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Archive for July 21st, 2008

Evolutionary

The Humanists have got in touch to say:

As part of South Devon Humanists’ series of lectures, Keith Denby will be talking about Robert Fitzroy, Darwin’s captain, at Birdwood House, Totnes at 7.30pm on July 24.

“Everyone knows of Darwin’s voyage in the Beagle, which led to his publication of ‘The Origin of Species’, but far less people know the story of her captain, Robert Fitzroy,” said Keith.

Keith - Devon-based biochemist, wreck diver and webmaster - said: “Fitzroy’s story is not well known, yet he made enormous contributions to our modern world. He wanted a companion on board the survey ship, HMS Beagle, because the previous captain had killed himself out of loneliness. At first he was suspicious of Charles Darwin, a geology graduate from Cambridge, because of the shape of his nose.”

“Fitzroy sailed for South America to chart the region around Cape Horn and to bring civilising Christianity to the natives. However, Darwin’s work eventually opposed what was written in the book of Genesis, but without Fitzroy’s fundamentalist approach to creation, Darwin may never have developed and published his theory of evolution.”

Find out more about nose-fascist Fitzroy at Birdwood House, Totnes at 7.30pm.

For further information on Devon Humanists contact Hazel Fuller on 01803 864156 or visit the Devon Humanists website.

Births, deaths and marriages

South Devon Humanists: Nativity not to be taken seriously

Savings bond

Newton Abbot wins Transition Town status

Public transport wins cartoon support

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July 21st, 2008

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Renewable energy on the increase

posted by Cptn

Our old friends over at RegenSW (the sustainable energy agency), who have been fighting the good, renewable fight since way back when, have announced that ‘the south west’s renewable energy capacity has grown by 15 per cent in the past year’.

The findings are from Regen’s own annual Survey of Renewable Electricity and Heat Projects in South West England survey, published on Friday (July 18), which also shows that ‘90MW of new capacity has been approved and is waiting to be built’.

But before you start wantonly leaving everything on standby, the total installed capacity of 189MW contributes just one per cent of the region’s heat and power use.

“The survey shows a mixed picture,” said Matthew Spencer, chief executive of Regen SW told the PRSD. “The region is falling short of its self-imposed target of 597MW of renewable electricity capacity by 2010 – but this doesn’t tell the full story. The fact that a record 90MW has been approved in the past year shows that things are improving. We still need more large renewables’ proposals to come forward, and the priority is to have them dealt with more quickly by the planning system.”

“Although we will miss our 2010 targets, we must now look forward to and respond to the UK’s new 2020 goals,” added Matthew.

“There are only 600 weeks to 2020, and we don’t have long to speed up deployment and ensure that our renewable energy businesses benefit from renewables becoming a mainstay of UK power and heat generation.”

It’s now that we mention the hard work of the little know Renewable Energy for Devon, with the unpronounceable acronym of RE4D, in pushing Devon’s micro renewable installations (making the installed electricity capacity of the count 29.40MW and the installed heat capacity 9.43). Cornwall and the Isles of Sicily are way out there with 57.28MW of installed electricity capacity and 11.63MW of installed heat capacity.

Of course, all this can be found in the full version of the Annual Survey of Renewable Electricity and Heat Project in South West England.