The musician's optimism is infectious, but can we make progress if green stars travel in vehicles that get one mile to the gallon?

The giant sash windows of Oxford's spectacular Radcliffe Observatory were designed to provide astronomers the best possible view of the starry heavens. But on Monday I found myself using them to scour the skies for something altogether less likely: a helicopter carrying rap superstar Will.i.am to the university to discuss, of all things, distributed climate change modelling.

Will.i.am (aka William Adams) is a busy man. Not content with his dayjob as a multi-Grammy-winning rapper, singer and producer, the Black Eyed Peas founder is also a judge on hit TV show The Voice, an actor, a creative adviser to computer chip manufacturer Intel and even a car maker. Little wonder, then, that his trip to Oxford was a flying one, both figuratively and literally.

It was the Intel connection that brought Will.i.am in a trademark sci-fi outfit, and his entourage, bursting into the Radcliffe Observatory, whooping in appreciation at the architecture. They'd come to meet and film Myles Allen, the academic behind the Guardian-backed weatherathome project, which enables anyone with a computer to contribute to atmospheric science. Like a screen-saver with a purpose, the system lets idle computers crunch models of the climate system to help pin down the links between global warming and extreme weather.

After a brief tutorial with Allen involving browsing through the dusty pages of the world's oldest continuous temperature record (with readings taken at the Radcliffe) and rolling weighted dice (to understand how some kinds of extreme weather events are becoming more likely), the rapper told me about his frustration that we're not yet solving climate change.

"It's confusing," he said. "It should be the thing that we all should be worrying about as humans on this planet ... so it's confusing that it's not. And it's confusing that if you ask a random person on the street about climate change, then they've been given five different versions of why it's not even an issue. That's confusing. So who is causing the confusion and why isn't it even a priority?"

His own view seemed to be that the mainstream media was partly to blame, for failing to get the message out properly. The result, he said, is that "we have more concerns on our economy than on our ecology".

He hoped social networks could help change that by increasing the connectedness of people just as climate change is driven by the interconnectedness of the planet. I asked whether that would be enough, if all the kids were aspiring to own fast cars and, um, travel in helicopters. But he said that wasn't necessarily what young people were interested in any more.

"When I was 15 or 16, I wanted a car, but kids today they want phones and computers. They want to be connected. Laptops, tablets, phones, iPads ... sharing their experiences on Facebook." And that presents an opportunity, according to Will.i.am, if people with access to those networks can find ways to make the global warming message "digestible, tangible and easy for people to understand".

That's something he's been trying to do for some time. Back in 2007, he released a song called SOS with a lyric reminiscent of Sir David King's famous comment: "We got a new terror threat, it's called the weather. More deadlier than chemical and nuclear together". What's striking listening to the track is how rare it is to hear a mainstream artist engaging directly with this topic in their music. Indeed, the rest of the climate rap oeuvre consists largely of spoofs.

There are a couple of blinders, it should be said, such as the group of Australian climate scientists who pause to "drop facts all over this wax, while bitches be crying about a carbon tax", or the Juice News debate in which Lord Monckton tells Al Gore: "The IPCC are Marxist, trapeze artists, bleeding the free market, and we're the target". Even funnier – albeit inadvertently – is the US Environment Protection Agency's unbelievably awful effort to make environmentalism cool, with sizzling lines such as: "The climate is changing and that's a fact, bears don't know when to take a nap".

Comedy value aside, though, none of these are going to help get the world's young people engaged in climate change. As far as we can tell, green campaigners aren't making much progress either. But Will.i.am, and celebrities like him, might just have a chance – which is why I hope more of them follow his lead.

Perhaps unsurprisingly for a serial entrepreneur, Will.i.am believes the key to saving the planet is business. When I asked if solving global warming meant changing the way we live, he replied: "Yes, but the only way to change the way you live is for big business to realise that green isn't just a little exercise for them to continue to do brown. Green should really be green ... you should be able to make a profit from it."

What about the political process? What would he say to the world leaders who keep failing to agree a global climate deal? "Politicians don't ever change anything," he said. "It's companies. You have to incentivise big business to realise that you want to have a healthy society, a connected society ... and instead of worrying about the marketplace you should worry about communities. You need communities to be educated and healthy."

And why should companies care in the first place? With a shrug to suggest he was being asked to state the obvious, he replied: "If you want to be in business, you have to have healthy people to buy your stuff, and a healthy planet to live on. So they should be concerned."

Before I could ask any more questions, Will.i.am had to dash off for a date with the Olympic torch. As the crew piled into a car to go back to the airfield, he left me with a line about the relationship of plastic bottles to plasticity of the mind. I wasn't sure exactly what he meant but it sounded good.

While I strolled back to train station, I looked up him up on Twitter and read that he was "about to leave Oxford in the hip.hop.copter". I found myself feeling a bit torn. On the one hand, it's hard to believe that we can make much progress if our green stars travel around in vehicles that get as little as one mile to the gallon . And I'm not sure I share his optimism about solving the problem in a bottom up way.

On the other hand, there's something undeniably infectious about Will.i.am's chutzpah. In place of a mini biography, his Twitter profile simply says: " i.am ... i.can ... i.will". If the movement to solve climate change could capture a slice of that positivity and self-confidence, we might just start to get somewhere.

The government has no responsibility to protect pheasant shoots from our native wildlife, so why is Defra pushing a plan that will damage a protected species?

David Cameron must have been having a laugh when he made Richard Benyon his minister for wildlife and biodiversity. In a previous post I explained what appears to be a crashing conflict of interest. Last year, Benyon, inheritor of a vast stately home and a 20,000-acre walled estate in the south of England, as well as properties elsewhere, managed to get planning permission for a sand and gravel quarry. It was fiercely opposed by conservation groups, on the grounds that it will damage wildlife and biodiversity.

Benyon has also shown a spectacular ignorance of the natural world he is charged with protecting. First, on a Channel 4 programme, he was unable to identify the common fish species for whose survival he is responsible (he is also minister for fisheries). Then he announced that he would wage war on people who let ragwort grow. As ecologists were quick to point out, ragwort is a native plant critical to the survival of other species.

But his latest act suggests something even worse: that he is using his department's budget to subsidise the class and culture to which he belongs, at the expense of both taxpayers and birds of prey.

Pheasants, which are an exotic species in the UK, are bred here in large numbers to be shot, generally by and for some of the richest people in the country. They are reared in pens, then released into the countryside. People then pay a fortune to line up in a field, armed with shotguns, while an army of beaters works its way through the woods towards them, driving the pheasants into the air and over their heads. This activity is classified as "sport".

As a teenager I sometimes worked as a beater or loader, and I think it is fair to say that the pheasant shoot is one of the most odious spectacles I have ever witnessed. The "guns" (the men doing the shooting) were so pumped up they would sometimes quiver. At some points in the shoot, the pheasants, which are slow and clumsy fliers, and try to stay on the ground for as long as they can, came over so low and in such numbers that if you shut your eyes and fired randomly into the air you could scarcely fail to hit one. Even so, many were not killed cleanly, but spun away through the air, one wing flapping, then hit the ground and ran off brokenly across the fields.

At lunchtime, while we ate our sandwiches, the guns would go into a barn where a feast of cold meat and pies was laid out on trestle tables. They would emerge an hour later, red-faced and reeking of cherry brandy, and even more wired than they were at the beginning of the shoot. After lunch they tended to fire at anything that came over their heads: crows, jays, woodcock; on one occasion I saw a green woodpecker blasted to feathers.

I dare say that they are not allowed to get so drunk these days, but the appetite for carnage on a tremendous scale appears to be undiminished. Woods where once as children we could freely roam are now filled with blue plastic pheasant feeders, and anyone stepping into them is quickly rounded up and ejected by an angry man on a quad bike. Pheasant pens seem to be springing up everywhere, as the money flushing through the City is spent on the traditional pursuits of the ruling class.

We don't know what impact this might have on our native wildlife. Every year some 40 million pheasants are released. They scour the woods and hedgerows for invertebrates, seeds and seedlings and compete with native birds and other wildlife, but the impacts have not been properly quantified. Nor do we know what effect the beating and shooting of other wildlife might have, nor do we have a clear idea of the scope of illegal killing of predators and other wildlife by those who manage the shoots.

But none of this seems to be of interest to Richard Benyon's section of Defra. Instead of defending the wildlife and biodiversity from pheasant shooting, he appears to see his role as defending pheasant shooting from wildlife and biodiversity. His department is about to spend £375,000 on capturing buzzards and destroying their nests to see whether this reduces their consumption of young pheasants (or poults). The buzzard is a protected species, whose continued survival is one of Benyon's responsibilities.

The rationale for this research is the weakest that I have ever seen in a government document. As Defra's tender for the research project admits, "at present, the extent of the problem on a national scale is unclear. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that it can be significant at the local site level. In one case, it is claimed that 25-30% of pheasant poults were lost to buzzards."

No reference is given for this claim. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds makes the following observation:

"An independent study carried out by ADAS (an independent consultant), commissioned by the British Association for Shooting and Conservation, found that on average, 1-2% of pheasant poults released were taken by birds of prey. It found 45% of poults released were shot, with the remainder dying as a result of other factors, such as road collision and disease, or surviving to join the feral population. The study therefore concluded that losses to birds of prey were negligible compared to other much greater causes of loss. It found the financial cost of "average" bird of prey predation to a shoot releasing 1,000 poults per year, would be just £30."

This, note, is all birds of prey, not just buzzards.

There are a number of sensible options for responding to the request by pheasant shooting estates.

1. Tell them to bog off. The government has no responsibility to protect pheasant shoots from our native wildlife, though it does have a responsibility to protect our native wildlife from pheasant shoots.

2. If, for a reason that so far eludes me, Defra deems that research does need to be conducted, tell the estates that they can fund it themselves: people who can afford to lay down and shoot pheasants don't need taxpayers' money.

3. If, for an even more obscure reason, Defra decides that the taxpayer should pay to discover how the estates can preserve more of their birds for the purpose of being blasted out of the air, the question it should be asking is not "how can we best control buzzards?", but "are buzzards a major cause of pheasant mortality?", or "is this 'anecdotal evidence' supported by anything more than a whiskey-soaked conversation in leather armchairs?".

