Reply: Modern trains that travel well loaded with passengers are clearly more fuel efficient, which is why the Competitiveness Report I have just launched looks at ways of adapting the technology to maximise use of the track with services people are likely to want to use, employing new more fuel efficient engines. However, we must also examine end to end journeys to see the true emissions picture, and look at the many trains operating at off peak times between less popualr destinations, where they are increasing the emissions problem. Electric trains burn much more gas and coal generated energy than renewable power, so we have to account for that pollution as well.

I can’t help thinking that trains are an outdated form of transport, which absorb a tremendous amount of capital to upkeep and perhaps are not as green as people think. Why not tear up the railways and replace them with something more appropriate for our age. Perhaps super buses that could connect to the existing road network and / or covered through-ways that could be used by eco-friendly two wheel transport.

Your description of people’s perceptions is interesting and worrying. You can go back to the peer reviewed science, and try and get to the bottom of what is really being predicted (Mark Lynas’s “Six Degrees” book gives some references, and a summary). But it’s hard, as climatology is hard.

I’m sufficiently worried that I think it is worth acting with leadership to reduce carbon emissions anyway. I want to keep our society and our lifestyle. I care about our country. The stakes are high, and it doesn’t seem worth the risk.

It’s not a trivial matter because Europe is churning out and importing vast numbers of new cars to replace perfectly good and repairable existing ones.

Oil prices are rising, tax on driving a fast car is headed in no direction but North. The revolution in diesel technology (largely thanks to German manufacturers) and the likelihood of hybrid technology achieving economies of scale against this back drop makes me think - “Hey, you can get a nice German V8 car now for

But make a green audit? Why not sit at home watching “The Great Global Warming Swindle” and stop worrying about green issues. They should also study astronomy: Mars has *proven* global warming (unlike Earth) - so global warming is apparently a normal part of the life-cycle of a planet.

Reply: We need a proper green audit to help guide people to lower energy costs in an era of increasing energy prices - and also to prevent green folly by doing things that are expensive and inconvenient which also fail to cut energy usage in the way intended.

The figures I’ve seen for Germany and California suggest that windmills actually have a larger carbon footprint than modern coal power stations. If this is true, then all we are doing is paying taxes to give subsidies to large German and Danish corporations in order to degrade our environment!