Tag Archives: EU

Tough Lobbying Rules in Ireland Work Well

Ten years ago when a bunch of bankers greatly damaged the economy the country of Ireland suffered quite a bit. The people of Ireland made the connection between influence on politicians from large corporations on poor public policy – thus they changed the rules on how the private sector can influence the public sector. The rues now put in place are appearing to rebuild trust in politicians, and the other countries are now looking at following Ireland’s lead.

The Irish reforms are simple. Any individual, company or NGO that seeks to directly or indirectly influence officials on a policy issue must list themselves on a public register and disclose any lobbying activity. The rules cover any meeting with high-level public officials, as well as letters, emails or tweets intended to influence policy.

For those in the business, the impact of the register and its requirements are primarily about the way the industry is perceived — and, broadly, they’re happy about it.

“I’ve not heard anybody suggest the Lobbying Act has impacted in any way the willingness or the ability to influence [policymakers],” said Conall McDevitt, CEO of Hume Brophy, one of Ireland’s largest lobbying firms. “It’s always better in our industry to have transparency, we’re all the stronger for it.”

Read more.

EU Bans Cosmetics Tested on Animals

The European Union has banned the selling of cosmetics that have been tested on animals. This will make the lives of many animals better and may encourage innovations in cosmetic testing .

The ban applies to all new cosmetics and their ingredients sold in the EU, regardless of where in the world testing on animals was carried out.

The 27 EU countries have had a ban on such tests in place since 2009. But the EU Commission is now asking the EU’s trading partners to do the same.

Read more at the BBC.

Victory for Chickens in Europe

Being a chicken who’s sole purpose is egg-laying can be hard because of the horrible living conditions. Too many animals, in this case chickens, are held in enclosures that don’t allow for movement. This is starting to change for chickens in Europe as they have now been granted better enclosures thanks to some ethical activists!

On the first day of 2012, keeping hens in such cages became illegal, in all 27 countries of the European Union. Hens can still be kept in cages, but they must have more space, and the cages must have nest boxes and a scratching post. Last month, members of the British Hen Welfare Trust provided a new home for a hen they named “Liberty”. She was, they said, among the last hens in Britain still living in the type of cages we had opposed.

In the early 1970s, when the modern animal-liberation movement began, no major organisation was campaigning against the battery cage. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the mother of all animal-protection organisations, had lost its early radicalism long before. It focused on isolated cases of abuse, and failed to challenge well-established ways of mistreating animals on farms or in laboratories. It took a concerted effort by the new animal radicals of the 1970s to stir the RSPCA from its complacency towards the battery cage and other forms of intensive animal rearing.

Read Europe’s ethical eggs-ample.

African Sunlight for European Power

Blue chip companies in Germany are looking at using solar energy to power the European markets, the really neat thing is that all the solar energy stations will be in northern Africa. This will help the EU become more efficient with power generation and help the northern African countries with more revenue.

The energy potential in the deserts south of the Mediterranean is enormous.

According to the European Commission’s Institute for Energy, if just 0.3% of the light falling on the Sahara and Middle Eastern deserts was captured, it could provide all of Europe’s energy needs.

The Desertec project aims to build solar power plants in several locations in north Africa. Jeworrek said the “most important criteria” was that the locations were “situated in politically stable lands”. Morocco, as well as Libya and Algeria have been cited as potential sites, where land is also cheap.

The technique called “concentrating solar power” or CSP, uses banks of mirrors to focus the sun’s rays in a central column filled with water. The rays heat the water, vaporising the it into a steam which is then used to drive turbines which generate carbon-free electricity.

Paris Airport to be Powered by Water

Orly Airport, outside of Paris, will be using geothermal energy to lower their carbon footprint. They’ll drive two 1.7km long pipes into hot water that is below the surface of the airport.

“We have the unprecedented luck of having hot water below our feet that can heat a large part of Orly without CO2 [carbon dioxide] emissions. We are the first airport in Europe to do this,” Pierre Graff, who is chairman and managing director of Aeroports de Paris (ADP), said on Wednesday.

The project, launched after a technical and financial feasibility study, will cost 11 million euros (17.27 million dollars). The Orly-Ouest terminal, part of Orly-South, the airport’s Hilton Hotel, and two business districts will be hooked up to the system from 2011.