But facts, who needs 'em? Defra has decided to go ahead anyway, paying researchers to catch buzzards and destroy their nests with shotguns, on the grounds of the "anecdotal evidence" that they are taking large numbers of pheasants.

This is state-sponsored persecution of a protected species to please some of the richest people in the country, pursuing a cruel, destructive and pointless activity. It is state spending for the 1% - or the 0.01% – which everyone else must pay for. It looks to me as if Richard Benyon is using public money to provide services for his aristocratic friends.

Has there, with the possible exception of Nicholas Ridley (another scion of an aristocratic family with vast estates), ever been a worse minister with responsibility for the environment in this country? Has there ever been a clearer sign that the "greenest government ever" couldn't give a tinker's cuss for the environment? Can David Cameron claim even a shred of green credibility while Richard Benyon remains in his post?

Buoyed by the success of this inspired appointment, I understand that the prime minister has asked Bob Diamond to become his new poverty tsar, and is currently scouring Transylvania to find the next chairman of the UK Blood Transfusion Service. Benyon should go, and so should the ridiculous policies his division is now supporting.

Monbiot.com

But European Environment Agency survey falls short of classifying waters – including Serpentine – as 'excellent'

The watercourses that will be used for the Olympics this summer – including the Serpentine in central London – have been given a clean bill of health by Europe's environmental watchdog.

But its waters fell short of being classed as "excellent", under the European Environment Agency's annual survey of bathing water.

The Serpentine, which is supplied with water from the Thames, will host the triathlon and marathon swimming events. Having met the bathing water standards stipulated by the EEA this year, as it has done for the past five years, only a freak storm or other disastrous weather could alter its clean status. "This is a good news story - the Serpentine and all the sailing venues and other water courses are looking good for the whole of the games," said Jacqueline McGlade, executive director of the EEA.

But under the EEA's ranking, sites are also checked for a higher level of cleanliness, above that required by the regulations. Judged against that more exacting standard, the Serpentine and four other inland bathing sites fell slightly short – they were classed as "good and sufficient", not "excellent", though the EEA said they were still fit to bathe in.

Around the UK, 504 out of the 605 coastal sites tested fell into the "excellent" category.

Most of the rest of the UK's bathing water also scores well on the assessment, with only 16 coastal sites out of 605 tested and none of the 12 inland bathing sites tested shown to have poor quality water. Several of the coastal sites that failed the tests were on the Irish Sea, reflecting problems with agricultural run-off and in some cases sewage outfall. with some of those deemed "satisfactory" clustered around London and the south-east, and most of the rest also on the Irish Sea.

Compared to other European member states, the UK fared well with 97.4% of the coastal bathing waters met the required standards of cleanliness in 2011, an increase of 0.6% compared to the previous year.

Those falling behind included the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Belgium, and Latvia and the Czech Republic, in many cases owing to agricultural run-off, which is a particular problem in popular inland bathing sites in the Netherlands. Nearly 15% of Spain's inland bathing sites also failed the tests, but on coastal bathing quality 84% of Spain's sites were judged excellent and a further 11% of good or sufficient quality. Of the 2,149 coastal bathing sites tested in Greece, 2,023 made the "excellent grade". Italy fared slightly worse, with 83% of coastal sites deemed excellent and 9% good or sufficient. France had only 65% of its coastal sites in the excellent category, while 21% were good or sufficient.

McGlade said: "We have changed to include stricture guidelines, and many countries are compliant with these, which is very good. The quality has improved markedly in the last 20 years, and the number of sites not complying is going down year on year."

Forest authority is confident its sparsely populated land will meet criteria laid down by International Dark Skies Association

Small, busy and overcrowded, England might seem the last place in the world to have room for one of the planet's largest inhabited areas of unspoiled, natural darkness when night falls.

But if plans by Kielder Forest and the adjacent Northumberland national park are realised, the country will be home to an official "dark sky preserve" equalled only by two lonely areas in Quebec and Texas.

Every outside light in 400 square miles of England's northernmost county is to be audited in preparation for the scheme, announced on Thursday by the two authorities. A public campaign will also be launched to win over local people to specially adjusted streetlamps and unobtrusive security lights.

The move follows the success of astronomical holidays at "star camps" in Kielder Forest, whose public observatory has attracted 30,000 visitors in four years. The area came top in a "dark skies" survey conducted by the Campaign to Protect Rural England in 2003, which condemned the spread of what it called "night blight" elsewhere in the country.

The forest authority is confident that its sparsely populated land will meet the criteria laid down by the International Dark-Sky Association (Ida) based in Tucson, Arizona, which has so far designated 12 reserves. The rolling, tree-covered hills surrounding the 27-mile shoreline of Kielder Water, England's biggest reservoir, have few homes beyond a cluster around the former shooting lodge of the Dukes of Northumberland.

The ambitious part of the new plan is to add the whole of Northumberland national park to the proposed reserve, more than doubling the size of the forest on its own. Although the park's boundaries were drawn, uniquely among UK national parks, to exclude all major communities, it is crossed by several roads including the A68 to Scotland, and a number of villages lie along its edges.

The director of the Kielder Water development trust, Elisabeth Rowark, said that the area was "magical by night", with the Milky Way stretching from horizon to horizon and distant galaxies visible without the help of telescopes or field glasses.

She said: "Dark sky status would allow us to protect, cherish and promote our natural nightscapes, but gaining public support is the key. It is crucial to understand that the idea does not mean turning lights off. Rather it is about working with local people and Northumberland county council to create better and less wasteful lighting and promote the night sky as an asset for the region."

The plan has won initial support from a number of local councils, including Byrness, whose chair, Joyce Taylor, said that local people would welcome less intrusive streetlamps. She said: "The fixtures we currently have are old and often spill light straight into peoples' bedrooms. Dark sky status will help us retain the rural and tranquil character of our community and keep us on the map for travellers for whom a starry night creates such vivid memories."

Anne Hutchinson, the chair of Wark parish council, said that her family elsewhere in the UK were staggered by the night sky when they came to visit. She said: "People don't want to see light pollution, whether it is from poor street lights or inappropriate external lights. It's not in keeping with the character of the area.

John Wilson, whose Whitelee Farm near the Scottish border at Carter Bar is one of the most isolated dwellings in the proposed reserve, has added star charts and binoculars to the equipment in his three holiday cottages.

Preparation for the launch has seen hundreds of light meter readings taken at night in the forest and park by Forestry Commission wildlife rangers, stargazers from Kielder Observatory and Newcastle astronomical societies, national park rangers and volunteers. The findings confirm that the darkness is Stygian enough to meet the standards of Idsa, provided regular monitoring and other measures are also agreed.

These include a light management plan and a comprehensive audit of the wattage and direction of existing lights, with measures to replace any with a pronounced upwards glare. The forest and national park have written individually to every resident, explaining the proposal and inviting comments and, ideally, participation.

Success will see Northumberland's "core area" join Big Bend national park in Texas and Mont Mégantic in Quebec at the top of the growing table of global dark sky reserves.

The UK's first dark sky park at Galloway forest in Scotland has been rated an economic success, with tourist business reporting increased trade as a direct result of the new status which was granted by the Idsa in 2009.

The project is on Facebook and Twitter.

The German development bank KfW borrows freely and is transforming the energy efficiency of the nation's homes. The UK's fledgling equivalent will do neither

Business secretary Vince Cable, responsible for the UK's Green investment bank (GIB), visits the German development bank KfW today, a day after the law establishing the GIB was published. It will be an interesting visit.

When I met Leon Macioszek, director of KfW in Berlin on Tuesday, I pointed out that the GIB can't actually borrow. This rendered him speechless as his mind wrestled hopelessly with the contradiction.

But I am sure he will recover in time to tell Cable about the bank's work. There is a lot of it, and much of it very relevant to the UK's troubled Green deal plan to make 14m British homes warmer and cheaper to heat.

KfW, owned by the German state, is huge. It has half a trillion Euros of assets, making it roughly twice the size of the World Bank. It lent €70bn in 2011, raised from international markets at low interest rates thanks to its AAA credit rating. About a third goes to energy and climate change investments, including €24bn from 2009-2011 on energy efficiency in homes, which leveraged a total investment of €58bn.

For reference, the Green investment bank has £3bn of taxpayers' money and will not, as it stands, support any home refurbishments, despite many experts saying this is exactly the sort of investment it should assist. Moreover, without big changes, the Green deal looks set to cut the number of roofs insulated by 93% and cavity walls by 67%, according to the government's own impact assessment.

The German government prioritised the KfW energy efficiency programme for the simple reason that 40% of the nation's carbon emissions come from buildings. It is serious about meeting its ambitious climate change targets of a 40% cut by 2020 and 80-95% by 2050, so it decided to deal with housing without delay. The same needs to happen in the UK.

So what has KfW achieved? Since 2001, its loans have helped insulate and seal over 2m homes, employing 200,000 people a year in the process. Since 2006, 156m tonnes of carbon have been saved, equivalent to over a quarter of the UK's total annual emissions.

The key is very low interest rates, currently 1-2%. These are delivered via KfW's top credit rating, topped up by further government subsidy of the interest rate. In 2011, the state put in just under €1bn, which KfW turned into €6.5bn in loans, which created a total investment of €18.5bn – that's a 20-fold leverage on the state subsidy.

"This programme is self-sustaining," Macioszek adds. "If the state puts in €1.5bn [to subsidise interest rates] it gets back €3-4bn in tax income on the works. This programme is one of the most important and most successful we have."

In the UK government has talked of Green deal loans around £6,000: German homeowners can borrow up to €75,000 via KfW. The latter sum gets you a very cosy and efficient home indeed, often including some domestic low-carbon power generation. In the KfW scheme, the higher you aim, the better the deal. For the most efficient homes – Passivhaus standard - you get up to 12.5% of the loan handed back to you. And if you don't like loans, you can get a grant of up to 20% of the cost of the works. It all adds up to a massive commitment to energy efficiency.

The UK energy policy academics I accompanied to KfW are resoundly gloomy about the Green deal's prospects prompting one to ask Macioszek a question of quiet desperation. Does KfW lend to energy efficiency projects in other countries? The answer, of which Cable should take careful note, is no.

