The UK’s recent run of damp summers could be down to a cyclical warming of the Atlantic Ocean. That was the view of scientists and meteorologists who gathered at the Met Office to discuss the unusual weather patterns of recent years. They said that this 10 to 20 year pattern of Atlantic warming was shifting the jet stream, leading to washouts in six of the last seven summers. But they suggested that the pattern would change at some point in the next decade.

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For a country blessed with bountiful oil supplies, it may appear incongruous. But Norway is importing as much rubbish as it can get its hands on, in an effort to generate more energy by burning waste in vast incinerators. The Eurotrash business may sound like an unpromising enterprise, but it’s one that is increasingly profitable. The UK paid to send 45,000 tonnes of household waste from Bristol and Leeds to Norway between October 2012 and April this year.

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 Fishing is expected to be banned near the Atlantic islet of Rockall after a rare methane gas vent in the seabed and two new shellfish species were discovered by British scientists. The methane, which leaks through a so–called “cold seep” vent in the ocean floor, was found last year by scientists working with the government agency Marine Scotland. It is the first of its kind to be found near UK waters and only the third in the north–east Atlantic. It was detected after Marine Scotland’s Scotia survey ship trawled up two new species of deep–water clam that have a “chemosynthetic” relationship with the methane: the clams’ food source is a bacteria that harvests the gas. That implies there may be a complex ecosystem around the mouth of the vent.

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An environmental lobby is to appeal the granting of 34 aquaculture licences in a Kerry harbour designated as a special area of conservation. Friends of the Irish Environment are angry over Marine Minister Simon Coveney’s decision to approve a number of projects in Castlemaine Harbour in Dingle Bay.

The harbour, a designated special area of conservation (SAC), is also a special protected area for birds.

In recent years, draft netting of salmon has been severely curtailed in the harbour.

In 2011, the harbour — an important source of mussel seed — was closed altogether during periods of environmental assessment.

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A recent poll shows that the public are in favour of a revival of deposit–and–return systems. The chief bottle washers, however, remain unconvinced

God be with the days when we used to go back to the shop with our empty bottles of Taylor Keith lemonade and get refunds. It may have been just a few pence for each bottle returned, but every little helped, and the extra coins could be used to supplement our pocket money so we could buy more sweets – or more red lemonade.

A recent opinion poll carried by Coastwatch Ireland found that many people from the over–40s bracket are nostalgic for the days when Ireland still had deposit–and–return schemes for drinks containers. It also found there is overwhelming public support for the return of the deposit and return.

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Procedures in six local authorities to be examined after part of review quashed

Six local authorities are to be subject to new investigations for planning irregularities by independent planning consultants to be appointed by Minister of State for Planning Jan O’Sullivan.

Planning procedures and practices in Dublin and Cork city councils as well as Cork, Carlow, Galway and Meath county councils had been examined in an internal review by the Department of the Environment.

“I am determined to uphold the integrity of the planning system,” Ms O’Sullivan said. “It is vital that scrutiny and evaluation of the planning process is not only fair and objective, but is also seen to be so by the public.”

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Plans to install warning signs at four storm water retention ponds in east Cork have been abandoned after residents complained they could adversely affect their house values.
Midleton Town Council refilled holes prepared for the signs following a petition signed by 43 residents of Millbrook Court, on Millbrook Estate. The petition asked that the holes be refilled, while expressing concern over signage placement and a potentially negative impact on house values, insurance and sale potential.

Midleton Town Clerk Joe McCarthy says the signs, measuring approximately 2 feet wide by 2.5 feet high and on standard poles of approximately 6 feet, were rejected “without being seen”. 

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Two Cork landowners have mounted a High Court challenge against a decision of the authorities to grant planning permission for a windfarm near their home.

Klaus Balz and Hanna Heuback, of Bear No Gaoithe, Inchigeelagh, Co Cork, are opposed to a decision by An Bord Pleanála to grant planning permission to Cleanrath Windfarm Ltd to construct 11 turbines up to heights of 126m and other structures including an 85m–high meteorological mast at Cleanrath, Co Cork.

The couple live and operate a shrubbery business just 650m from the nearest turbine on the proposed development.

Yesterday Eamon Galligan, for the applicants, told the High Court that in Jun 2011, Cork County Council refused to grant planning permission for the project.

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Politicians and the fish farming industry are acting to abate concerns following eating health experts’ warning over Norwegian farmed salmon toxicity levels.

“I don’t recommend pregnant women, children, or young people eat farmed salmon. There is too much uncertainty regarding the amount of toxins salmon contains and how these affect children, adolescents and pregnant women,”Anne–Lise Bjørke Monsen, specialist at Bergen’s Haukeland University Hospital told VG in article including chief physician Bjørn Bolann.

Ms Bjørke Monsen referred to the presence of Persistant Organic Pollutants (POPs) accumulating in the fat–rich fish. Included in this group is PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) and DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane).

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Only 7% of farmers willing to accept recommended protection

Eyeries based Friends of the Irish Environment has written to IFA President John Bryan asking him to address the issue of set backs or buffer zones for farm animals grazing near water courses.

The letter follows further boil water notices being issued in Roscommon because of another outbreak of cryptosporidium, which is transmitted in the faeces of humans and animals. While the spreading of the waste is controlled, the grazing by animals is subject only to a set back or buffer zone of 1.5 metres. This was reduced from 3 metres to 1.5 metres in 2004 as part of an agreement between the IFA and the DoAFF. The recommended minimum set back is 5 metres.

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Support for EU agriculture commissioner Dacian Ciolos and Ireland’s smaller farmers was expressed by the environmental lobby group Friends of the Irish Environment as the two–day informal EU council of agriculture ministers got under way at Dublin Castle this week.

