocks and betting on rises? Well, maybe. Or maybe global depression got us off the hook temporarily, and as the economy slowly starts to recover, we may see a pick up in demand for oil, and a rapid return to the 130 pence or more a litre. Roger will be showing how likely this is, and what we might do to limit the impact.

What really happened at Copenhagen?

Friends of the Earth central think they know. It was the rich countries, selling out the developing world with secret documents, weak targets and dodgy carbon offsetting deals. But what do they know, they were removed from the Conference part-way through, either because of a protest or to make room for the hundreds of flashbulb-hungry premiers who showed up temporarily before finding there was no cool deal to be associated with and scuttled off again. It isn't clear.

Environment journalist Mark Lynas thinks he knows too. In an article in the Guardian, he says "How do I know China wrecked the Copenhagen deal? I was in the room" Quite what a journo was doing in the room while China allegedly beat down all efforts to quote targets, Angela Merkel threw a tizz and Barack lost his legendary cool is never quite answered. Do we 'embed' reporters with environmental delegations like we do in war zones now?

So I don`t know.

But I do know that it`s seems pretty dumb to suggest China can continue increasing emissions until 2030 or so when their per capita emissions (4.6 tonnes) are already more than double what they need to be by 2050 (2 tonnes).

I also know it`s pretty dumb for Ed Miliband to drone on every industrialised nations cutting emissions by 80% when the USA, Canada and Australia all emit more than double the EU's emissions. I want to see them hurt more than us. That's climate justice.

I know too that it's pretty dumb to keep talking about China and India as an entity, when India's per capita emissions are 1.3 tonnes - less than the 2050 target. OK - set a target, but it should be a 50% increase by 2050. That's climate justice too.

Finally, I know that the deals around carbon credits are really dumb. This is where the UK or another developed world country earns credits to pollute for investing in some Congolese forest, or for paying an Indian businessman millions to capture some HCFCs, or for giving China a stack of cash to build a hydroelectric power plant which is already built, and then pretending that none of these things would have happened without the cash! How stupid is that? And whilst claiming that we can save the world through carbon trading, for countries to magic carbon credits out of thin air creates rampant devaluation of permits. This is tacklimg climate change Mugabe-style.

There a solution to climate change. Draw a straight line between where countries are now on emissions and where we all need to be in 2050 (2 tonnes per head), and that's your quota. Distribute the right amount of quotas, and make the climate sceptics in Australia, Canada and Oz, the big coal entrepreneurs in China, and the Easyjet addicts in the UK pay for their damage. A huge dividend to the developing world or a real reduction in developed and semi-developed world emissions. Al Gore's your Uncle. I thank you.

Environmental film season

There's a season of green films coming up in Alnwick, organised by Alnwick Area Friends of the Earth in partnership with Transition Alnwick. We can't tell you what they are, as we can't advertise under the terms of our licence. We can't tell you where they'll be for the same reason. And 'cos we haven't decided yet. Anyway. To make sure you find out about the films, complete the form below.

Join Alnwick Friends of the Earth to find out about Green on the Screen
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Taking Alnwick off-Grid - talk summary

Why should local environments be damaged to provide energy elsewhere? Why should the people of Blyth have to live beside a coal fired power station to provide Alnwick with electricity? Perhaps it is time to take responsibility for our own energy use as individuals and as communities.

In the town of Alnwick, each person uses 9890kWhs of energy each year. How could this be met using locally available renewable energy?

• Solar thermal could provide about 50% of domestic hot water


• Miscanthus (Elephant grass) could produce the remainder of our water heating, and space heating with 12.6 sq km.


• Heat pumps could produce this space heating, but we need electricity to power them.


• 3 large turbines would be required for electricity alone, with a further 7 to produce electricity for heat pumps.


• Domestic photovoltaic panels would need to be very large to get close to eliminating even one wind turbine.

A system of feed in tariffs will be introduced next year, guaranteeing a fixed price to individuals or communities that supply the grid with electricity from renewables. Maybe Alnwick won't become energy independent soon, but perhaps we should all be working towards it.

