Interesting piece, despite our ongoing technical development our brains can't take it all in and we subsitute scienitific facts with beliefs so our brains can cope. Hence we can't explain the Climate which is too complex to understand (and model) so we end up with Mumbo-Jumbo beliefs.

http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1367949/What-Mayans-teach-wind-turbines.html

Snippet :-

. In the case of the Mayans, as drought conditions worsened, their leaders abandoned rational man-made remedies such as building reservoirs and underground cisterns, and turned to worshipping objects for their supposed magical powers.
The same confusion over facts and beliefs also occurred as the Roman Empire, Ming Dynasty, Khmer and Egyptian civilisations began their
descent. The modern-day equivalent is best illustrated by our failure to find an alternative to oil. Instead, we build wind turbines which are inefficient, expensive and do not solve the problem.

Observer piece on UK nuclear policy post Fukushima, it seems Huhne is now not so keen, Yeo more rational and informed, at least about the lack of output from wind and solar, and consequential blackouts:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/mar/19/huhne-says-uk-might-have-to-drop-nuclear-option

But both still appear committed to the ludicrous and pointless 80% CO2 emissions reduction by 2050.

BTW - I have never been pro nuclear (waste problem has to be addressed) but I put more blame on the earth scientists (seismologists) than the nuclear scientists/engineers for the Fukushima fuck up (which it is, despite the spin the Register puts on it). Here's why:

- the reactors shut down the minute the earthquake struck as they were designed to

- the backup diesel generators kicked in within 40 seconds of the grid supply failing as they were designed to

- the batteries took over when the diesels failed, as they were designed to...

The problem was that the sea wall was designed to only protect the other plant infrastructure from tsunamis up to 6.5m high. Considering it is well known that Japan is in a seismic hell hole, and that tsunamis can easily be 10m + this was incompetent.

Likewise the fact that the diesel generators were not built on high ground like the reactor halls were.

And for anyone who thinks such a disaster could never happen in seismically quiet British Isles, google the Storegga Slide, a sub-sea land slip off Norway which happened about 8000 years ago, and triggered a tsunami 50m high, which reached up to 50 miles inland. Goodbye Aberdeen, half of Angus, lowland Perthshire, Fife (no loss there then), Leith, East Lothian, Newcastle etc. And Torness is only 10-15m above sea level. Hopefully the Storegga Slide is only a 1 in 100,000 year event.

More scaremongering.

Climate change may not be responsible for the tsunami, but it is shrinking our margin of safety. It is time to shrink back ourselves

So the solution is to revert to Dark Ages, thats funny because a smaller earthquake in Hahti kills 230,000, much more than the expected 15,000 in Japan, Hahti is the Dark Ages !!!!!!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/18/japan-horror-thin-edge-climate-change

I don't know how they can keep a straight face when they tell these Porkies.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/mar/17/wind-cheaper-nuclear-eu-climate

This should start a few tongues wagging :)

'Green' price tag: $700 trillion to drop Earth's temp 1 degree
Even EPA admits cost of regulating greenhouse gases 'absurd'

Read more: 'Green' price tag: $700 trillion to drop Earth's temp 1 degree

http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=275109

Our loal paper has a paragraph on the forthcoming Climate Week which will included members of the local Energy Network asking local residents to sign a pledge to make at least one behavioural change "resulting in a reduction of energy usage and hence carbon [sic] emissions."

All I can say is, they had better not ask me to sign any such pledge.....

Farming isn't what it was. We once had harvest festivals. Then set-aside festivals. Now our feed-in tariff festivals are soon be a thing of the past.

Farming isn't what it was. We once had harvest festivals. Then set-aside festivals. Now our feed-in tariff festivals are soon be a thing of the past.

biddyb, 12:31pm - I posted here on Climate Week: http://climatelessons.blogspot.com/2011/02/topical-storm-alert-climate-week-has.html. Back then it looked to be something of a damp squib. And since then, it has raised the ire of one part of the Climate Church, the part that doesn't care too much for the Royal Bank of Scotland (see footnote to post). Note that the supporters list represents quite an 'establishment'. I guess more than one sect of the Church would be uncomfortable to be part of 'the' establishment. That would not, of course, include well-integrated multinational corporations such as WWF or Greenpeace - I think they really like being there. There time has come. Big time. (May it soon be Short Time!) It will be interesting to see what kind of splash this climate week makes in the media and elsewhere. I'm guessing very low key, and your report of a photo competition is consistent with that. Insidious, nevertheless.

Very unusually (perhaps uniquely), the BBC Radio 4 programme "material World" yesterday was almost completely unbiased. It was all about Fukushima Daiichi and the effects of radiation. It is very well worth listening to, but not completely accurate with regards to modern nuclear technology.