News Items

 

• The oil price exceeded $100/barrel for only the second time at the end of January 2011; this reflects the growing demand for oil derived products at a time when the world’s oil supply is close to peaking or has peaked; any large scale switching from oil to gas will simply forward the peak in the world’s gas supply which will likely peak around 2025

• A new study has been made of coal demand and it suggests that the world’s supply will peak by 2100; however, any switching from oil and gas to coal will increase greenhouse emissions per unit of energy

• The annual survey of greenhouse gas emissions by the US Energy Administration shows that China is now the biggest emitter; this is partly due to increased internal demand for goods and products and partly due to production being switched from local to global manufacture

• Some 20 years after the first UN conference on Sustainable Development, a second conference will be held in 2012; the major outputs from the first conference included conventions on limiting climate change and maintaining biodiversity; what the outcomes will be of next years conference is not yet clear, but there is as yet no agreement to a successor treaty to the Kyoto convention on reducing greenhouse gas emissions; information and education are likely to be an agenda item

• Changing with the climate network held its first project meeting in Bologna in December hosted by Unita Ambiente, Comune di Bologna, Italy at which the 2011 activities were planned

• Two fifth-scale glass fibre composite bogies completed their sixth year in service on Lakeside Railway, adjacent to Southampton Airport