Business & Politics

Some time back we asked readers about sustainability/ green stories in their local media here. I didn’t mention at the time, but BBC viewers in the West of England are actually pretty well served in this regard. BBC Points West, our local news show, includes a regular feature known as the Politics Bus – a purple VW Camper Van that hits the road to investigate the latest political issues in the region. The bus is also a regular feature on the Saturday Morning “Politics Show”. Recently, the famous purple camper has taken on a decidedly green hue – taking chefs on the road to experiment with local produce and spread the word about food miles. The project has been known as “Eat the West” and, amongst other endeavors, has seen the team cooking up a banquet for hundreds of sailors on a Royal Navy warship. Last week the bus visited a local catering oil supplier that was running it’s trucks on homebrewed biodiesel. During the course of the program it emerged that the bus itself had been converted to run on biodiesel earlier this year. The full story can be found here. Unfortunately there is little debate about the possible drawbacks/ limitations of biofuels, but the fact they are looking at local supply of food and fuel is certainly a step in the right direction. I had no idea that the BBC were such a bunch of hippies. [Written by: Sami Grover]