When King Midas was granted a wish by Dionysius - for finding and returning Dionysius's foster-father - Midas asked that everything he touched should turn to gold.

With energy demand and costs soaring, the appeal of cheap energy is easy to see. And if that cheap energy could also be carbon-free, we might imagine the world's greatest crisis would be solved.

Download the new leaflet for the MSc in Human Ecology, run collaboratively by The Centre for Human Ecology and the University of Strathclyde:

http://www.che.ac.uk/mambo/media/humanecology_MSc_course_leaflet.pdf

We're involved in three 'climate challenges'. They raise some interesting questions about cooperation and competition.

We’ve recently been asked by several organisations for advice about carbon offsetting. This brought up some interesting issues that we thought would be good to explore.

Given the universal condemnation of events in Zimbabwe, how should businesses respond? Those with operating subsidiaries in the country, have been offering some interesting accounts of their activities.

The price of oil is becoming a major global issue. People are taking to the streets, truck drivers are striking and blockading, fishermen warning of bankruptcy, farmers of increased production costs, airlines are introducing surcharges and cutting jobs and routes.

Real action, sufficient to tackle climate change, will only come from engaging deep personal values of empathy with others and the natural world, says a new report from WWF. What does this means for businesses and other organisations wanting to be part of the solution to climate change?

Why does Tesco do it? The company has been accused of behaving aggressively in Thailand by undercutting small local stores.

According to The Economist - “Voters have good reason to worry about energy, security and their environment.

"But they may have to get used to more pricey petrol. Historically cheap gasoline, partly as a result of low taxes, has enabled what even George Bush has called an American addiction to oil. More pricey oil might be one factor that reduces carbon emissions.”

It is good to see that enviornmental issues are now an accepted part of mainstream politics.  Or will they be confined to electioneering?

So the UK is to go for nuclear technology. Could this be related to the recent overhaul of the planning system?

And it would be nice to see the 250,000 year management plan - which is of course perhaps the minimum timeframe needed to look after all that nuclear waste.  No doubt John Hutton will personally guarantee that nothing goes wrong over the next few million years.  If only such long term thinking applied elsewhere.