Earth works, wasps and the Greedy West in the weekly round up.

Image of the Week

Sean O Braonain


Sean O'Braonain leads a demonstration against building a 23 mile stretch of the M3 through Ireland’s historic Tara Valley from Enniskillen to Dublin. Digging on the project had only just begun when an important ancient burial site ‘the size of several football pitches’ was unearthed, bringing work to a halt.

Quotes of the Week

“For me, the glass tower of the Seagram Building in New York defines the time when energy was plentiful. You effectively designed rows of desks in a sauna, and then simply added air conditioning.”

Sir John Sorrell writing on the BBC Web site

The boom/bust in oil and house prices is, quite simply, good news, whatever the tangential pain. It shows that the good ship Gaia, planet Earth, is traumatising its passengers into husbanding its scarce resources. Above all they must ration living space, for which the West has been appallingly greedy, and carbon fuel, of which the same is true.

Simon Jenkins in the Times

Story of the week

Alaska is warming faster than any other place in the world. The Times reports that the the number of wasp stings in Fairfax, its first town, has risen sevenfold in the last few years. Wasps have ventured further north that ever before – into the Arctic Circle, in fact, where the Inuit tribe has no word for the insect. Local radio had to broadcast a special warning not to touch it.

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