The Secret Life of Stuff (Jan11)
Julie Hill thought I’d be uncomfortable with her view that we’ve had enough of green consumerism, where people are left to choose to be green or not. What we want, she says, is more ‘choice editing’. That effectively means that businesses and retailers only offer products that have a minimal environmental impact or are deemed to […]
Eco-Renovating London Flat (Jan11)
I’ve started eco-renovating my London flat. It’s been rented out since 1995 but needs sprucing up. I’ve employed architect Jerry Tate , who specialises in bringing ‘buildings and nature closer together’. In this case it means lots of insulation, inspirational energy and water-saving ideas and including as much recycled materials as possible. I’ll be up-dating my […]
Eco-Sheets – Using Recycled Plastics (Jan11)
In January 2011 I took my son Connor (far right in picture) to see the Eco Sheet factory. Melinda Watson from the Raw Foundation came too (pictured far left) – and Amanda Barry-Hirst from Greenhouse PR. Omer Kutluoglu, one of the founders showed us around. They’re making brilliant use of recycled mixed plastics – turning them into […]
Laser Vision (Dec10)
It’s brilliant – I’m over the moon! I now have 20:20 vision again. I had the surgery just before Christmas. It was totally painless – although a little frightening. But I was completely confident in the surgeon – Dr. Dan Reinstein from the London Vision Clinic which he set up.
Buying a second-hand green car….(Dec10)
My Audi A3 was a bit battered but I loved it. I particularly liked the fact that it was extremely fuel efficient, whilst also being quite speedy. Although, my sons complained that I drive too slowly and so didn’t make the most of this quality. One of the few problems with the Audi was it […]
Eco-driving by Fiat (Dec10)
If everyone in Europe was an eco-driver we could apparently save the equivalent of the annual CO2 emissions from Portugal! According to Fiat, we’d also all be getting places faster. Their eco-driving advice encourages less stopping and starting – and less vrooming on the accelerator. That made me wonder if women were better eco-drivers than […]
Ecotricity Advisory Board (Dec10)
Dale Vince, CEO of Ecotricity set up an Advisory Board in 2010. Other members include Jonathan Porritt (Forum for the Future), Charles Middleton (Triodos Bank), Martin Wright – Green Futures Magazine, Anna Guyer (Greenhouse PR) and Lucy O’Shea (Futerra.)
Eco-renovation – starting with windows (Nov10)
I have a flat in London that’s been rented out for years. But I’ve recently started some renovation work, which I’ll be reporting on over the next few months. The first job has been repairing the windows. They rattled and in some places had large gaps, which let the air in and the heat out […]
Unilever’s Sustainable Living Plan (Nov10)
There was a lot of talk about de-coupling. But they weren’t referring to what people get up to in laybys. It was a Unilever inspired session on sustainable consumption, which I watched as a webcast. De-coupling in this case was all about ‘green growth’ – whether it’s possible for a company to both increase profits […]
Recycling in Somerset – new scheme includes plastic bottles and cardboard
I got stuck behind the recycling truck. What frustrated most was that it had just passed my house and I’d forgotten to leave anything out for them. But I’m a supporter of recycling. When household collection was first introduced – about 7 years ago – my non-recyclable waste dwindled to almost nothing. Our home recycling […]
Is the Green Deal a Good Deal? No! (Nov10)
This week I went to a Green Monday event, held in the offices of Merrill Lynch, the theme of this well attended evening was ‘The Energy Bill – The Green Deal’. This Bill is due to go before parliament by the end of this year, but is still in its formative stages. We heard from Patrick […]
Second Nature Partnership – Advisory Board (Nov10)
South Africans, Charles Perry and Mark Griffiths, co-founded this partnership in 2009. The philosophy is to make sustainability ‘second nature’. I’ve worked with them on a few projects and in 2010 they set up an advisory board, which I agreed to sit on.