Paint it white to save the planet

There were two interesting articles in the generally excellent G2 section of The Guardian today, both of which seemed to capture the zeitgeist but in very differing ways.

First there was an article concerning one of the so-called geo-engineering solutions to global warming, though one which sounded eminently sensible compared to some of the other suggestions. The idea was to paint all roofs white, to increase reflection and reduce absorption of solar energy. It seems such a simple concept that it is surprising that it has not received more publicity. It was pointed out in the article that this was not a solution to global warming; it did nothing to reduce CO2 emissions, and so was more of a temporary mitigator. Even so, given some of the more extreme consequences of global warming that have been suggested, a bit of temporary mitigation would be very welcome.

You can read a summary of the full article here, highly recommended.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2009/jan/16/ethicalliving-climatechange

The second article was a brief piece concerning the acceptance speech given by Kate Winslet on receiving some worthless gong the other night. For those who did not hear her, she went for the worst kind of Paltrow-esque faux-excitement and pretending to be overcome. This is not something which has increased my respect for her. Without wishing to philosophise, I do wish that people would keep things like winning such awards in perspective; I think that failure to do so shows a rather narrow world view.

Again no relevant photo, so you will have to make do with this shot of your correspondent descending into the valley of Littondale, North Yorkshire.