Brand new French recycling network My Recycle Stuff is not just eye candy, it works like social media and allows you to create a profile, user groups and barter online for items. It is still in beta, and free, but looks like it may move to a paid subscription model, which is less cool. Nonetheless, I signed up, trawled the mosaic and saw some nice stuff like a bright red retro radio and a brand new Ipod.

France: Pierrelatte

Since the 1970s, France’s commitment to nuclear energy has been axiomatic and based on a societal consensus that it provides energy independence as well as a source of energy which is both clean and green. The green component of the argument rests on the assertion – taught to all engineering students as gospel – that 97 % of spent nuclear fuel in France is recycled and transformed into re-usable fuel. That myth was shaken last week by a documentary broadcast on Arte entitled “Déchets – le cauchemar du nucléaire” (Waste: the nuclear nightmare) which showed that EDF, which is France’s main electricity provider, sends nuclear waste to Siberia where most of it is not recycled, but instead is laid to rest in the atomic security complex of Tomsk-7, Siberia.

The documentary provoked disarray in parliament, where the Junior Minister for the Environment, Chantal Jouanno, said she would order an internal enquiry. Speaking on France Info radio, she said: “For my part, I haven’t been able to confirm or deny this information, so there has to be an enquiry.”

The main argument of the documentary is that Areva and EDF run a fuel “cycle” where after first use in nuclear power plants, the fuels are treated and transformed into 3 % of of nuclear waste which has to be stored, 1% of plutonium which is re-used to make MOX (a mixture of uranium oxide and plutonium) and 96 % uranium which is enriched to produce new combustible fuels.

Whereas in fact, of the 96 % of the uranium which is sent to Russia to be enriched, only a tiny fraction is actually re-used (in 4 out of France’s 59 nuclear power plants). This means the real rate of re-use is closer to 10 %. Areva and EDF maintain that under French law, it is illegal to send nuclear waste overseas, and therefore the 96 % of uranium which goes to Russia is recyclable fuel.

Now, the fact that this used uranium is sent to Russia is not news. An official overview of France’s nuclear policy is available online, and the pdf entitled “L’énergie nucleaire en 110 questions“, on page 45, states the following: “The volumes of URT (uranium issu du retraitement) used today in France do not justify the extension of or the creation of a specific industry dedicated to the manufacture of URT fuel, this is why it has relies on existing installations overseas, for example in the Russian Federation.”

The semantics of this debate clearly illustrate the chasm between France’s elite engineering corps – notably graduates of the Ecole Des Mines – and the political class and civil society, both of whom have probably fallen victim to a kind of consensual blindness in wanting to believe the myth of a perfectly clean, green and safe nuclear industry in the competent hands of the country’s best and brightest, who themselves have operated behind the veil of their techno-scientific jargon which few have sought to explain clearly to the man in the street.

Earlier this year, Areva withdrew the use of its corporate slogan “L’Energie au sens propre” (“Energy in the literal sense of the term” with a play on the word “propre” which means clean) following action by the ARPP (France’s watchdog for advertising standards) based on a complaint filed by the Green party that the claim that nuclear energy was clean was inconsistent with the production of nuclear waste. Watch this short video (set, oddly, to “Funky Town”) to get a sense of the corporate message Areva is trying to get across – the offending slogan has been replaced by “Experts en énergie (Energy Experts).

French allergy doctors from the Association for Clinical Research on Allergies and Asthma (Arcaa) unveiled a new label last month called “Allergenes Controlés” which aims to guarantee – with the help of independent laboratories – the safety of a range of consumer products for the fast-growing ranks of those who are afflicted by allergies.

Allergies affect one in every three French citizens today, compared with less than four percent of the population 40 years ago. Arcaa fears that this rate could increase to one in two people by 2020.

There is no single cause for this phenomenon. Some of the possible culprits are pollution, the arrival of more and more chemical compounds our industrialized food systems, premature weaning from breastfeeding and shorter breastfeeding times as well as the fact that doctors today are simply more aware of the allergy problem and tend to test more frequently for it.