That leaves him with the following: a non-bank needing to prove itself; a new government pledge on Tuesday to "massively" increase infrastructure spending in the search for growth; and an energy efficiency policy in desperate need of rescue. I'll leave you to join the dots.

Last-ditch agreement reached in Baghdad to make another attempt at a compromise deal in Moscow next month

International talks over Iran's nuclear programme were salvaged from collapse in Baghdad with a last-ditch agreement to make another attempt at a compromise deal in Moscow next month.

After two days of intense talks in the Iraqi capital, Lady Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief, said: "It is clear that we both want to make progress, and that there is some common ground. However, significant differences remain. Nonetheless, we do agree on the need for further discussion to expand that common ground."

The common ground seems limited, beyond the desire to keep talks going to forestall the threat of Israeli military action. Ashton pointed to Iran's "readiness to address the issue of 20% enrichment" – a particular concern for the international community as 20%-enriched uranium is easier to convert into weapons-grade material. But diplomats at the talks said Iran's lead negotiator, Saeed Jalili, did not explicitly offer to curb 20% enrichment.

"It wasn't easy," one diplomat said. "Jalili said he was prepared to talk about 20% enrichment but then he came up with a bunch of peripheral issues like relations with Bahrain, and events in Syria."

After the talks, Jalili told CNN that progress at Moscow would require that "measures that damage the confidence of Iranians should be avoided", an apparent reference to punitive measures such as sanctions.

Responding to the mixed outcome of the talks, the foreign secretary, William Hague, said Iran needed to take "urgent, concrete steps". He added: "If Iran fails to respond in a serious manner, they should be in no doubt that we will intensify the pressure from sanctions, including the embargo on oil imports already agreed, and will urge other nations to do the same."

The UK remained fully committed to a diplomatic solution to the nuclear impasse, he said, but added "we must see significant progress from Iran" in Moscow.

At the outset of the talks, a six-nation group of senior diplomats presented what they termed a confidence-building package, calling on Iran to stop 20% enrichment, ship all its 20% uranium out of the country and stop operations at its underground enrichment plant at Fordow.

In return, the group – the US, UK, Russia, France, Germany and China – offered nuclear fuel plates for a research reactor, help with nuclear safety at Iranian reactors and spare parts for Iran's commercial airliners.

Jalili verbally presented counter-proposals, but they were considerably more vague. First was what he termed "the operationalisation of the fatwa", a reference to supreme leader Ali Khamenei's reported religious edict outlawing the development of nuclear weapons, although it was not clear how this would be put into effect.

His second point was international recognition of Iran's right to enrich uranium, and the third point dealt with regional issues like Bahrain and Syria.

Western diplomats argued that Iran's right to enrich uranium as part of a complete nuclear fuel cycle had been suspended until Tehran could convince the international community it had entirely peaceful intentions for its programme. The six-nation group argued that such issues would ultimately be addressed in a comprehensive settlement of the Iranian nuclear stand-off, but that the two sides should first carry out smaller, confidence-building steps.

Iranian state media reports criticised the package offered to Tehran on the grounds it did not include immediate relief from sanctions, but European diplomats claimed Jalili hardly mentioned sanctions inside the meeting "because he knew he would get no traction".

As evening fell on the second night of talks, Jalili's delegation was threatening to end the negotiations without agreement on a time and venue for a further round, which would have signalled a breach in the tenuous diplomatic process begun in Istanbul last month, and a ratcheting up in tensions in the Gulf once more.

Ashton, and the Russian and Chinese delegations held separate meetings with the Iranian negotiator in the late afternoon to persuade him to agree to a further round in Moscow on June 18. His agreement was only evident in the dying minutes of the last plenary meeting.

Western diplomats conceded that less had been achieved than had been hoped, but claimed that the Baghdad meeting had met the minimum goal set by the six-nation group, of marking the start of the first serious and detailed negotiations about Iran's nuclear programme since January 2011.

A US negotiator said: "We are getting to the things that matter … this is at least the beginning of a negotiation."

European diplomats said that the threshold for the Moscow talks would be substantially higher and that failure to reach a compromise there would have to be counted as a failure. "This cannot continue like this," one diplomat said. "The pace will get faster and the benchmark will get higher."

Ban Ki-moon and other United Nations officials think Rio+20 is unlikely to replicate breakthroughs of 1992 global summit

The United Nations chief, Ban Ki-moon, held out little hope on Thursday of an historic outcome at the Rio global development summit, now less than a month away, admitting negotiations had been "painfully slow".

The warning was the latest from United Nations officials and others involved in preparations that the summit, known as Rio+20, is unlikely to replicate the breakthrough achievements of the original environmental gathering in the city in 1992.

Ban, who has made sustainable development and climate change his signature issues as secretary-general, was candid about the difficulties of having world leaders engage with Rio.

"The negotiations have been painfully slow," he told a group of journalists at the United Nations foundation on Thursday.

The pace was so sluggish, in fact, that Ban prevailed on the international community to agree to an extra five days of talks, from 29 May to 2 June. The last-minute talks were aimed at getting at producing a face-saving outcome for a summit, which so far has failed to engage world leaders.

With Barack Obama focused on his re-election, and European leaders focused on the financial crisis, the advance work for Rio has been left to bureaucrats who do not have the political clout to make the kind of bold decisions that would allow a breakthrough.

Negotiations were bogged down on minor details and narrow national interests which, Ban said, had overwhelmed far more important issue of setting the world on the right track for sustainable growth.

At one point, the negotiating text ballooned to an impossibly unwieldy 6,000 pages Ban said. It was currently about 80 pages.

Other UN officials involved in Rio preparations have also rued the failure of world leaders to fully engage with the summit. But Ban added urgency to their concerns on Thursday.

"My message is that this is not the time to argue against any small, small items. Please do not lose (sight of the) bigger picture," Ban said. "This is not the end. Rio+20 is just the beginning of many processes so they should be flexible. They should rise above national interests or specific group interests."

He admitted the lack of urgency in the negotiations had drastically lowered expectations for Rio. "There is some scepticism about whether this conference will be a success," Ban said. But he added that he remained optimistic.

Ban's remarks mark the second time since mid-April in which he has tried to get world leaders to focus on the Rio+20 summit. For Obama, attendance at the summit would be politically toxic in an election year.

Nancy Sutley, a White House environmental advisor, on Wednesday said the administration had yet to decide which officials to send to Rio.

In his remarks, Ban said the summit had identified five main areas of concern including developing a global strategy for developing a green economy to putting in place the institutions that would encourage social development, such as improvements in health and education, along with economic growth.

But he indicated that the most progress could happen outside the government negotiations, with ten of thousands of business leaders, activists, and environmentalists descending on Rio to make their case for a greener and more equitable model of development.

With a sandstorm swirling around them and closing the airport, the six-party talks with Iran in Baghdad had every incentive to get a peace process worth talking about back on track

With a sandstorm swirling around them and closing the airport, the six-party talks with Iran in Baghdad had every incentive to get a peace process worth talking about back on track. In an election year, Barack Obama has no conceivable political interest in sliding into another Gulf war, which is what a bombing campaign started by Israel would unleash. And Iran has every interest in avoiding the oil sanctions that are about to start in earnest in June and July. Both sides are more than aware that the clock is ticking. And yet two days after they began, the talks ended with an agreement to meet in Moscow in a month's time but precious little else.

The Iranian negotiators talked extensively about their rights to a full fuel cycle under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT) but not about specifics. A full nuclear fuel cycle can be achieved with levels of enrichment well below the danger level of 20%, which is what their centrifuges buried under a mountain in Fordow are designed to achieve. The US and European members of the six-party talks refused for their part to offer Iran a real incentive for abandoning enrichment to 20%, a short technical hop to highly enriched uranium that can be weaponised. Dangling modest relief from technology restrictions, such as aircraft parts, fall well short of the bargaining price. And whatever Iran agrees to, foreign financial firms who continue to deal with Iran's central bank after 28 June will be blocked from US markets, and an EU embargo on Iranian crude starts shortly after on 1 July. So where is the incentive for Iran to trade?

This is the problem with the sanctions. They have to be liftable and or least delayable. Given all the problems surrounding oil tankers and their insurance, a six-month delay is not too difficult to achieve. Sanctions relief has to be part of the negotiations if they are to work as a lever, rather than as a spanner in the works.

The hope that something can be salvaged in Moscow was still there in the closing statement by Cathy Ashton, the EU foreign policy chief, but she did not disguise the fact that significant problems remained. Although the two sides were at last talking about the substance of the issue – Iran's nuclear programme – the process was still bumping along the bottom.

Both sides have decisions to make. Iran has to address concerns by the IAEA over the extent to which it conducted research on weaponisation. If progress is achieved, the conditions could be laid for a breakthrough in Moscow. But the US and the EU have also got to be mindful of Iranian psychology. The regime needs a deal they can present as a victory, not a national humiliation. If the ending of medium-enriched uranium is the goal, it is one worth spending time on. It will not be achieved by Iran looking down the barrel of a gun.

• Comments will be opened on this editorial in the morning

I agree with Simon Jenkins that "British energy policy is a dark underworld of fanatics" (Comment, 23 May) and I can't understand why the government is pushing for more investment in nuclear power when Fukushima is so recent. I've also heard Ed Davey "squirming" on the BBC and saying we need investment to "keep the lights on". Keep the lights on? Maybe 50 years ago this was the primary use of electricity but now most goes on powering masses of superfluous appliances and gadgets. So we should ask ourselves how we might distinguish between essential (keeping the lights on) and luxury (frothing coffee) electricity? One way would be to install a supplementary DC circuit in every home. Here batteries would be charged at cheap night-time rates or from solar panels, with them supplying a limited amount of essential electricity. The cost for daytime AC power could then be increased significantly so we all start to feel a real level of "financial pain" when we run the tumble-drier, switch on air-conditioning or leave the TV running when we are not really watching it.
Alan Mitcham
Cologne, Germany

• It ill behoves those of us who have lived long lives of profligate energy consumption to wring our hands as if nothing can be done to rationalise UK energy policy. 0ur best efforts make little impression on the global problem and may not impress India or China, but to do nothing sends a message about the greed of arrogant developed nations which they and others will seize with both hands. And we don't need to wait for Jenkins's wise mathematician to deliver answers. We should begin now by taking aggressive measures to cut energy use; not a glamorous step but effective, and cost-effective too.
Phil Booth
Bristol

• Simon Jenkins is right that energy policy can be confusing. Technologies hailed as the sustainable solutions to all of our energy problems often prove nothing of the sort. But his view of biomass as either a new dawn for energy or a technology that threatens half the world's forests is no longer true. The biomass power plant we have developed at Aston University overcomes many hurdles that have held back this technology. By using residues and waste instead of energy crops, the plant does not require the destruction of rainforests or agricultural land for palm oil production.

