Autumn finally arrived this October after a long and pleasant summer in the land of blog; but unlike the grasshopper in Aesop’s fable, Isonomia did not spend the summer in idle sport, but was a busy little ant storing up a wealth of articles for the winter. What’s more, the hard work has paid off: outside the leaves may be falling, but we’ve been warmed by viewing figures that just keep on rising. In October we yet again reached new highs in terms of visitor numbers, visits and page views. If you’ve been frittering away the last of the summer cavorting with the grasshoppers while we’ve been soldiering away, what have you missed?
The change in the seasons has coincided with an influx of new authors from across the world of waste, who have found Isonomia to be a warm and dry home for their thoughts. We were glad to welcome Roy Hathaway, consultant to the Environmental Services Association, who shared his harvest of Eurostat data to reveal why in his view, for some EU countries low recycling rates don’t necessarily equate to poor waste performance. Jane Green of the UK Zero Waste Alliance stopped by to tell us the tale of her journey to the European Parliament’s Committee on Petitions to make the case that the UK is in breach of the Aarhus Convention when it comes to waste infrastructure decisions.
New international friends found their way to the site in October: Amir Dakkak, who has written for the Middle East and North African environmental website EcoMENA, revealed how Egypt needs to take urgent steps to address issues of water scarcity; and Duncan Wilson, from all the way down under, took a look at the relationships and contributions of the public, private, and third sectors in achieving sustainable waste management.
We also welcomed back some familiar faces: Mike Tregent returned to drill deeper into the issues surrounding fracking, concluding his two part article by asking whether the possible benefits are worth the associated risks; Hattie Parke allowed us onto her train of thought regarding the difficulties of ‘multi-modal journeys’ to show why taking a bicycle onto a train isn’t so easy; while James Fulford and Joe Hudson took on the roles of waste’s own Holmes and Watson to investigate a possible link between falling material prices and a recent spate of MRF fires.
In fact, Joe offered a rare double bill performance, displaying his range by also acting as kind of a material recovery Derek Acorah, channelling the spirits of waste prevention in an Isonomia Halloween special. Not even this double effort was sufficient to exorcise the revenant of Thomas Vergunst’s article on the case for reusable nappies, which despite being originally published back in June was October’s most read article, making it far and away the most read article of the last year.
Thanks to our readers for dropping by; the more the merrier in the Isonomia homestead. A special thanks goes out to all those who commented on our articles, the Isonomia equivalent of taking part in a good old sing song round an open fire – it’s something we and our authors really appreciate. Offering a platform for a variety of opinions and generating debate is what we’re all about, so if anything you read here has raised your bile or made you smile, please do add your voice to the throng, through our comments section or even with an article of your own. We try to provide an informed but accessible viewpoint on a wide range of environment issues, so whether it’s recycling rates or water waste that’s on your mind, please do get in touch.
It’s easy to shift from visitor to commentator to author, and we’re always glad to hear from you. Whether you’re from Silicon Valley or Mole Valley, the Savanna desert or Savannah, Georgia , with your help we will create a space where thoughts on topics from across the environment sector can be expressed and explored, enabling communication and cross fertilisation of ideas.
We have a plentiful bounty of blog left for November: the ever popular Chris Sherrington will be back with some topical thoughts on bonfires and air quality; we will have another helping of water from Amir Dakkak, this time on Jordan; James Fulford will be considering what a fall in newspaper circulation might mean for the recycling industry; Steve Watson will be profiling the man responsible for the waste hierarchy; and Ann Ballinger will be asking what’s wrong with WRATE?
As if a simple blog wasn’t enough, you can now follow us by subscribing to our Paper.Li site, where you can see Isonomia’s articles, and other interesting material, gathered together in a newspaper format. And now you can keep track of our articles via our Facebook page. We tweet about each new article, and of course at the top right of each page you can still subscribe to have each article e-mailed to you.
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