The association hopes with the launch of the label that it can lobby the private sector more effectively to innovate and manufacture products which significantly reduce allergies in the home, office, hotel rooms, shopping malls, cars, trains and planes. Royalties from the label will be used to finance medical research.

The new ‘miracle’ sweetener Stevia (100% natural) has just been authorized in France, making it the first EU country to give the green light to a much-hyped product which is hoped will save the soft drink industry from falling sales and aspartame backlash. Already in use in Australia, Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, full approval in France is still dependant on a scientific opinion from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), but France has taken advantage of a window that allows individual member states to approve ingredients for a limited two-year period. So, in the coming months, it will be rolled out in drinks, desserts, yoghurts, tinned fruit, mustard and certain diet products.

Stevia sweeteners with 97 % purity rebaudioside A (Reb A) are made from a plant which originates in Latin America (but now grown in China) and are said to have a sweetening ability 300 times that of saccharose, but with no calories.
It will appear under the brand names PureVia (owned by Pepsi), Truvia (developed by Cargill and Coca Cola) and Liv.

Why do we need another sugar substitute, even one that is 100% natural and calorie-free? A new study from the Netherlands shows that the brain may in fact be able to distinguish between sugar and non-caloric sweetners. Paul Smeets, a neuroscientist at University Medical Center Utrecht, used a technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to measure brain responses in people sipping two versions of orangeade, one containing sugar and one containing a mix of four artificial sweeteners: aspartame, acesulfame K, cyclamate and saccharin. The scans revealed consistent differences in how their brains responded.

According to an article in the LA Times, both sugar and the artificial sweeteners activated a brain region called the amygdala, which signals sensory pleasure. But only the sugared drink turned on a cherry-sized nugget of brain tissue in a region called the caudate. That little nugget, Smeets concluded, seemed to represent an unconscious perception of calories — assessed quite separately from the sweet taste. “We think the brain can distinguish, even if the people themselves cannot distinguish, between a caloric and a noncaloric sweet drink.”

We can only hope that it will be less toxic than aspartame. If you consume a lot of Diet Coke, or your children are addicted to ‘sugarless gum’, please check out this film, “Aspartame: Sweet Misery – A Poisoned World.” It’s quite an eye-opener.

The current round of global soul-searching about our blighted system of economic organization has led to an upsurge of activity in the field of alternative metrics. In France, on Sept 14, Nicholas Sarkozy unveiled the findings of a commission he appointed last year to study new, alternative measurements of social progress in a bid to move beyond GDP. Results of the findings are available here. The application of the findings will inevitably be political and self-serving, but the questions economists and statisticians are asking are vital to policy-making and the kinds of political choices we as citizens make in the coming years.

Joseph Stiglitz wants governments to move beyond "GDP fetishism"

For many years, researchers have been vexed by the paradox that rising incomes do not make people happier in the long run. A recent book, “The Spirit Level – Why more equal societies almost always do better“, documents the timely and provocative thesis that all social evils stem from inequality rather than differences in material living standards. They ask the million dollar question: Is sustainability compatible with retaining our quality of life? In response, they single out a study from the 2006 WWF Living Planet Report which analysed data relating the quality of life in each country to the size of the ecological footprint per head of population. Quality of life was measured using the UN Human Development Index (HDI) which combines life expectancy, education and GDP per capita. Guess what? Only one country was able to combine a quality of life above the WWF threshold of 0.8 on the HDI with an ecological footprint which is globally sustainable. It was Cuba. Despite its much lower income levels, its life expectancy and infant mortality rates are almost identical to those in the U.S.

Cuba - La Havana, from Rudi Heim

Thought for the day: “There is nothing in the world more favourable to genius than leisurely poverty” Miguel de Unamuno.

Hives on the rooftop of the Grand Palais in Paris

Beekeeping in the city? Surprisingly, bees in Paris, and other big cities, produce two to three times more honey than their country brethren. Higher average temperatures in the city lead to an earlier flowering, which entices the worker bees to emerge earlier. City bees also produce honey with better flavour because they have access to a much greater variety of trees and flowers

In 1983 Jean Paucton installed the first hives on the rooftop of the Paris Opera, the Palais Garnier. The Palais Garnier honey, known as “Miel de Béton“, or Concrete honey, has notes of lemon and mint and can be bought at luxury stores such as Fauchon in Paris, or online. A total of some 300 hives are thought to exist in Paris.