In fact, its by-product – biochar – can be used to increase crop yields. And by using heat instead of incineration, it produces no emissions. In short, there are no downsides. The first industrial-scale plant is working. If the government wants a clear conclusion for its energy policy, it need look no further.
Tim Miller
Project manager, European Bioenergy Research Institute, Aston University

• No public subsidy for nuclear power, says the energy secretary. Subsidies to the nuclear industry are illegal, according to EU regulations. So the government seeks to create a market structure which ensures the lights stay on. Consumers will have to pay for the infrastructure for new nuclear power stations, meaning prices will rise (Energy market shakeup raises fears of higher bills, 23 May). The insurance industry has become more reluctant to insure nuclear power stations after Fukushima, meaning we, the consumers, would have to pick up any bill in case of an accident.

The issue of storing used nuclear material has also not been settled. Will the nuclear industry pay for a depository deep underground, and for safe transport of the material? The used fuel rods are likely to remain at Sellafield, and will need guarding from terrorists and rising sea levels for centuries to come. Again, the government, ie we, will have to foot the bill. That is not called a subsidy, but it amounts to one by any other name. Legal wrangling will also cause super delays. Why does nobody mention the building of the high-voltage, direct current European supergrid, which will allow import of electricity from the Sahara, hydro-power from Norway, and geothermal from Iceland at times when we cannot generate solar or wind power, and export electricity when we generate more than we need? Several undersea links are there: to France and Ireland. Last year a cable was laid to the Netherlands. The next link to Norway has already been planned. Why does the energy secretary not mention this project, which won't expose us to the risk of a nuclear future?
Aart and Wiebina Heesterman
Birmingham

• Is this a Simon Jenkins first? "Do not read on if you want a conclusion on this subject" says Simon to introduce his second paragraph. As he is never normally under-opinionated, perhaps he is starting to realise, as the government already has, that there is no easy answer to Britain's energy future. Governments for years have read all the reports about the deleterious effects of burning fossil fuels and the future cost of the almost certainly increasing reliance on importing them, and tried to nudge energy policy towards other options, but immediately bang up against voters who are against whatever else is offered – nuclear (safety and cost), and renewables (cost and impacts on what I would call amenity and ambience rather than environment). The only logical response to my mind is to charge the cost to the taxpayer and ignore the amenity, but recent governments, especially this one, won't increase taxes for that, and are also terrified of campaigns against large-scale and/or highly visible options, as they are mostly in or proposed for Conservative areas.

A further consideration that Jenkins does not mention is that renewables would immediately become more attractive if a way could be found to store  the intermittent power generated from solar and wind, to keep the grid going at night and between weather depressions. I've not heard of any work being done in this regard. Anyway, come on Simon, give us a clue, how would you navigate through the "dark underworld" as you put it?
David Mills
York

• Simon Jenkins is looking for mathematical formulae that will help him understand the complexities of climate change, renewables and nuclear. Let me oblige with three suggestions from a recent conference on climate change organised by Help Rescue the Planet.

First RC + MJ = GG where RC stands for Reduced Carbon, MJ for More Jobs and GG for Green Growth. Secondly, EC + R > NO where EC stands for Energy Conservation, R for Renewables and NO for Nuclear Option (In maths > indicates greater than). In other words if the government is planning to spend £100bn to meet our energy requirements, should it spend it on conservation and renewables or on getting Russia or China to build a new generation of nuclear reactors. In political as well as purely economic terms this is a "no brainer".

The third formula was devised by our conference organiser and is the Russell-Jones variant of Einstein's famous 1905 formula MC2 = E where M stands for multitude (as in world population), C = carbon per capita (ie emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases per head of population per year) and E stands for extinction of species or, for those politicians who calculate that plants and animals don't vote, it stands for the END of human civilisation as we know it.
Michael Clink
Chairman, Help Rescue the Planet, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

• If Simon Jenkins is unable to discriminate between James Lovelock and Nigel Lawson on the matter of global climate change, he should cease writing about this topic at all, with immediate effect.
Pam Lunn
Kenilworth, Warwickshire

Heathland, West Sussex: Male insects raise and rub their forewings on warm, early summer evenings to produce a soothing love song

Finally, it is a still, warm evening. I follow the footpath across the soft, grey sand of the heathland. Scattered trees glisten and a square of rape on the South Downs glows bright yellow in the sun. This is just one of a number of patches of heath in the shadow of the downs and for one insect the most important. The air all around is thick – almost oppressive – with the high-pitched chirruping of the field cricket.

By 1988 it was believed that just 100 of these insects remained in Britain, and they were on this one small area of heathland. The decline had been caused by the fragmentation and disappearance of light chalky or sandy heaths with the short, grazed grass preferred by the field crickets. Today, through breeding and translocation programmes, this colony is providing crickets for reintroductions at suitable habitats elsewhere in Sussex and Surrey. Looking closely at the ground, among the uncurling ferns and low, cropped heather, I find the round entrances to the crickets' burrows in the sandy soil.

The pioneering nature writer Gilbert White described the field cricket in one of his letters of 1779, remarking on its shy and retiring nature. Sure enough, finding one proves difficult. As I home in carefully on the source of one chirrup, the cricket senses the vibrations of my approaching footsteps and scurries down into its burrow. Then I find one, a male, sitting still, sunbathing in the grass. It is about 20mm long and black, with a large, round head. The small forewings – the field cricket has only vestigial hind wings and cannot fly – have a golden-brown band at their base. The wings and abdomen are intricately patterned, resembling tiny beaten bronze panels. The male insect raises and rubs these wings on warm, early summer evenings, to produce its soothing love song. I leave the crickets to their trilling., thinking of Gilbert White's description: 'Thus the shrilling of the field-cricket, though sharp and stridulous, yet marvellously delights some hearers, filling their minds with a train of summer ideas of every thing that is rural, verdurous, and joyous."

Brown Argus, once rare and declining, depended on one plant species but warmer temperatures have helped it expand range

A modest but resilient British butterfly has bucked the trend of worried predictions about the species' health, with scientists reporting it appears to have benefited rather than lost out from climate change.

The Brown Argus, Aricia agestis, named after a 100-eyed giant in Greek mythology because of the multiple eye-like dots on its underwing, has long been dependent in the UK on a single plant species, the rockrose Helianthemum nummularium. It appears this is probably because the plant tends to grow on south-facing slopes and absorbs the warmth and sun which the butterfly's caterpillars need.

But hundreds of records kept by amateur butterfly enthusiasts since 1990 show that Brown Arguses have expanded their range by 40 miles in the past two decades, moving north at more than 2.3 times the average pace of other flourishing insect species.

Research published on Thursday in the journal Science by five experts led by Rachel Pateman of York university shows that the butterfly is now within a few miles of her labs on the Heslington campus. Its startling advance is credited to warmer temperatures encouraging the caterpillars to try other foodplants, notably geranium species, especially dove's-foot cranesbill.

The group, which includes members from the Natural Environment Research Council's base in Oxfordshire and Butterfly Conservation in Dorset, says that the butterflies appear to have adapted very quickly to new foodplants, for egg-laying as well as caterpillar diet. On the continent, where the Brown Argus ranges from the Pyrenees to Iran, geranium species are commonly used, and a closely-related butterfly, not yet found in the UK, is called the Geranium Argus.

"Ecological and evolutionary adjustments by the butterfly, interacting with alternative host plants that differ in their niches and life-history traits, have resulted in rapid range expansion of this previously rare and declining butterfly," says the study. "We suggest that altered interactions among species do not necessarily constrain distribution changes but can facilitate expansions."

Research on global warming's effect on the natural world acknowledges that there can be benefits as well as actual and potential disasters, and also recognises the ability of species to adapt. The United States Environmental Protection Agency notes a marked northward movement by invertebrates and insects, which form 97% of all animal species. The Brown Argus phenomenon conforms to the pattern, at the fastest end of the process.

An even more dramatic range-leap by a butterfly – albeit involving a hitch on a plane – involves the Geranium Bronze, a little smaller than the Brown Argus but equally tough. It first arrived in Europe in 1987 in ornamental pelargoniums sent from South Africa to Majorca, reached the UK in 1997 and, although seldom seen since, is being monitored as a potential pest to the horticultural trade.

Everything you need to know about the scheme that pays generators of small scale solar, wind and hydropower

What are feed-in tariffs?

A feed-in tariff is a rate of money paid by the government to homeowners, business and organisations such as schools and community groups to generate their own electricity through small-scale green energy installations such as solar panels. Under the UK scheme, which was launched on 1 April 2010, a typical homeowner could receive around £500 per year.

How does it work?

You can receive feed-in tariffs for both the generation of electricity (a generation tariff) and for giving unused generated electricity back to the National Grid (an export tariff). The level of payment depends on the technology and whether it is being fitted to an existing home, or installed as part of a new build. In the UK, future payments are guaranteed for the next 25 years for solar and 20 years for wind turbine-generated power and are linked to inflation. Solar installations registered after 1 August 2012 will only receive the payment for 20 years.

How much could I receive?

It depends on how much electricity you generate and how you generate it. As of May 2012, anyone fitting an average-sized 2.5kW solar photovoltaic (PV) system to their existing home will be paid 21p per kilowatt hour (kWh) generated. Households also receive an extra 3.2p for every kWh that they export back to the grid, on top of the money given in the first place for generation (though this export tariff will rise to 4.5p after 1 August 2012).

