The environment - Pious talk at odds with behaviour

IT IS becoming evermore difficult to reconcile the great prominence and lip service given to environmental matters — especially all of the worrying predictions surrounding global warming, peak oil and the diminishing quality of our water supplies — and the reality of our day-to-day lives.

Yesterday former US vice-president Al Gore was named as the joint winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for raising our awareness through his polemical film An Inconvenient Truth.

This disturbing film presents real challenges for all of us but how many of us have even considered enduring the mildest discomfort to reduce our impact on the environment?