Pleasing the greens

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

You can't. Whatever you do, there will be some segment of the 'green' community having a moan.

I live near the Severn Estuary which I am led to believe has the 2nd highest tidal range in the world. So today the Government has published ideas on how to harness this source of beloved sustainable energy through barrages and inshore lagoons which could generate 5% of the UK's electricity needs. Earth Cymru says it prefers to have offshore lagoons but says nothing more.

And of course, there are in the inevitable moans about the destruction of the wetlands on which birds survive. No mention that there will be a rise in sea levels if we carry on with fossil burning and that would swamp them anyway.

This mob has protested against nuclear energy for 50 years despite the fact that the only really serious failure was Chernobyl. Yes I know there were others like Three Mile Island etc. And now we are in the dicky dirt and facing up to the fact and winds and tides alone will not give us the carbon free energy we need in years to come. So we are going to go nuclear anyawy.

I don't have an answer to this complex subject but I do realise that a knee-jerk moan to every new initiative will get us nowhere. For those that worry about birds and other wild life (and I have some empathy here), the big question is - Which is worse for them? Global warming or new ideas on energy generation.