The income is tax-free. The Guardian's Miles Brignall estimated at the scheme's launch that solar PV could generate a return of 7-10%. The Energy Saving Trust has a feed-in tariff calculator which you can use to see how much you could earn.

What will happen to the rate in future?

On 1 August 2012, it will drop again to 16p per kWh for new registrations, though the government still estimates a return of 6%. After that, the level will be assessed every three months, and frozen or cut depending on the number of installations in the quarter before.

How do I know if I am eligible for the scheme?

The scheme is available to those who have one or more of the following technologies: solar PV panels (roof-mounted or stand alone), wind turbines (building mounted or free standing), hydroelectricity, anaerobic digestion (generating electricity from food waste), and micro combined heat and power (through the use of new types of boilers, for example). You will only qualify for the full feed-in tariff if the technology was installed using a product and installer certified under the government's microgeneration certification scheme. Under changes introduced to the scheme in the spring of 2012, homes must be brought up to a minimum energy efficiency standard – D, which many of the UK's homes do not meet – in order to be eligible for the tariff.

Where does the money come from?

From all energy users' bills, with payments made via the utility companies. Climate minister, Greg Barker, has previously estimated that if there are a high number of installs, it will add around £80 to the average household energy bill in 2020.

Consumers who use solar panels to generate electricity will receive less money as government cuts feed-in tariff payments

Payments for home owners using solar panels to generate electricity are to be cut further, the government said on Thursday, which is set to be the hottest day of the year with widespread sunshine in the UK.

The feed-in tariff for solar photovoltaic panels fitted to existing homes will be cut by about a quarter, from 21p per kWh to 16p, and the length of payments reduced from 25 to 20 years. However, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said financial returns would still be around 6% for homeowners, down from the 7-10% when the scheme launched in 2010, as panel costs have fallen.

The changes take effect on 1 August, one month later than planned, after the government missed a legal deadline for making the changes on 1 July. Future tariff rates will also be assessed every three months and automatically cut or held depending on the number of panels installed in the last quarter, the government said.

The climate minister, Greg Barker, said: "The sector has been through a difficult time, adjusting to the reality of sharply falling costs, but the reforms we are introducing today provide a strong, sustainable foundation for growth for the solar sector. We can now look with confidence to a future for solar which will see it go from a small cottage industry, anticipated under the previous scheme, to playing a significant part in Britain's clean energy economy."

The fall in the incentives, which was expected, comes after a tumultuous six months for the solar power industry. The government lost three court cases after solar companies and Friends of the Earth challenged its rushed halving of the Fit payments late last year. New rules have also been brought in that mean homes must meet energy efficiency standards before becoming eligible for the scheme, and recent data shows installations fell 90% after the most recent subsidy cut.

But solar industry, consumer groups, and green campaigners welcomed the new changes for bringing clarity. Audrey Gallacher, director of energy at Consumer Focus, said: "Consumers need certainty on the returns they will receive, if they are to have the confidence to invest in this technology. So it is good news that the government has now shed the light on the final subsidy."

Jeremy Leggett, chairman at Solarcentury, said: "Though investor confidence will remain uncertain given the proposed three-monthly digressions, the majority of the government's policies may herald a new seriousness of intent on solar, and indicate that a meaningful solar industrial policy is now a real prospect for the UK."

The UK secretary of state for the environment, food and rural affairs says the challenge for the UN Earth summit must be how to 'green' the world economy

Sustainable agriculture should be the UK's key objective for Rio+20, according to the UK secretary of state for the environment, food and rural affairs, Caroline Spelman, who will be attending next month's UN conference on sustainable development with the deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.

"Everywhere in the world, wherever farmers farm, should be put on a sustainable footing," she told a Faith in Rio debate in London on Wednesday, organised by the NGOs Cafod, Christian Aid, Tearfund and Progressio. "Just imagine if we could move farmers from subsistence to sustainability," she added, citing some farmers' inability to store produce and water as an example of where low-key technology could make a real difference in developing countries.

Spelman gave her support to the creation of a set of sustainable development goals, which have been suggested both as an aim for Rio+20 and to inform the debate on objectives for development post-2015, when the millennium development goals, which Spelman described as "a very good model of how to drive action forward", expire. She said the UK delegation "want to come away [from Rio] with a statement of intent and a plan of action".

Outlining the challenges facing policymakers in Rio, and perhaps the failures of the UN Earth summit 20 years ago, which, for the first time sought to address concerns about environmental protection and social and economic development, Spelman claimed that "the poorest 20 years ago are still the poorest today", and warned that "sustainability is not fully integrated into economic decision-making. The world's economy needs to be greened. A green economy can't be a subset."

Water, land and energy should form the nexus of the SDGs, Spelman said, echoing the sentiments of the European Development Report published last week. She called for a small number of goals focused on the most critical sustainability issues. She added: "SDGs have to be relevant to individuals and meaningful at a local level. It isn't all about carbon. The worthy and wordy zero document [the draft outcome document for Rio+20] is not going to save the planet; 400 paragraphs is not the answer."

But Peter Price, the bishop of Bath and Wells, warned the debate that the SDGs would be "voluntary" and "aspirational" with "not very much legal pressure" to bring them into force.

Despite concerns that the non-committal attitude of the US president Barack Obama to Rio+20 will prevent any meaningful outcomes for the summit, Spelman said there was "recognition by superpowers that power is on the move. The distinction between developed and developing has begun to slip away. The economic crash has not distracted from our will to make progress on sustainable development."

She said she was "encouraged" by the attitudes of China, Brazil, India and Russia to put growth on a sustainable footing, citing China and India's desire for a water sustainability goal to emerge from Rio to avoid conflict over water resources, particularly in the Himalayas.

Spelman encouraged the business community to put sustainability at the heart of their decision-making and drive a green economy, saying: "Companies are asking for governance. Companies have a very good reason to put sustainability at the heart of their operations – to show, above all, that business wants this … after the disastrous consequences of unsustainable growth. The exciting thing is that businesses want to do this."

Her view was echoed by UK insurer Aviva's chief responsible investment officer Steve Waygood, whose company is asking world leaders at Rio+20 to commit to a convention on sustainable reporting, claiming that the Brazil gathering will be the first time corporate social responsibility has been discussed at a global summit since the 1992 summit's declaration on CSR, which lasted only two years.

Waygood called on companies to "embed sustainability in their disclosures to the market". The Rio+20 zero draft document calls for greater corporate responsibility, and Aviva – in coalition with NGOs, the FTSE, investment management companies and others is calling for a "report or explain" standard for companies to declare their sustainable business practices to allow consumers and investors, whether large corporate investors or individuals with pension funds, to make informed decisions about how their money is used.

"If we want responsible capitalism … so that the right companies are getting the capital, there is a massive data gap," he said. He called on Rio+20 to deliver a mechanism to require large and listed companies to declare their thinking on sustainability, and, if they have done nothing, to explain why not. "We need a regulatory or policy vehicle to prevent us having the same conversation with different companies," he added.

Brazil has a proud record of protecting the environment, but a bill allowing deforestation would undermine the Rio+20 summit

Never before has the survival of so much rainforest depended on one person. But that is where President Rousseff of Brazil finds herself. The Brazilian congress just passed a forest code that puts the Amazon and other forests in jeopardy.

Dilma Rousseff's imminent decision on whether to pass or veto the bill will have huge ramifications. If approved, it would give loggers and farmers free rein to chop down 190m acres of forest. A territory the size of France and Britain combined will be at risk. It would open forests and rivers up for grabs, putting 70% of Brazil's river basins at risk. It would also give amnesty to anyone previously charged with illegal deforestation.

This bill would be a catastrophe not just for Brazil, but for the world and all our futures. Brazil is home to 40% of the world's last remaining rainforest – a lung that provides the earth with one fifth of our oxygen. So why is the congress passing such a destructive bill? And why would Rousseff not just veto it right away? Simple: industrial farmers and loggers have a stranglehold on congress and this powerful lobby claims current legislation is freezing development in Brazil. Others say forest must be converted into farmland to tackle rising food prices in Brazil.

None of these arguments hold water. The incredible development of Brazilian agriculture in the past decade is due to investment in more efficient farming and has been fuelled by the rising price of food commodities over 10 years. It has nothing to do with needing more access to forests. In Brazil, 200 million cattle roam over 500m acres. More efficient farming will free more land without any need for deforestation.

Every threat to the Amazon is a threat to indigenous life. The forest code would allow deforestation in previously protected areas. The interests of those that have lived in the forests for generations are being put second to those of commercial land speculators. Environmentalists who have spoken out to protect the forest have been harassed, threatened and even killed by thugs.

But this is not just a dispute between businessmen and environmentalists. More than 79% of Brazilians reject the new bill. All former environment ministers , whatever their political leaning, have joined forces to express their strong opposition to this issue and recently, even some of the top businessmen in Brazil came out against the forest code. More than 2 million people have signed a global Avaaz campaign calling on Rousseff to use her veto. Tens of thousands have signed the petition and thousands have called Rousseff's office and Brazilian embassies across the world. This bill is now as important to people living in the islands of São Tomé as it is for those in São Paulo.

The government has a proud record of protecting the environment: in the past few years Brazil vastly reduced deforestation rates, achieving a 78% decline between 2004 and 2011. Rousseff came to office promising to firmly oppose any amnesty to the destroyers of the forest. It is now up to her to stick to her promises and maintain the environmental records of her predecessor.

Brazil's track record made it the natural host of next month's critical Earth summit – the most important global environmental summit in 20 years. More than 50,000 people from all over the world will come to Rio and discuss the fate of the planet and how to accelerate the fight against environmental destruction, the collapse of biodiversity, and climate warming.

Rousseff will host the summit – a massive responsibility that requires legitimacy. But if she allows this bill to pass, Brazil will not be seen as a credible host of Rio+20.

A veto by Rousseff will be an act of global leadership, a gesture desperately needed to win the fight against climate change. An approval by her will cast a dark shadow over her presidency and Brazil's authority in these global forums. Worse still, a victory for big business profits over the planet's future will set a frightening precedent for the protection of the last remaining forests across our world. Brazil is seen by many countries as a model of 21st century development. This is a crucial moment to define what kind of model Brazil wants to be.

Millions of people will be watching Rousseff as she comes to a decision on this forest code. It is a decision that will have an impact on all our futures.