Read Barbara Sexon's full paper - Taking Alnwick off grid

Alnwick Off-grid – peak oil and new possibilities

Dr Barbara Sexon will be speaking on whether Alnwick can live on locally-produced renewable energyat St James Church, Pottergate in Alnwick on Thursday 4th June at 7.30pm.

How many tons of wood fuel would we need, and could we use Hulne Park to produce it? (would the Duke be cool with it?) How many wind turbines would we need, and how high would they need to be? Where could we store the wind energy we produced for the calm times? Barbara’s talk offers an interesting perspective of how we might live sustainably and what Alnwick would look like as a result.

“On any day in The Journal you will find some people complaining about having one form of power station or other. People have got to get their energy from somewhere. I aim to show how we could do it with close to zero emissions.”

Barbara has a PhD in small-scale wind energy, and lives in Thropton. She worked for several years in Sudan producing a small-scale hydropower system which would allow farmers to replace unreliable and polluting diesel generators for irrigation.

Admission is £2 and includes free refreshments.

Letter in support of Wind farms at Toft Hill, Moorsyde and Barmoor

You can send your own letter to Ruth MacKenzie, the Planning Inspector via
moorsyde4us@hotmail.co.uk.

Dear Mrs MacKenzie,

APP/V2913/A/08/2079520 Appeal by Moorsyde Wind Farm Limited for site at Felkington, Berwick upon Tweed TD15 2NR
APP/V2913/A/08/2078347 Appeal by Catamount Energy Limited for site at Barmoor between Ford and Lowick
APP/V2913/A/08/2077474 Appeal by NPower Renewables Limited for site at Toft Hill, south west of Grindon.

I write in support of wind farm at all of the above locations. I am in favour of wind turbines in any location where:

• it is economic to place them
• where fragile ecosystems, which might, for instance be covered by allocating status of SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest), are not placed at risk.
• where there are appropriate mitigations for interference with radar systems
• where there is not collateral damage to the wider economy

None of the criteria above are met by the 3 applications, and it is therefore my view that all should go ahead.

On the economics of wind turbine location - previous views have already identified these areas as UK locations with well above average wind speeds, and the fact that several energy companies have already sought to make applications, and have persisted despite 5 years of blinkered opposition from a minority of well-connected residents indicates their commitment.

Nobody has, to my knowledge, claimed that these or any of the other locations being proposed in Northumberland, are host to threatened species or ecosystems, and none of them are in SSSIs.

On the subject of radar, the Ministry of Defence have offered up inconsistent positions, as shown at Wandylaw, where evidence was presented indicating that the MoD had previously accepted that the wind turbines would not cause problems to neighbouring radar stations, whilst the MoD representative himself appeared to oppose the development on the grounds that they would. In the light of this contradictory stance, I would suggest that the UK's future energy needs are not delayed by such prevarications. The recommendation should be to go ahead with the development, subject to certification that radar facilities can be modified, and upgraded if required, to eliminate this concern, which has been hyped up by anti-wind farm protesters who have as little understanding of radar technology as wind turbine technology, the national grid, or threats to bird life.

Finally, on the damage to the wider economy, I have rarely heard more disingenuous rubbish published as fact than on the subject of the impact of wind turbines on tourism. At no point has any reliable evidence been presented that tourism will suffer as a result of wind (a loaded questionnaire on people's intent to travel to an area once a demonic vision of hideous turbines has been presented does not constitute evidence). The south-west of England and Cumbria have both seen increases in tourism following installation of wind farms. Whilst this cannot be attributed to wind farms, no evidence suggests that areas with similar reliance on tourism which have not installed wind energy facilities have received greater numbers.

The final objection thrown at wind farms, about the aesthetics of them. Surveys continue to show that a large majority of people actually find wind turbines attractive. We should not let a vocal majority obscure this fact. I would like to see a longer-term view of aesthetics which considers the option of extreme weather events with ever-increasing frequencies, coastal settlements turned into ghost towns by encroaching seas, and food shortages in the developing world which leads to mass migrations of desperate, hungry people. Now that is aesthetically displeasing.

David Farrar