Jean Paucton's "Miel de Béton" from the rooftop of the Paris Opera

The latest piece of prime Parisian real estate to offer space to beekeepers is the Grand Palais museum, which has installed its first two hives since May and plans to add three more early in 2010.

A bumper harvest of 50 kilos of honey took place on September 2, and the honey will be available for sale in autumn 2010. Nicholas Géant, beekepper of the two hives at the Grand Palais, was quoted in Le Monde recently as saying that “in the countryside, the mortality rate (for bees) is 30 to 50 percent” due to the high levels of pesticides present.

I haven’t tasted the Palais Garnier honey, but I do confess to finding it difficult to find a honey in France that tastes just right. Childhood memories of  taste-testing honey all over New Zealand seem to have left their mark and all other honeys don’t seem to measure up. Many of those honeys came from New Zealand’s unique wild flora, and have names like Tawari, Manuka, Towai and Kamahi.

Living in Paris most of the year, the only guarantee I have that a product has not been treated with pesticides is the AB (Agriculture Biologique) label, which itself is due to be watered down in 2010. But here in the rural southwest, many producers have chosen not to apply for the AB label and those who have are thinking about abandoning it because of the cost, what they refer to as the “intrusiveness” of the organic label inspectors, and, above all, the fact that they have the type of relationship with their customers which ensures trust in their devotion to adhering to organic norms of production and quality.

Stone-ground organic flour from Les Papilles Gourmandes

Last weekend I purchased a bag of flour from a vendor at a local market after asking why she chose not to label her flour organic even though she claimed that it was not treated with any pesticides. The proof was in the baking. The flour was a lovely speckled grey-brown colour. The resulting loaf was by far the most delicious I have ever attempted, with greater depth of flavour and texture than the organic flours I have so far tested from supermarkets and even organic stores. The flour is milled from wheat produced from a small five-hectare plot, and stone-ground on site. I spoke with the farmer, Bruno Clerq, who told me that he just started the business this year and is motivated by the satisfaction of seeing a product through from A-Z. Along with the wheat, he also keeps bees. The satisfaction of eating the bread and sharing it with family was immense. I returned this morning to purchase a five-kilo sack for the rest of the summer.

One of the black gascony pigs from Pierre Laugier's farm

Next to the flour vendor was a breeder of a rare indigenous variety of pork, the “porc noir gascon“. These rustic black pigs are classified as “endangered-maintained” according to the 3rd edition of the World Watch List for domestic animal diversity compiled by the FAO. An indigenous breed found in the southwest of France, the adult male weighs on average 200 kg, and females 180 kg. It’s worth remembering that the report documents that each week the world loses two breeds of domestic animal diversity, so efforts such as these by local farmers are worth supporting. I tested the dry sausage and it was succulent and surprisingly low in fat, as the pigs gain weight very slowly, thereby producing a rich, dense, almost gamey meat. They currently have an AB label but plan to give it up at the end of 2009.

If you would like to see these pigs close up, the Ferme de Guillaumet is open for visits and also has rural “gites” for rental by the week.

A French government panel has recommended the imposition of a carbon tax on transport and heating fuel as soon as 2010. The panel, headed by former Prime Minister Michel Rocard, recommended last month that the tax be imposed on all citizens “without exception and exemption”. A commitment to the carbon tax was one of the victories of the 2007 Grenelle on the Environment; however it has already generated an outcry from trade unions and consumer associations.
Under the recommendations, France would bill 32 euros for every tonne of carbon dioxide emitted in 2010, rising to 100 euros per tonne in 2030. This compares with the current 14 euros per ton on the European carbon emissions market. In practice the levy would add 7 centimes extra per litre of petrol, and represent an increase in 10%-15% in heating costs for households. According to the Ademe, the carbon tax would generate an extra charge of 160 euros per household per year.

Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands and Britain have already adopted similar measures. In Sweden, a carbon tax was introduced in 1991 and the price of carbon currently stands at 97 euros per ton. The proposed French carbon tax would generate an estimated 8 billion euros in government revenue per year, some of which would be used to offset the price rises for the most vulnerable French households and businesses.

The French climate contribution is separate from a proposal floated by President Nicholas Sarkozy in March for a carbon tax on imports from countries which have lower environmental standards than France.

via Les Echos and Mediapart

France backs international ban on bluefin tuna, from Sam Fromartz at Chews Wise. Sarkozy’s decision was announced at the Grenelle de La Mer last week. Bluefin tuna fishing in France is esssentially concentrated around the Ile d’Yeu, off the Brittany coast. WWF welcomed the decision and the U.K. followed suit with a similar commitment.

Nice eco-tourism idea from “Un lit au pré”: five sites in France currently in working farms, you are housed in luxury tents furnished with plenty of understated, crunchy eco-chic flair and wood burning stoves. Spend your days collecting freshly laid eggs and mucking in around the farm.

This year I’ve noticed that our vegetable garden is suffering from some unidentifiable ailment – the soil is more than normally heavy, clayey and generally unfriendly even though there are no new variables this year. I started asking around and a farmer we visited last week at La Rabasse D’Astarac who specializes in preserving ancient varieties of heirloom tomatoes mentioned the fact that it is a year of thirteeen moons.

A treasure trove of biodiversity at La Rabasse D'Astarac: the farm boasts 60 odd varieties of heirloom tomatoes grown organically with virtually no watering

Thirteen moons is a reference to the natural cycle of time. For every trip the Earth makes around the sun, the moon makes thirteen trips around the Earth. Thus “13 Moons” represents the wholeness of the natural world and its seasonal rhythms.

I then asked my favourite vegetable guy at our local market in Mirande this morning whether he subscribed to the 13 moons theory. His lettuce was looking bedraggled and I figured he would have an opinion. He replied that the 13 moons was an excuse for people who’ve had a bad year, and that the real culprit was some kind of thermic shock which has been operative since the beginning of the year in the region with strong winds coming from both the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts which have disturbed the climatic conditions for growing. If anyone has strong opinions or background info on 13 moons, please give me a shout!

Summer is here at last, with the promise of leisurely evenings spent outdoors under the stars, eating grilled meats and catching up with friends. The yearly mosquito scourge hasn’t arrived in France as the weather has been unseasonally cool, but it’s time to start thinking about natural remedies and protection that do not involve DEET.

DEET (N,N-diéthyl-3-méthylbenzamide) is a registered pesticide classified in the US as “slightly toxic”. It is a member of the toluene chemical family, an organic solvent used in rubber and paint removers. Between 9 % and 56 % of DEET is absorbed through the skin, mostly within two hours following application. Neurological problems have been linked to DEET exposure and research in rats has revealed that high levels of DEET can kill neurons in areas of the brain that control muscle movement, learning, memory and concentration .

Here’s a list of alternatives available in France. Most can be purchased online:

Anti-Pique by Abiessence.

In this unpressurized atomizer, a blend of essential oils of lavender, citronella, eucalyptus, peppermint, geranium, lemongrass, sage and cinnamon provides lasting protection from mosquitoes. Spray generously at 20 cm from the skin and massage lightly. Re-apply several times a day.

Abiessence, La Source. 33-4-77646488

Mousticare from Végébom.

Composed of purified geraniol extracted from citronella, this spray can be used both on clothing and curtains, tents, strollers and cars. The manufacturer says it is effective for six weeks, and requires re-application after each wash.

MoustiCare, Végébom. 33-1-45004629

Outdoor lotion with citronella, from Druide.

Certified by Ecocert, this citronella-based lotion from Quebec’-based natural cosemetics firm Druide is safe to use on children from two years and upwards. It contains citronella, terpenes, aloes, betacarotene and tea tree oil.

Lait Hyrdatant Citronelle by Druide. Available at biocosmeo.

Répulsif insectes volantes from Gravier.

At night, try putting this mixture of lavender and cloves and geranium and citronelle into a diffuser for some bug-free beauty rest.

Répulsif insectes volantes, Gravier. 33-4-72443868

via Quelle santé magazine