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The week's top environment news stories and green events

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Environment news

• Government announces biggest energy reforms in 20 years
• Farmer charged with criminal damage at GM crop trial site
• Indian state to let forest guards shoot poachers on sight
• Heartland Institute in financial crisis after billboard controversy
• Ben Fogle plans to swim the Atlantic to raise environmental awareness

On the blogs

• Busting the carbon and cost myths of Germany's nuclear exit
• Web chat: Fred Pearce on his new book The Land Grabbers
• Will the airbag bike helmet be the way forward?
• Only renewables - not nuclear - could be too cheap to meter
• Environment Agency seeks to redefine 'drought'
• Chelsea flower show isn't as green as it appears

Multimedia

• The Hard Rain Project Whole Earth exhibition – in pictures
• The saola 'Asian unicorn' in pictures
• The week in wildlife - in pictures
• US car industry drives deforestation in Brazil

Features and comment

• GM crops: protesters go back to the battlefields
• Will.i.am arrives by helicopter for flying visit to climate debate
• Kielder Forest bids to become 'dark skies preserve'
• Dilma Rousseff must veto Brazil's devastating new forest code
• David Attenborough presents award to old friend Ted Smith

...And finally

• Teabags targeted for new compost scheme
New campaign to persuade Britons to recycle teabags instead of throwing them in the bin launched by PG Tips owner Unilever

Post your questions to our panel of environmental experts

Universities may have good intentions – but in practice, being eco-friendly isn't always high on the agenda.

Following on from next week's launch of the People and Planet Green League – which ranks universities to show how well they manage their environmental impact – we will be hosting a live Q&A with sustainability experts and students.

Join us from 1-4pm next Tuesday to discuss the ways in which universities can tackle their carbon footprints – and how students can benefit from green policies.

Would you consider a university's environmental record before applying for a degree? Perhaps your own university has introduced a successful scheme. Share your opinions and questions in advance by posting in the comments section below.

Our panel:

Debby Cotton is head of educational development and pedagogic research at Plymouth University.

Danielle Gufferty is vice-president of society and citizenship at National Union of Students, and campaigns on environmental and ethical issues.

Gill Coleman is co-director of the sustainability and responsibility programme at Ashridge Business School.

Dr Chris Seeley is co-director of the sustainability and responsibility programme at Ashridge Business School. He is also a faculty member for the Ashridge doctorate in organisational change.

Louise Hazan is the creator and compiler of the People & Planet Green League and supports students campaigning to improve the environmental record of universities.

Darren Twort is the environmental officer at Oxford Brookes Student Union. He is studying environmental management.

Single-seater aircraft with 207ft wingspan aims to reach Morocco via Madrid and is being seen as a trial for a round-the-world flight

An experimental solar-powered airplane took off from Switzerland on its first transcontinental flight on Thursday, aiming to reach North Africa next week.

Pilot Andre Borschberg will fly the jumbo jet-size Solar Impulse plane on its first leg to Madrid, Spain, by Friday. His colleague Bertrand Piccard will take the helm of the aircraft for the second stretch of its 1,554mile journey to the Moroccan capital Rabat.

Fog on the runaway at its home base in Payerne, Switzerland, delayed the take off by two hours, demonstrating how susceptible the prototype single-seater aircraft is to adverse weather.

"We can't fly into clouds because it was not designed for that," Borschberg said as he piloted the plane with its 63meter (207ft) wingspan towards the French city of Lyon at a cruising speed of just 43.5mph.

Before landing in Madrid in the early hours of Friday, Borschberg will face other challenges, including having to fly over the Pyrenees mountains that separate France and Spain. He has a parachute inside his tiny cabin that he hopes never to use.

Piccard – the son of an undersea explorer Jacques Piccard and grandson of balloonist Auguste Piccard – will have to cross the windy Straits of Gibraltar from Europe to Africa.

The team has been invited to Morocco by the country's King Mohammed VI to showcase the cutting edge of solar technology.

Morocco is about to start construction on a massive solar energy plant at Ouarzazate, part of a country-wide solar energy grid with a capacity of 2000MW by 2020.

The solar flight is described as a trial for a round-the-world flight with a new aircraft in 2014. That trip will include stops in the US, said Borschberg.

In 2010, the Swiss flew non-stop for 26-hour to demonstrate that the 12,000 solar cells attached to the aircraft can soak up enough sunlight to keep the plane airborne through the night. A year later, he took Solar Impulse on its first international flight to Belgium and France. The project began in 2003 and is estimated to cost about $100m (£67m) over 10 years.

Researchers from Imperial College London say their map of timber prices could be used to model regional vulnerability to deforestation across the Amazon rainforest
• More data journalism and data visualisations from the Guardian

Researchers exploring the value of different types of timber across the Amazon rainforest have produced a fascinating choropleth map to illustrate their findings.

Shown above, it consists of timber values plotted on a gridded map of equal-area cells, each 0.25km-squared in size. Click on the image to view the full-size version.

Sadia Ahmed and Robert Ewers, both of Imperial College London, carried out the study and believe its findings could provide a method for predicting future deforestation patterns in the region.

Their theory is that a knowledge of spatial patterns in timber value could play an important role in helping conservation groups target the areas at highest risk of imminent logging.

Ahmed and Ewers explain that the link between timber values and deforestation patterns is related to road networks in the Amazon:

The spatial patterns of deforestation are determined largely by the patterns of roads that open access to frontier areas and expansion of the road network in the Amazon is largely determined by profit seeking logging activities.

In other words, the higher the price loggers can expect to receive for the timber of a certain tree, the more likely they are to target areas of forest where that genus is most abundant, building roads along the way.

A previous study found a high correlation between deforestation and road networks, with almost all logging taking place within 25km of roads.

Ahmed and Ewers hope that conservationists will be able to use the map to locate high value areas and thus determine where loggers are most likely to build new roads - allowing them to focus their efforts on vulnerable regions before deforestation takes place.

The image panel below provides a more detailed illustration of how Amazonian timber varies spatially by genus and value. Hymenaea appears to be the most valuable variety across the rainforest as a whole, while Manilkara has something of a high-value hotspot in the northern central area.

You can find Ahmed and Ewers' full research paper, including tables and images, here.

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The world's best garden show presents nature in all its glory yet uses methods that harm the environment

After weeks of darkened skies, the Chelsea Flower Show was blessed with glorious sunshine on its opening this week. With thousands of stunningly beautiful flowers, trees and scents wafting in the air, it looks at first glance like a glorious celebration of nature But is there a dark heart to the beautiful displays of Chelsea? Is the show guilty of being complicit in environmental damage or is it part of the solution?

To be fair, it is impossible to organise an international flower show and not incur a massive environmental footprint. Take the Australia Garden, which brought two containers of stone and timber by sea from Australia, shipped six absolutely enormous palm trees from Spain and flew 12 people over to staff the stand. The flights alone emitted 43 tonnes of CO2, or the equivalent of a year's emissions for seven UK homes. Or the floral orgy that was the Thai Garden, which imported 80,000 orchids, of which only 50,000 were actually used.

But how do they manage to get all these flowers into bloom at the right time? The answer is bucket loads of energy. Rueslyn Nurseries said they had been lighting their fuschias since Christmas to get them to bloom for Chelsea. Two industrial heaters were used to the maximum for weeks before the show by another stand. Some exhibitors use chillers to prevent plants flowering too early.

The waste of lighting energy was spectacular. The enormous three acre Great Pavilion, which is naturally lit, had nearly all its internal floodlighting and external floodlighting on, despite the glorious mid-day sun. Almost 50% of the open-air stalls along the main avenue also had their lights on, the vast majority of which were energy-guzzling halogen spots.

Most of the catering was also ecologically poor, with every foodstall we saw using 100% disposable ware. Even the champagne was being swilled in plastic glasses. The 188 page show catalogue was not on recycled paper. An estimated 1,100 trees were felled just to provide the nine million sheets of paper used. Over ten years this would be a shocking 11,000 trees or a veritable forest razed to the ground.

But there were some green rays of hope. Bob Sweet, RHS development manager, reported that nearly all waste was recycled. Peat products are banned as is any non-certified timber. Some RHS publications are printed on recycled paper. The groundwork end-of-show plant recycling scheme means some of the show-gardens find an inner city home. The RHS also provides advice to gardeners, including how to use fewer toxic chemicals.

Among the plethora of tropical plant sellers, there is a tiny band of eco-friendly stalls. Interestingly, it is these stalls which often feature in the show's press releases. Philippa O'Brien, who designed the fascinating Capel Manor College display on urban meadows, said "I get upset about the awful conspicuous waste." Other eco-stands included Green Spaces and Urban Green.

The RHS says it has been on a journey to make the show greener, but there is no environmental data on their website and they don't have any strategic plan yet to reduce the RHA's overall carbon and other environmental footprints. RHS member and visitor Tania Thorne said: "Having seen the level of environmental waste, I would not have guessed the RHS had even heard of climate change".

So is it an ecological monster or a fantastic show promoting the wonders of nature? The evidence sadly indicates it is more of the former. This was neatly summarised in Bob Sweet's response to the huge waste of lighting on the traders' stands: "I have no objection to it if it adds to the shopping experience. We are a consumer show".

This is simply not good enough. The RHS as the nation's leading horticultural institution, should be leading from the front. Britain's gardens are already suffering the damaging effects of the climate crisis. Let's hope next year's show will positively demonstrate the actual level of urgency required and begin the process of turning Chelsea from an environmentally-damaging consumerist monster into the leading eco-angel that our gardens desperately need.

LA becomes biggest city in America to phase plastic bags in supermarkets after pressure from environmental activists

The second largest city in the country has voted to adopt a ban on plastic bags in supermarket checkout lines.

The Los Angeles city council voted 13-1 on Wednesday to approve a policy that would ban single-use plastic bags, which will be phased out over the next 12 months at an estimated 7,500 stores, the Los Angeles Times reported.

After the year is up, retailers will be allowed to charge 10¢ for paper bags.

The ban was supported by clean water advocates, who found a spokeswoman in the actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who claimed discarded plastic bags are clogging the region's landfills and making their way into the ocean.

