Energy

Green Britain Day – Again

June 18, 2010 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

It’s time for Green France Day…

OK you could have blinked and missed it – but in a Groundhog Day moment, Green Britain Day happened again – yesterday. Although ‘happened’ might be a bit of a euphemism for something that ever so didn’t (happen).

Guessing that response might be poor, we thought we’d help EDF out. So we asked b3ta (a satirical website) to launch an ‘Image Challenge’ – a challenge to produce some alternative creative concepts for EDF’s Green Britain Day.

And what a hoot that turned out to be. We got an awesome response (OK some are a little rude, OK maybe more than a little).

But on the whole – really, very funny. (more…)

Our new Zero Carbon HQ

April 27, 2010 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

Ecotricity Eco HQ plan drawing 2 Some great news today, we’ve been granted planning permission for our new Zero Carbon HQ. More impressively, from our point of view, it didn’t take an appeal…

Only slight bummer is that it’s planning permission for a site we don’t own – not yet anyway.

The site is on the way into Stroud (where we’re based) and it’s known as Tricorn House. It’s an ugly brute of a building that’s stood empty and derelict for a decade or so. Actually in architectural terms it’s style is described as ‘Brutalist‘.

(more…)

We are not British Gas

February 2, 2010 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

Six months of behind the scenes work came to fruition two weekends ago when our gas systems (for customer registration and billing and so on) went live.

Our first ‘Green Gas’ customers are with us now. Me included I’m pleased to say.

While we shake things down we’re limiting the sign up rate to a few hundred a week. If you want to get in the queue to be among the first you can do that here.

The response from Ecotricity customers and non customers, to this idea, has been fantastic.

The response from British Gas has been something else. Odd to say the least. (more…)

Olympic sized Pork Pies anyone?

January 29, 2010 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

EDF Porky Pie Earlier this week EDF (that big Olympic sponsor, and green flag waver……. ) announced (it appears), through the Evening Standard, that they’ve decided to walk away from a Wind turbine project to power the Olympic games in 2012.

To most people that may have been interesting but not such a big deal. To anybody close to this issue it’s something altogether different.

The article runs under the headline:

Energy firm EDF abandons 2012 Olympics turbine due to ‘lack of wind’

The article doesn’t quote EDF directly but it confidently says:

“French-owned EDF Energy are not bidding to run the 393ft-tall turbine on the Games site as they were concerned about a lack of wind.

The company, London’s largest electricity supplier, said it would not be able to sell enough wind energy from the 2012 Olympic site into the national grid in future years to justify the turbine’s £2 million start-up costs.

This is an Olympic sized ‘Pork Pie’. (more…)

Dale on Guardian ‘You ask, they answer’

November 23, 2009 By paul

Filed under: Energy

Hiya all,

Just a quick heads-up – Dale is just about to take part in this week’s Guardian Environment ‘You ask, they answer’ Q&A session – could be interesting… If any of you fancy chipping in your 2 penneth, dive on in – the water’s lovely!

EDITED TO ADD: The Q&A session is now closed now but it’s still worth reading.

‘Green Gas’ is here

November 21, 2009 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

The real British Gas? The ‘how green is it to supply gas’ debate kicked off here last week, in response to some questions we asked of our customers. Actually we had over 1400 responses and overwhelming support in principle. And a lively debate followed, it even had our friends at Treehugger joining in…

I couldn’t say much last week except we had something I thought was pretty exciting to unveil in a few days time. Well here it is now.

Today we’re launching Green Gas. (more…)

Nobody in their right minds would think EDF is Green or British – according to the ASA

October 28, 2009 By paul

Filed under: Energy

Green Britain - do something really green You may have heard in the news (In the Guardian, Business Green, Campaign, Brand Republic) that the ASA have recently decided not to uphold the 149 complaints against EDF and their Green Britain campaign.

The ASA said:

” ..we considered that consumers were unlikely to infer from the ads that EDF was a ‘green’ company, we concluded that the ads were unlikely to mislead.”

“..we considered that consumers were unlikely to infer that EDF Energy was a British company. We therefore concluded that the ads were unlikely to mislead.”

