∙ The total value, globally, of new wind power installed in 2006 was £12 billion - and the industry grows by an astounding 30 per cent or more a year.
∙ But the UK is only seizing a small percentage of that market, and we're being left behind. Germany, Denmark, the US, Italy, Spain, China and India all have more wind capacity than us. Canada, France and Portugal are at about the same level or slightly less but, last year, they all grew faster than us.
∙ When heat and transport energy is included, the UK ranks near the bottom of the for renewables development. Only Belgium, Cyprus and Malta are worse.
Wind power
Wind power is a large-scale, reliable source of power that's already having a major positive impact; it provides enough electricity to supply 1.2 million UK homes every year. But we've barely scratched the surface.
Despite the fact that our wind is stronger and more constant than theirs, Germany has built more than ten times our wind farm capacity. Spain has built over five times more than we have, in just a few years.
Once approved, a wind farm doesn't take long to build, so the projects stuck in planning could give us a quick and substantial leap forward in renewable capacity - adding 7.5 per cent of our total electricity supply at a stroke.
Offshore wind farms like the are planned on a scale that will generate the equivalent of the electricity needs for 750,000 homes. Some more recently conceived projects are even bigger, with a predicted output from one such offshore wind farm being about the same as the output from a typical nuclear power station.
Ocean power - wave and tidal
As an island nation, we've always relied on the ocean around us for food, travel, trade and protection. Now it's providing us with clean energy too. The waves crashing onto our western shores carry the power of the Atlantic behind them. The great inlets, firths and channels around our coast have some of the highest tidal ranges and strongest currents in the world.
The is on Islay, in the Western Isles of Scotland. There are plans for a harbour wall . The Orkney Isles has a hugely important for wave and tidal machines.
At the other end of the UK, the mighty Bristol Channel alone has enough tidal energy potential to power the whole of Wales. A - an underwater turbine powered by the streams of the tidal current - off the Devon coast is one of a number of developments helping to drive forward tidal power development. Meanwhile, plans are near completion for what will become the world's largest wave power array, the , to be sited off the coast of Cornwall.
According to government and industry figures, wave and tidal power combined could meet 12.5 per cent of today's electricity demand - economically and practically - by 2025.
Conclusion
Between them, could deliver more than twice as much electricity than the new fleet of nuclear reactors being debated - and the renewables would be built more quickly.
Copenhagen
According to Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the four essentials calling for an international agreement in Copenhagen are:
1. How much are the industrialized countries willing to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases?
2. How much are major developing countries such as China and India willing to do to limit the growth of their emissions?
3. How is the help needed by developing countries to engage in reducing their emissions and adapting to the impacts of climate change going to be financed?
4. How is that money going to be managed?
“If Copenhagen can deliver on those four points I’d be happy,” says Yvo de Boer.
“You see already that investments in renewable energy projects are going down, partly because of the oil price going down and partly because of the economic activity going down,” he says.
But even though greenhouse gas emissions are expected to slow down as a result of shrinking industrial activities, de Boer does not believe it will lessen the pressure on countries to act and sign a new treaty.
“I get the impression talking to business people that they still want clarity from Copenhagen. If you're making investments now, for example in the energy sector, in power plants that are going to be around for the next 30 to 50 years, you can't really afford to keep waiting and waiting and waiting for governments to say where they're going to go on this issue.”
Conflict (Brent Spar)
∙ In 1995, Grenpeace activists occupied the Brent Spar oil storage facility in the North Sea. Their purpose was to stop plans to scuttle the 14,500 tonne installation. The action was a part of an ongoing campaign to stop ocean dumping, and pitted Greenpeace against the combined forces of the UK government and the world's then-largest oil company.
∙ Dramatic visual footage of activists being attacked with water cannons and relief teams being flown in by helicopter brought the stand-off to a massive audience. Spontaneous protests in support of Greenpeace and against Shell broke out across Europe.
∙ Some Shell stations in Germany reported a 50% loss of sales. Chancellor Kohl raised the issue with the UK government at a G7 meeting. But despite the UK government's refusal to back down on plans to allow the Spar to simply be dumped into the ocean, public pressure proved too much to bear for Shell, and in a dramatic win for Greenpeace and the ocean environment, the company reversed its decision and agreed to dismantle and recycle the Spar on land.
∙ The decision led to a ban on the ocean disposal of such rigs by the international body which regulates ocean dumping.
∙ Although the Brent Spar campaign is remembered as one of the most significant Greenpeace successes of the 1990s, it was actually just one part of a much larger campaign in which Greenpeace continues to confront industry and governments, challenging them to take action to .
Cooperation (Venezuela and Africa)
∙ Sept 27, the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela endorsed eight cooperation agreements on energy with an important group of African countries, such as South Africa, Mauritania, Cape Verde and Sudan.
∙ “We have agreed joint development at mature fields; we will evaluate the participation of this country at the block 4 of the Orinoco Oil Belt; and joint development of technology for Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) to produce natural gas based diesel,” Ramirez explained.
∙ Likewise, he stated that there is a project to expand the storage capacity in South Africa, because this country is in the path of the oil route between Venezuela and China.
∙ Minister Ramirez talked of signed agreements with Mauritania, already holding an installed refining capacity that will be evaluated to increase oil production perspectives in that nation.
∙ Agreements were signed as well with Cape Verde and Niger, which are smaller countries and purely oil consumers, including refining projects to increase their production capacity, so as to satisfy their domestic demand.
∙ “In addition, there was signed an agreement with Sudan in the framework of the energy cooperation agreement, so our companies will work in each other countries, but making emphasis on developing Sudan's natural resources, specifically an area that has a significant oil production,” Ramirez commented.
∙ Moreover, Minister Ramirez informed that he held a meeting with the Egyptian delegation in order to reach joint agreements, because both countries have high quality on gas development processes.
∙ Finally, he said that among the agreements to be signed with Lybia this Monday in Caracas, there is a project to transform that nation into a significant storage point to distribute oil to Africa.