The organisation said that ‘misinformation in the media suggested that the sole aim of EU agricultural policy is to ensure ‘viable food production’. In fact, said FIE, the sustainable management of natural resources and the balanced development of rural area throughout the EU (and beyond) compose the other equally important objectives of EU agricultural policy.’

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Second phase will look at environmental impact of genetically modified potatoes

Blight–resistant plant could be ready for market in under five years, says Teagasc

Teagasc hopes to begin planting more than 5,000 potato plants in the next two weeks, in the second phase of its study into the environmental impact of blight–resistant genetically modified (GM) potatoes.

The agricultural development body began the study last year by planting 48 GM and non–GM potato plants at its Oak Park crops research centre in Carlow. Its senior research officer Dr Ewen Mullins said he hoped planting would get under way later this week if the ground was not too dry. About 5,274 plants will be planted across two acres. One–third are GM plants, one–third are non–GM and the final third are the organic Sarpo Mira variety.

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Celebrity chef Darina Allen and the international Slow Food organisation have clashed with Bord Iascaigh Mhara over its proposed 500–hectare organic salmon farm off the Aran Islands.

In a letter to Simon Coveney, the agriculture and marine minister, the renowned owner of the Ballymaloe Cookery School accused BIM of placing information in part two of its environmental impact statement (EIS) that incorrectly “created the impression that Slow Food supported and endorsed the proposed project”.

In the letter, Ms Allen stated that BIM, which is spearheading the project, took “a passage from the Burren Smokehouse website allegedly without the knowledge or permission of the owner and added that she is a member of Slow Food and Good Food Ireland”. 

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FRIENDS of the Irish Environment has appealed two of Minister Simon Coveney’s recent grants of 34 aquaculture licences in Castletmaine Estuary, County Kerry.

According to the lobby group: “The proposal to cultivate invasive species of non–native oysters and non–native clams and mussels in a Special Area of Conservation and Special Area of Protection for Birds flies in the face of reason and undermines a recent ruling by the European Court of Justice.”

The Minister determines that the loss of up to 15% of the site does not undermine the sites integrity, ruling that “finding of damage to that site is not necessarily incompatible with there being no adverse effects on its integrity”.

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To tackle the rising scourge of tuberculosis in cattle there are three possible measures: culling badgers, vaccination and controlling cattle movements. A new report from MPs on Wednesday, rushed out ahead of vote in the Commons, concludes that vaccination is “no magic bullet”. I completely agree. But the fact that vaccination is hard does not mean badger culling is an easy way to control TB in cattle. In fact, as I have covered many times, the scientists who know most about culling are adamant that shooting badgers is, in Lord Krebs’s words, a “mindless” way to tackle bovine TB.

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The dam is beginning to crack, faster than I would have believed possible. Britain, one of the world’s most zoophobic nations, is at last considering the return of some of its extinct and charismatic mammal species. While wolves, lynx, bears, bison, moose, boar and beavers have been spreading across the continent for decades, into countries as developed and populous as ours, and while they have been widely welcomed in those places, here we have responded to this prospect with unjustified horror. Or perhaps I shouldn’t say “we”. The population as a whole tends to be more sympathetic to reintroductions than the tiny number of people who own most of the land¹.

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The dust hasn’t even settled yet on our economic collapse, singularly caused by the financial and banking system with the support of a complicit government.

Yet it has not stopped our financial services sector, their cheerleaders and fellow travellers from insisting that we need to get back to a lighter regulatory environment, else we may lose some of these companies.

In essence they are asking us to trust them. But events across the world would suggest that corporates have little responsibility to the community at large, so why should we? These companies are profit takers and their major, perhaps even sole responsibility, is to their shareholders.

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Could the writings of ancient Irish monks and scribes hold a key to our cold weather patterns? A group of Irish and international researchers think so.
Studying descriptions of weather in the medieval Irish writings and comparing them with measurements taken from ice cores, researchers have successfully linked the climatic aftermath of volcanic eruptions to extreme cold weather events here over a 1,200–year period.

Researchers from universities including Harvard, UCC, UCD, Trinity College and Queens University Belfast assessed over 40,000 Irish and Latin entries in the Irish annals. Kept by educated scribes in monastic centres until the 13th century and by historians until 1649, the annals describe major events in Ireland’s history.

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Facebook And Twitter Once Again Show Social Media’s Effectiveness As Organizing Tools

As many as 2 million people in 436 cities in 52 countries around the world may have demonstrated in March Against Monsanto protests conducted Saturday, according to the Associated Press, which cited event organizers.

The demonstrators targeted the St. Louis–based Monsanto Co. (NYSE:MON) because of its historical role in introducing genetically modified products into the food supply. GM products are controversial for a number of reasons. One centers on health risks; another centers on labeling.

Because labeling is not mandatory but voluntary in many jurisdictions, such as the U.S., consumers are not universally made aware which products are GM and which products are not GM. Hence, one sign singled out by AP in its coverage of the March Against Monsanto protest in Los Angeles Saturday read, “Label GMOs, It’s Our Right to Know.”

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Study shows a severe accident at a British plant would not require evacuation
Britain’s nuclear power plant building programme poses a “very low” risk to Ireland, a study from the Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland has found.

However, the study was criticised by Friends of the Irish Environment and An Taisce, who have mounted challenges to the first of an expected eight British nuclear plants, the proposed Hinkley Point C reactor in Somerset, England.

The institute’s chief executive, Dr Ann McGarry, said severe radiological effects in Ireland were “unlikely”, but “a socio–economic impact” would be felt in the event of a severe accident.

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