EDF had this to say:

“EDF Energy welcomes the decision by the Advertising Standards Authority regarding our Green Britain Day and Team Green Britain advertising, in which neither challenge has been upheld by the authority… We are committed to leading the energy change to bring about a low carbon future and we have led the way among energy companies in making long-term commitments to the environment and to sustainability… EDF Energy is the UK’s largest generator of low carbon electricity.”

Dale had this to say in response: (more…)

Copenhagen here we come (well not me)

October 15, 2009 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

I’ve spent some time in the last few weeks thinking about Copenhagen, should I go? What could I do there? Drive the Nemesis there maybe….

There’s lots of campaigns focussed on it right now, lots of people trying to show politicians that this is what we all want. And I hope they succeed, I think they probably already have actually. Copenhagen is all over the news and it’s clear that there’s real public pressure for a deal. That’s about the best a campaign can hope for. Now it’s up to the delegates. At least this time the US isn’t being led by an oil man/half wit.

I went to the UN conference in Kyoto, the one that put climate change on the map. A friend of mine got hold of some passes and we just turned up with no idea what to expect. Our plan was to talk anyone that would listen about the role that wind energy has to play in fighting climate change. The message went down well. (more…)

Festival of Innovation and 500Kites

September 4, 2009 By paul

Filed under: Energy, Transport, Wind Car

Hiya Folks,

Paul here (back off my hols).

A couple of event announcements for our UK based readers. Firstly – I thought you might like to know about a public appearance of the Nemesis Wind Powered Car happening on the 12th/13th September at the Science Museum in Wroughton, Near Swindon in Wiltshire. It will be part of the family oriented Festival of Innovation. I am hoping to be there with my family on the 12th – so might see you there? It is a free event (although high carbon producing transport will be charged £5 to park).

Here’s the event page for the Festival of Innovation on Facebook.

Also – Ecotricity are hosting a kite festival to celebrate the power of the wind on the 13th September 2009.

Help us to fill the sky with kites and celebrate the power of the wind at Thistledown Environment Centre, near Nailsworth (Stroud).

Free Admission
500 kites to give away (or fly your own)
Explore 70 acres of natural environment and wildlife
Free soft drinks courtesy of bottlegreen
Professional kite demonstration

I also created a Facebook event page for the 500Kites event too.

Take it easy, and we hope to see you at one or both

Paul

Greenwash Day

July 10, 2009 By Dale Vince

Filed under: Energy

I’d like to declare today to be National Greenwash Day…

Winston Churchill Victory - ETHOFF!

…to celebrate that relatively modern phenomenon of companies trying to sell themselves as being rather greener and more ethical than they really are. Today would be an apt day, it is after all – Green Britain Day. Where’s the Greenwash in that? Oh where to start.

Green Britain day comes to us courtesy of EDF. That’s Electricite de France to give them their full name. EDF is a French, state owned nuclear power company. They are also the world’s biggest corporate producer of nuclear waste, and one of it’s biggest traders and burners of coal – with a tiny tiny fleet of windmills (0.7% of their generation). And to promote this campaign they’ve ‘borrowed’ (as Fred Pearce gently puts it in this week’s Guardian) someone else’s logo – the green union jack. This flag symbolises two things, Green and British. EDF are of course neither.

This really does take Greenwash to a whole new level. It could almost be the plot of a slapstick comedy or a farce. If it wasn’t for the fact that they are seriously intent on convincing us Brits that they (EDF) and nuclear energy are green and good for Britain.

Stealing someone else’s clothes is not a new tactic in the world of big dirty business. And nor is Greenwash. (more…)

Energy

Green Britain Day – Again

It’s time for Green France Day…

Our new Zero Carbon HQ

We are not British Gas

Olympic sized Pork Pies anyone?

Energy firm EDF abandons 2012 Olympics turbine due to ‘lack of wind’

Dale on Guardian ‘You ask, they answer’

‘Green Gas’ is here

Nobody in their right minds would think EDF is Green or British – according to the ASA

Copenhagen here we come (well not me)

Festival of Innovation and 500Kites

Greenwash Day

I’d like to declare today to be National Greenwash Day…

Zero Carbonista

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