The city's program will be modeled after bag bans in 48 other California cities, including San Jose, San Francisco and Long Beach.

"My hope is that so few paper bags will be used as a result of this measure that the formal ban … on paper bags may not even be necessary," said councilman Paul Koretz, who voted in favor of the ban.

City officials are slated to conduct a study in two years to determine whether the prohibition should be expanded to include paper.

Not everyone is celebrating Wednesday's vote. Among the displeased was the American Progressive Bag Alliance, an organization representing the United States' plastic bag manufacturing and recycling sector.

"Bag bans have not been proven to reduce litter," writes Mark Daniels, the organization's chair, in a statement.

"With this draconian bag ban, the city takes a simplistic approach that misses an opportunity to provide a more effective solution for consumers and the environment – programs that encourage greater recycling of plastic and paper bags and preserve jobs."

A mild winter and wet spring means slugs are likely to be on the rise this summer, but views about the best remedy vary

After a mild winter and wet spring, the UK should brace itself for a "slime wave" this summer. So warns Dr Richard Meredith, a slug expert who works for Bayer Crop Science, a leading manufacturer of mollusc-massacring products:

They like the rain and warm, and we prayed for rain, and now we've had months of it - and the slugs are thriving. If it carries on the way it is, we can expect to have a serious challenge with protecting crops.

Yes, it's his job to remind us that this problem – and his company's products – exist (Bayer has even produced a very handy "Slug Expert Guide"), but such news will still send a shiver down the spines of gardeners and farmers alike. Is there a greater sworn enemy of the keen horticulturist than Arion hortensis, the common garden slug?

Debate has long raged about the most effective way to deter or kill slugs. Of course, there is a sharp divide between those who favour "organic" methods, and those that chose "chemical" intervention instead. Each has their perceived advantages and disadvantages. For example, organic methods, such as beer traps (there's worse ways to go, I suppose), hand-picking at night and introducing slug-busting nematodes are all said to be "kinder" on the other flora and fauna that share the same soil as the slugs, but are arguably less effective than baits laced with metaldehyde or methiocarb.

Personally, I try to take a fairly laissez-faire attitude to slugs these days. My days of rage and tears are behind me. I now force myself, for example, to accept that a percentage of my potatoes will be stolen from me by these piratical pests. I don't like it one little bit, but I prefer to enter this (yes, somewhat capitulatory) deal with them rather than continue with the angst, torment and, frankly, fruitless efforts to eradicate them. I still relish squashing the blighters when I find them hiding under a stone or clump of vegetation, but I know they - just like the Black Knight in the Monty Python and the Holy Grail – have death-defying qualities (or, more accurately, reproductive qualities) to which I have no proven remedy.

But maybe you have stumbled on a better method or approach to fending off the relentless march forward by this formidable army? If so, please furnish us with the details. We must stand as one against this common enemy.

Agency says radiation exposure from nuclear power plant's meltdown was below levels thought to increase risk of cancer, but one town's infants could be at greater risk

Radiation exposure caused by last year's accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was below levels thought to increase the risk of cancer in almost all parts of Japan, according to a World Health Organisation report.

But in its preliminary estimate [pdf] released on Wednesday, the WHO said infants in one town near the plant could be at a greater risk of developing thyroid cancer after exposure to radioactive iodine-131.

The study is the first by a UN agency since the Fukushima plant was hit by a 14-metre (46ft) tsunami following a magnitude-9.0 earthquake on 11 March last year. The wave knocked out the facility's back-up power supply, causing three of its six reactors to suffer meltdown.

The independent experts who compiled the report said that people in the towns of Namie, located inside the 12-mile nuclear evacuation zone, and Iitate, which lies 25 miles north-west of Fukushima Daiichi, may have received the highest doses, of between 10 millisieverts a year and 50mSv in the wake of the accident.

Infants in Namie were thought to have received thyroid radiation doses of between 100 and 200mSv a year. "That would be one area because of the estimated high dose that we would have to keep an eye on," WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl told Reuters. "Below 100mSv, the studies have not been conclusive."

Radioactive iodine-131 accumulates in the thyroid gland, and children are known to be particularly at risk of developing cancer.

In a separate interim report, the UN's scientific committee on the effects of radiation (Unscear) said that none of the deaths of six plant workers since last March was related to radiation. It added that several workers had been "irradiated after contamination of their skin", but that no clinically observable health effects had been reported.

A Unscear spokesman in Vienna said the six workers' deaths had been caused by accidents and health problems that preceded their time at the plant. They included a man in his 40s who died from acute leukaemia, and another who fell from a ladder. Two men are thought to have drowned in the basement of a reactor turbine building when the tsunami struck the plant.

While little is known about the possible health effects of long-term exposure to radiation below 100mSv a year, UN experts say people exposed to higher levels are at a slightly greater risk of developing cancer. The threshold for acute radiation syndrome is about 1Sv (1000mSv).

Japan's government hopes to keep public exposure from the accident below 20mSv a year, but eventually wants to bring levels in areas contaminated by the accident to 1mSv a year or below. Natural background radiation around the world is about 2.4mSv a year.

The 124-page WHO report, compiled using data provided by Japanese authorities, found that doses in other parts of Fukushima prefecture were within the typical 1-10mSv range, while those in the rest of Japan stood at just 0.1-1 mSv.

Despite fears in other countries that they have been exposed to dangerous radiation leaks, the report said levels were below 0.01mSv – or about half the dose received during a chest X-ray – in other parts of the world, including in neighbouring South Korea.

The experts based their assessments on data on the amount of radioactivity in the air, soil, water and food supplies after the disaster. "In these most affected locations, external exposure is the major contributor to the effective dose," the WHO said.

The experts conceded they had made assumptions based on limited information – including the composition and dispersion of radioactive clouds – but insisted that every effort had been made "to avoid any underestimation of doses".

The WHO report said that the lifetime dose in Fukushima was expected to be lower than that among people exposed after the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.

"The experience of the Chernobyl accident was that about 30% of the lifetime dose was delivered during the first year and about 70% during the first 15 years," it said.

"On the basis of environmental activity concentration data, it can be expected that the fraction of the lifetime dose beyond the first year will be lower for the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident than for the Chernobyl accident."

We haven't had Springwatch yet and I've already got heat-based irritation. Why can't we accept hot weather doesn't belong here?

Now that summer appears to have finally arrived, can I strike a dissonant chord by suggesting that it goes away again? No?

I should explain. I'm writing this article in the middle of the night. Earlier today, an unscheduled siesta on my desktop whisked me away from work into a swirling narcoleptic swoon, punctuated only by the sudden thud of an office stapler I'd been holding as it landed on the floor. This was no elective nap, I had no choice in the matter; a restless night turning the pillow for the cool side, an over-the-counter antihistamine pill, an airless, warm office and the soft warble of a wood pigeon are as effective an anaesthetic as a Horlicks and chloroform cocktail, and I went under like a ketamined dormouse. I've no wish to be a killjoy, but all of the blame for this can be laid firmly on the doorstep of summer.

It is, of course, a British tradition to moan about the weather as a conversational gambit. And, like most of us, I can extract a good minute and a half of chatter about the finer nuances of a climate that veers from mildly interesting to interestingly mild – chatter that saves me from revealing the terrifying truth about my social ineptitude – but I'm at a loss when it comes to discussing the heat, because everyone else seems to like it and I really don't. Furthermore, while I'm resigned to nodding along in pretend agreement about "the lovely weather" if it's soaring away in the high 20s in August, I'm damned if I'm going to go down without a fight in May. This weather doesn't belong here. We haven't even had Springwatch yet and, in terms of temperature, the tube is already on its merry way towards "fan oven".

The French call these heatwaves canicule, which translates as "little dog", a reference to the dog days of summer – so called because they follow the first sight of the rising Dog Star, Sirius, just before sunrise as it gets far enough away from the sun to be visible again after an absence of over two months. In Ancient Greece and Rome, the malign influence of Sirius was blamed for the sultry, stifling weather of July and August because it appeared so close to the sun. Not very good science, perhaps, but maybe they found it hard to think straight in the smothering warmth. Given that they were from the Mediterranean and couldn't stand the heat, what chance do solidly northern Europeans like me have of coping with a scorcher.

Not much. While for some the first sight of a bright-blue sky signals an instant transformation to human solar panel, pointing completely unprepared flesh at the sun while identically coloured pork chipolatas sizzle away on a nearby barbecue, some of us become irrationally irritated by heat. Even when we attempt to be mellow about it, something pierces the bonhomie we are trying to cultivate within – a middle-aged man on a four-stroke motorbike throbbing down an A-road like an Avro Lancaster bomber, or the appearance of a legion of wasps, between-the-eyes-flies and infuriating insects of every other stripe. While others attempt a "Mediterranean" approach, according to a template based on a half-remembered Sophia Loren movie, all I see is the sudden appearance of convertibles touring the more affluent areas of the country while adolescent boys cry "wanker" in their wakes. Likewise, the spectre of cafe diners going alfresco in the slipstreams of bus lanes, while parks and gardens fill with seasonal alcoholics, leaves me cold. If only it did leave me cold, because the heat, dear God, the heat – doesn't that really get on everyone's nerves?

There are some good signs that I'm not the only one – frustrated motorists seething in traffic queues on buckled motorways, people tutting on buses and summer riots all point to an undercurrent of heat-based irritation. I'm biased; I have hay fever and asthma, so a hot day sees me snivelling like a toddler at the hands of an unjustly militant parent, either that or wheezing like an iron lung with an integrated squeezebox, and all while simultaneously developing the perspiration profile of a muskox. Which is why I wonder whether we are really set up in this country for hot weather. Everyone agrees that we're useless at snow, perhaps it's just that we feel we should be better at the other end of the scale.

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The captain of Portsmouth naval shipyard confirms there were no weapons on board a nuclear-powered submarine which caught fire while docked in Kittery, Maine

Temperatures in London and south-east expected to reach high of 29C and sunshine to continue into the weekend

Britain is set to enjoy the hottest day of the year so far, with temperatures in London and the south-east expected to hit 29C (84.2F) on Thursday.

According to forecasters, the mercury could creep up from the 27.8C recorded in Southampton on Wednesday.

