Across the world, there is plenty of news that supports the view that we are in deep trouble. With North Korea carrying out missile tests every other day, the Trump presidency appearing all the more like a bad sitcom, and the country’s obsession with fidget spinners, you’d be forgiven for having a somewhat pessimistic view of the future of the world.
But let’s not be so down-hearted about everything. As Jonathon Pryce’s Elliot Carver said in Tomorrow Never Dies (in typical bombastic Bond-baddie fashion) “there’s no news like bad news”. If the majority of your information comes from main stream media outlets, you’ll know that the majority of headlines are negative. To counteract this balance, we’ve rounded up the best environmental news stories, which are sure to put a smile back on your face.
Tesla is ditching leather interiors
A few weeks after the announcement of the Tesla Model 3 – the company’s first mass market saloon car, the electric car giant has also made it clear that they want to move away from leather interiors. We’re all too aware of the effect that cattle farming has on the planet; not just for food but for leather as well. Seeing an innovative manufacturer like Elon Musk’s car company take this step will hopefully encourage others to move in the same direction.
France plans to outlaw non-electric vehicles
While many experts were upset by the news that President Trump had opted to remove the USA from the Paris accord, some good news came from France shortly after. The country has announced plans to ban the sale of petrol and diesel cars by the year 2040. This is great news coming from a global economy, and shows a trend started by the similar announcement from Norway. They ambitiously plan to completely ban petrol cars by 2025.
UK Government encourages battery investment
In a move that came as good news to environmental campaigners, the UK government announced plans that they plan on investing nearly a quarter of a billion pounds into battery storage technology. The announcement came as the plans state that the public are to be encouraged to install solar panels and sell any extra electricity they generate back to the national grid. The UK may not be in the best geographical location for solar power, so we may see more hydro-electric, tidal and geothermal energy solutions coming out of here.
Russian LNG project moves forward
In the Yamal Peninsula, in the North East of Russia, work is currently under way to build a massive natural gas plant, with the help of engineering firms across the world. Though this is still a fossil fuel plant, it is worth noting that liquefied natural gas, or LNG, is considered to be the cleanest form of fossil fuel. Building a gas extraction plant in such harsh conditions is no mean feat. The Sarasin RSBD valves that are being used in the plant are designed to withstand cryogenic conditions.
There is clearly much work to be done to save our beautiful planet, but at least with stories like these, we can see that some small steps are being made in the right direction.
