The Wave and Quit Dirty Coal

James Hansen, one of the world’s foremost climate experts has warned that “coal is the single greatest threat to civilisation and all life on the planet”. (1) The organisers of The Wave, the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition have a policy on dirty coal (2) which includes a call on Government to “withhold permission to build new coal fired power stations that cannot capture their carbon emissions, such as Kingsnorth”. So tonight’s news, that power company E.ON have shelved their plans to build a new coal fired power station at Kingsnorth (3) is a small victory in the campaign against dirty coal.

Per capita the UK produces more CO2 emissions from fossil fuels than any other nation.(1) During the winter the UK produces around 55,000 MW of electricity (4) to satisfy peak demand, of which half (28,000 MW) is provided by the UK’s 18 coal fired power stations. (5) E.ON operate 3 of the 18, Ratcliffe-on-Soar, Ironbridge and the existing Kingsnorth power station, between them producing 5,000 MW (9 percent of UK electricity) from dirty coal. (5)

And that’s why Ratcliffe-on-Soar, Nottinghamshire, E.ON UK Headquarters and the 2,000 MW coal fired power station at Didoct A, Oxfordshire remain on our cycle tour of climate crime scenes from Manchester Airport to London for The Wave.

(1) http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/15/james-hansen-power-plants-coal

(2) http://www.stopclimatechaos.org/policy/quit-dirty-coal
(3) http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/oct/07/eon-cancels-kingsnorth-power-station
(4) http://www.e-day.org.uk/national.aspx
(5) http://www.ukqaa.org.uk/PowerStation.html

London to Copenhagen Bike Ride 2009

Things are going well with our preparations for our ride(s) to London. Some of us met in Bradford last night to discuss a few practicalities. Also, with the ride from Manchester taking shape, and with people in different parts of the country starting to get in touch, it looks like we could have quite a healthy number of spokes on our Wheels To The Wave.

I'd also like to mention Christian Aid’s London to Copenhagen Bike Ride, which starts after The Wave, from 9th-16th December. This will see an army of cyclists arrive in Copenhagen in time for the UN Summit. There will also be an opportunity to hand over mass numbers of pledges which people in the UK have signed to Gordon Brown to ask him to commit to a fair and just deal for developing countries from the talks.