"There's lots of decent weather around and today will probably be the hottest day of the year so far, with a high of 29C in London and the south-east and high temperatures in the west of England, the west Midlands and Scotland," said a spokesman for the Met Office.

"It will be less warm on the east coast, but most places will get into the 20s and there will be a good deal of sunshine, with any cloud burning away except on the east coast."

Although the good weather is likely to last through the weekend, he added, Friday will feel less warm because of "a breezy east wind".

"There will be strong sunshine but it will be a little bit less warm, with temperatures in the low- to mid-20s," he said. "The temperatures on the east coast will be in the high teens, where it's going to feel a little bit fresher."

Saturday and much of Sunday, he said, were set for "pretty much unbroken sunshine", while Devon and Cornwall could expect the odd, scattered shower on Sunday. But, he added, "it won't be a washout".

Wednesday's warm weather reached most parts of Britain, with Altnaharra in the Scottish highlands recording a maximum of 27.3C, and Heathrow airport near London recording 27.2C.

Average maximum temperatures for England in May are 14-17C, while Scotland would normally be 13-15C.

Thousands of people flocked to beaches and parks to bask in the sunshine, as conditions were hotter than many popular European destinations. Ibiza was 25C, Italian capital Rome 22C, while Barcelona lagged behind at 21C.

Sun-worshipping humans are unlikely to be the only ones basking in the late May sunshine. On Wednesday, the Health Protection Agency's National Poisons Information Service (NPIS) warned people to leave snakes in the countryside alone following dozens of incidents of bites caused by people picking up venomous adders.

People sought advice over adder bites 196 times between 2009 and 2011, according to NPIS figures. In around half the cases, a person had picked up an adder, the only venomous snake living wild in England, Scotland and Wales.

Professor Simon Thomas, director of NPIS Newcastle, said: "Adder numbers have decreased in recent years so they are rare but still present in certain areas. They usually keep well out of sight, but in the summer months are active because the weather is warmer.

"Because they are well camouflaged, people can accidentally tread on them, which is when they can bite. They can also bite if picked up."

Although bites can occur between February and October, experts say they are most common in the warmer summer months.

Authorities say USS Miami was not carrying nuclear missiles and that reactor was undamaged in fire at naval shipyard in Maine

Six people have been injured after a fire broke out on a nuclear-powered submarine docked in a US naval shipyard.

The blaze – which started in the "forward compartment" of the USS Miami shortly before 6pm local time on Wednesday – has not affected the vessel's reactor, which was not operating at the time.

Reports suggest there were no weapons aboard the submarine, which was at the Portsmouth naval shipyard in Kittery, Maine, for upgrades and maintenance.

Firefighters were still battling the blaze after 10pm, with equipment brought in from Logan international airport in Boston, about 60 miles away.

Six people – including one of the firefighters, who was suffering from heat exhaustion – have been treated and released, according to the shipyard authorities.

The fire still was not out shortly before midnight but a shipyard spokesman said the situation was improving.

All nonessential personnel on the submarine were ordered to evacuate when the blaze was reported. The cause of the fire is still unknown.

Local media reported that black smoke was visible in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The naval shipyard is located on Seavey Island just over the New Hampshire-Maine border.

The Los Angeles class submarine, whose home port is Groton, Connecticut, arrived at the shipyard in March. The vessel typically carries a crew of 13 officers and 120 enlisted personnel.

Heartland president admits advertisment comparing believers in human-made climate change to psychopaths has taken a toll

The ultra-conservative Heartland Institute admitted it was in financial crisis on Wednesday, with the flight of corporate donors making it difficult to pay staff or cover the costs of its annual conference aimed at debunking climate science.

In a speech at the close of this year's climate conference, Heartland's president, Joseph Bast, acknowledged that a provocative ad campaign comparing believers in human-made climate change to psychopaths had exacted a heavy cost.

However, Bast also attributed Heartland's current problems to his weakness in financial management.

"These conferences are expensive, and I'm not a good fundraiser so as a result I don't raise enough money to cover them. We really scramble to make payroll as a result to cover these expenses," Bast said.

"If you can afford to make a contribution please do. If you know someone, if you've got a rich uncle or somebody in the family or somebody that you work with, please give them a call and ask them if they would consider making a tax-deductible contribution to the Heartland Institute."

The organisation has lost at least $825,000 in funds from corporate donors although Heartland also claims to have attracted 800 new small donors. Heartland also came in for bruising criticism from its own allies – a number of whom faulted Bast for failing to consult Heartland's colleagues or board members about the ads in advance.

Among ultra-conservative activists, the billboard controversy has shaken confidence in Heartland's ability to serve as the hub of the climate contrarian network. It has also raised doubts about Bast's leadership. Bast is listed on Heartland's website as its earliest employee. His wife is also employed at Heartland.

But Heartland was facing a cash crunch even before the Gleick expose.

Nine employees were due to be laid or take pay cuts in 2011, according to the budget documents obtained by Gleick.

This year's conference was a drastically shrunken version of earlier Heartland gatherings, which attracted up to 800 attendees and ran several concurrent sessions. Those events were also lucrative for Heartland, accounting for half of its non-fundraising events revenue, according to documents obtained through deception by the scientist Peter Gleick.

At this year's gathering in Chicago, fewer than 170 turned up for the gala opening banquet, and the conference only managed to eke out one session at a time, and brought in relatively few outside speakers.

And the only member of Congress to attend this year, conservative Republican Jim Sensenbrenner, used his speech to criticise Heartland for the billboard.

"We can continue to win these debates out of the strength of our arguments without recourse to unsavoury tactics that only serve to distract from our message," he said. "Let's not get off message."

Heartland initially had not even planned to hold a conference. But after the organisation was shaken last February by the internet sting exposing its donor list and fundraising strategy, Heartland changed its mind.

However, Bast said Heartland may stop putting on the conferences. "I hope to see you at a future conference, but at this point we have no plans to do another."

Apethorpe, Northamptonshire: Female hairy-footed flower bees look like black bumblebees wearing orange trousers. They are even busier bees than bumblebees

The sun has reappeared, lifting the recent rain from the ground. The prospering wheat is knee-high, deep green and dense. Along the field margin trundles a pill woodlouse; they desiccate easily so only emerge in direct sunshine on the most humid days. Among the wheat, variously sized brown and ginger solitary bees sit on the leaves and veer drunkenly on to the soil. I wonder if they have been poisoned by pesticides. A disused track sheltered between hedges provides a refuge from agricultural chemicals. Here there are patches of blue speedwell and ground ivy, and sprays of cow parsley. On a cow parsley flower head is a small but wonderful find, an umbellifer longhorn beetle. This scarce animal is dark ash-grey with a thin body, giant antennae, oversized head and orange forelegs.

In the cow pasture on the other side of the fence, a movement in the grass catches my attention. The sharp, neat features of a wheatear, black eye-patch and acute bill, peek out. He hops into the open to watch me, showing off his immaculately defined grey mantle, black wings and pastel-peach breast. Although common in north and west Britain, the wheatear is an unusual spectacle in Northamptonshire.

The yellow limestone garden walls in Apethorpe glow in the sunshine. They are alive with hairy-footed flower bees. The females look like black bumblebees wearing orange trousers. They are even busier bees than bumblebees, flitting speedily from flower to flower and then back to their burrows in the soft mortar. Each female provisions a series of cells with nectar, pollen and a precious egg. Predictably, a quick scan of the stonework also reveals a similar-sized but much less busy bee. Flatter, with a pointed abdomen fringed with tufts of white hair, this is the white-spotted cuckoo-bee (Melecta albifrons). She is a parasite of the flower bees, waiting for them to leave their homes unguarded then stealing in to lay her own egg. Her grub then supplants the flower bee's grub to exploit its foraging efforts.

A solitary Lady's Slipper, found in the Dales years after the species was declared extinct, has a growing family through propagation. Some of them are about to allow us a peep.

Orchids are notoriously the cause of passion and crime and their protection is among the closest in the plant world.

That hasn't always been successful, but it has worked with the wild Lady's Slipper orchid which was thought to have become extinct towards the end of the First World War.

As so often happens, given the relatively small number of people who knowledgeably look out for such things, it was then rediscovered - in 1930 at a site in the Dales which remains secret. Since then, careful propagation from this solitary parent has gradually increased the plant's UK population, with sites for new stock regularly and carefully chosen in the north of England.

One of them is Kilnsey Park in the brooding shadow of Kilnsey Crag, that famous rock feature of Wharfedale which made a fleeting appearance in this week's 56 Up on TV, because one of the children who have been followed by cameras for all these years, Nick Hitchon, grew up on a farm nearby. The park has seven other types of orchid among 150 different wildlflowers on its two hectare site.

All of them will be up for careful inspection at the first Wild About Orchids Festival which is being held at the park between between 4 and 10 June. Other attractions include the red squirrels which are part of a national breeding and reintroduction scheme and an orchid-themed (but not -consuming) high tea.

The Lady's Slipper, Cypripedium calceolus, has always been prized for its prettiness and curious shape and was sought after by collectors as early as the first decade of the 17th century. In Victorian times, farmers used to bring them from the Dales to Skipton and Settle markets to sell to curio hunters from Bradford and Leeds.

The original plant's site is protected by the Cypripedium Committee which oversees all matters related to the Lady's Slipper in conjunction with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. Kilnsey Park was once part of the vast estates of Fountains abbey and later passed to Sir James Roberts, who revived Sir Titus Salt's vast alpaca mill at Saltaire in the early 20th century and gave the pleasant Roberts Park to the model industrial village - which is now a World Heritage Site.

Kilnsey's manager Jamie Roberts, the fourth generation of the family to live and work on the estate, is well-suited to orchid guardianship. His last job was director of the national trust on St Helena, where he helped to save the even rarer Bastard Gumwood tree from extinction. He says:

The Lady's Slipper is a particular passion and fascination of mine and has been since childhood. I remember vividly being taken to see the orchid when I was a young boy. I wasn't told where I was being taken only that it was a very special plant and that I couldn't tell anyone else about it. Even at a young age the flower struck me as being incredibly beautiful. I'm one of the lucky ones, because even today the site remains a secret to all but a handful of conservationists.