A fascinating tweet today from Andy Wales, former Global Head of Sustainability at SABMiller, which read: “Hey @volansjohn – on hols in Fjaerland Norway. Look what I found on the world’s most idyllic top shelf!” If you zero in on the top shelf, there is a copy of the paperback version of my 1987 book The Green Capitalists.
Is Human Sperm Headed Towards Extinction?
One of the questions I have often asked myself is whether I want to be right – or to be effective in driving change? Too often, things that I was talking about as risks decades back now prove to be emergent realities – like the story covered today in The Observer.
“it’s official: men’s sperm count is falling rapidly. Now scientists must tell us why.” That’s how the paper headlines Robin McKie’s article. And, sadly, this is an area I covered extensively way back in 1985 in my book for Viking/Penguin/Pelican, The Poisoned Womb: Human Reproduction in a Polluted World.
That was the book that poet Ted Hughes sent to Margaret Thatcher when she was Prime Minister – and then wrote a poem about in his role as Poet Laureate. I could call that impact, but here we are with evidence that sperm counts in men in the West have more than halved in the past 40 years – and are continuing to fall at around 1.5% a year.
Orri Vigfússon: Green Capitalist
Orri Vigfússon said that he was “a new kind of environmentalist. I don’t take the moral high road.” Instead, as his obituary in The Times on 29 July noted, he described himself as a “green capitalist”.
When I wrote The Green Capitalists, published 30 years ago in 1987, I had to cast around for people who truly fitted the label. Vigfússon, who I sadly never met, did – and in a number of dimensions. A key element of his work was to buy up fishing rights from trawler owners and others whose activities were leading to the possible extinction of the Atlantic salmon, the “King of Fish.”
Useful background on his career can be found here – while reactions to the news of his death can be found here.
Carbon Productivity Goes Live
Thrilled with the just-launched website for our Carbon Productivity campaign. A lot more to come.
Out And About In London
A few images, including a couple looking west from Gavin Starks’ converted Norwegian coaster near Tower Bridge, on 27 July; a poster now housed in the Museum of London which we would often see borne through Oxford Street by Stanley Green in the last century; and, while allowing the random generator to operate freely, a somewhat disconcerting image of me with an instabeard.