The Long Way Up .

[Mr Nick]

we develop marine reserves to help bolster fish and other aquatic life.

A theoretical possibility, but at the expense of existing sanctuaries. Money overpowering the system protecting the wildlife in action: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-55509225

In 10 years the developers will probably have made their investment back & passed the site on through shell companies to avoid any comeback when the bird boxes prove ineffective.

I live about half a mile downwind of a recently built biomass heat & power station and, apart from the constant burning wood smell, my area saw a massive decline in small birds at the moment the plant went live. A few years down the line and only a fraction have returned. Most importantly though, it's a useful cash customer for the pine plantations that are now ready to harvest, which will no doubt attract another subsidy to replant as biofuel... 

[porter]

What no more gas! I only got my new gas boiler in late September after 30years with the same old oil boiler till one day it spilled it guts all over the garage floor and garden!
Guess I'm not very environmentally  friendly.
 I'm off out now to the garage to start up my MZ250 and fill the atmosphere with 2 stroke.

[Mr Nick]

Yeah, North Sea gas that we were all encouraged to install is now demonised at our expense. Sounds like diesel cars.

Returning to the original point, HD have had electric prototypes out in field testing for years...

[2112]

I live about half a mile downwind of a recently built biomass heat & power station and, apart from the constant burning wood smell, my area saw a massive decline in small birds at the moment the plant went live. A few years down the line and only a fraction have returned. Most importantly though, it's a useful cash customer for the pine plantations that are now ready to harvest, which will no doubt attract another subsidy to replant as biofuel...

Agreed, Biomass is not the way to by any stretch of the imagination. By all means plant trees for crops but not to just burn. Waste incineration is actually greener than Biomass. An abomination.

[StromGeeza]

We definitely could target green incentives more effectively. Too much of the investment ends up with non-resident-for-tax-purposes chums  from Eton days...
But that shouldn't stop us as a nation cleaning up our environmental act.

[Gassoon]

  It's always wise to see who benefits from whichever feck-up is eventually foisted upon us. No doubt it will be backed-up by rational (as well as emotive) arguments, and abundant solid-looking data and projections....which ultimately will probably fail to meet real-world conditions and outcomes, because of poor scientific methodologies, biases, and inadequate imaginations.

So there!

[tallpaul]

  What he said...

[Mr Nick]

As more research establishments become reliant on funding from industry, the outputs from scientists will always fall broadly into line with the 'guidance' that will come from the benefactor companies if they want the cash to continue to flow. Much like the companies bring in consultants to recommend what the management had already decided. The one thing researchers discover early on is that biting the hand that feeds stops your grant & you have to finally leave school...

[2112]

My company once did an assessment for a new to the market product which claimed a lot and seemed too good to be true. Sure enough the panel (a solar thermal panel) did not get anywhere close to the claimed out put or performance. After we had sent the rather damning report back to the company they came back with the classic line "that's not the report we asked for". They went bust shortly afterwards.

[Gassoon]

   exactly! Look out for: ''...claimed a lot and seemed too good to be true''

Suspicion-level red! I wonder how many attempts/bribes they made subsequently to obtain the 'correct' analysis?

[2112]

It was a hound of a product riddled with design flaws, material flaws and it was poorly made too. No wonder they went down the pan. The only thing going for it was that it was matt black (maximum heat absorbtion), pretty much everything else was wrong.