I rather liked this letter in yesterday's UK Daily Mail, so I thought I would share it:
Red alert on Greenpeace
IS GREENPEACE more powerful than UK voters? Its lawyers are demanding a judicial review of the Government's decision to reconsider its attitude towards nuclear power.
Would that we could do the same about Greenpeace's undemocratic decision to cover the world with useless and damaging windfarms, a course of action which almost all governments are following.
I know why we can't: it would take too much money. How democratic is a democracy which allows rich lobby groups to influence its policy? Greenpeace seems to be awash with money: how much of it comes from the wind industry (i.e. taxpayers' money)?
Greenpeace's co-founder Patrick Moore was right: 'They (Greenpeace' s new management) have become far more extreme, their politics little more than neo-Marxism in green garb.'
As he points out, much of the environmental movement today tends to be strongly anti-human, anti-science, anti-business and anti-civilisation - as well as highly misleading. Greenpeace isn't green and doesn't want peace. It's red and it wants power.
I don't particularly care for nuclear power myself, but I don't like an organisation that pretends to be green while destroying our natural surroundings for cialis its own gain - financial and political.
MARK DUCHAMP,
Pedreguer, Spain.
I don't think that question can be answered without focussing on specific groups Paul. In some spheres of policy and countries, maybe private have more influence, in others, public.
I know that most of the skeptics on this blog would be of the view that greenie groups in Australia like ACF, WWF and Greenpeace have enormous influence over govt policy on climate change.
In my view, such views are wrong.
I think it should be quite clear that John Howard and co don't give a flying proverbial what Greenpeace or any other green group thinks, and don't look to them for policy advice, EVER. They have approximately zero influence with the federal govt. And plenty of the Labor State govts would only pay them lip service, give them a meeting every now and then to keep them happy, as well.
The pressure for cliamte change policy that govts feel comes from voters. As JWH is now finding - ignore climate change and you lose popularity. Now he is resorting to all sorts of knee-jerk quickly and sloppily implemented climate change policies to appear like he is doing something.
One might argue that green groups exert significant pressure on govts indirectly, via the influence they have on the general public.
However, I'm not a subscriber to this argument. I think it is common on *both* sides of the political fence to view the general public as incredibly stupid and easily led. But I think that the general public (not individual people, I mean voters as a bloc) are pretty good at picking the spin and incompetence from the substance. You'd want to be in today's world, otherwise you would be buying every product in sight after the constant battering of advertising we receive.
I think that environmental awareness is something that has been growing over 4 decades, and to try and sheet home current widespread public concern on climate change to the undue influence of a handful of NGOs is absurd.
In Australia, I'd say that industry lobby groups such as the Energy Supply Association of Australia, the Business Council of Australia, the Property Council of Australia, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry etc, have FAR FAR FAR more direct influence on energy policy with both State and Federal governments than any of the green groups.
What influence do privately funded lobby groups have compared to public funded groups?
The original post is about the influence of rich lobby groups, and about the bias that may be inherent in Greenpeace's apparently altruistic posturing due to them potentially receiving wind industry funding.
You can certainly apply the same views/criticisms to privately funded lobby groups.
The post was about undue influence carrying a hidden bias, not mis-use of taxpayer monies.
Just change the goal posts why don't you Paul?
Privately funded lobby groups aren't funded by the tax payer, which is the issue here.
Let's turn an equal dose of scrutiny on privately funded lobby groups. I await a balanced story on other activitist groups Paul
An invisible wind mill competition. Hmmm. And would they also be invisible to aircraft?
Eeep!
hahaha. yup, wind turbines in the city would be good.
The main problem would be turbulence - it can really add to wear and tear.
I did see a design for a whacky wind turbine that would be suspended between skyscrapers, with a funnelling array to help channel even more wind towards the blades. CAn't find a link quickly, sorry!
But found a different one found while quickly looking for a pic, this one even more way out:
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/wind/windscraper-buildings-generate-power-260400.php
Crap(!) and an actual implementation for the Bahrain World Trade Center, featuring 3 wind turbines suspended between towers:
http://bahrainwtc.com/
There are also smaller, domestic or light industrial scale designs thare are designed to look more aesthetic:
http://www.mag-wind.com/
but what they gain in appearance they lose in efficency - not really appropriate for large scale power generation trying to compete with coal etc.
Make the gargoyles look like famous eco-warriors - Al Gore f'rinstance? Shut up Davey ... exit gibbering.
Harry Potter might have some ideas on invisibility. Are you there, Harry?