Question:
Wind energy provides a sustainable alternative to fossil fuels and nuclear power

There is little doubt that the current mix of energy provision is simply unsustainable. Fossil fuels are simply too damaging to the environment and nuclear is just too expensive. Wind power is an established technology providing, for example, 21% of electricity in Denmark. [i]

The research is already done and can be made available around the world.

Once externalities are taken into account nuclear energy is the single most expensive way of producing a therm. Clean coal is, frankly, a myth and the trend for oil and gas is constantly upwards in term of price.

Other renewables are embryonic technologies fraught with development costs whereas wind is an established technology already providing a significant share of the energy mix in several developed economies.

[i] World Wind Energy Association, World Wind Energy Report 2010, April 2010, p.5

No renewable energy is going to provide the sheer quantity and variety of energy needed to power a developed society. Wind suffers from being unreliable – producing either too little or too much – and as a result would be a bad choice to be the core technology.

The basic staple of the energy supply needs to be predictable as well as clean. Wind may well have a useful role providing a surplus that can be tapped in to at times of high demand. However, it is simply not reliable enough to be the mainstay of the energy blend.

It is worth noting that wind energy requires government subsidies which is simply not viable in the long term, people are unlikely to be keen on the idea of paying for their energy twice; once through their power bill and then again in their taxes [i] .

[i] Industrial Wind Energy Group. 23 August 2008.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Wind energy provides for price stability in the long-term, wind will be with us for the duration

The critical, and increasing, issue of a reliance on fossil fuels is that the price is not only increasing but is doing so in an unpredictable manner. Oil and gas in particular are subject to the political whim of some of the world’s most unpredictable regimes. Wind, by contrast, is produced domestically or, where it is exported, is produced in stable European nations.

Given the choice between negotiating with Chavez’s Venezuela or Putin’s Russia for oil and gas or with Belgium or Germany for wind energy is really not a difficult choice.

Critically, in addition, any form of mineral-dependent energy is based on a resource that will deplete – be that coal or uranium. Wind, by contrast, is the ultimate sustainable resource.

The difficulty with wind energy is not whether it will be here in 500 years, it’s whether it will be here next Tuesday. Relying as a long term prospect on something so unreliable is simply building fallibility into the future.

A short term reliance on wind would be risky enough, building it in for the long term would be incredibly dangerous.

This is particularly true in countries where the weather is considerably less reliable that it is in Europe. Not only does wind face the risk of a shortfall but it also risks surges to the network at times of high wind. Denmark which pioneered wind energy in Europe, and remains the largest producer, is compelled to export much of that energy to Norway and Sweden because production frequently outstrips demand. That’s fine if one nation in the region is relying on the technology; if everyone is then the capacity simply isn’t there [i] .

[i] Mark Landler. “Sweden turns to a promising power source, with flaws.” New York Times. 23 November 2007.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Wind energy is an economic form of energy generation reducing both running costs and environmental harm

The installation costs of an entire wind farm are, admittedly, fairly high – although they pale into insignificance compared to an oil station or a nuclear plant – but after that there is almost no associated cost whatsoever. In addition to which farms can be built incrementally; a half completed wind farm is simply one that is half its original size for virtually any other form of power generation it’s an all or nothing proposition [i] .

Furthermore, many experts agree that so-called micro-renewables will play an increasingly important role in the energy future of the planet and wind energy is the example par excellence of how this can be done; the most basic homemade windmill can power a generator and wind power predates electricity – offshore and on – by centuries.

[i] "The Future of Energy. Trade winds". Economist.com. Jun 19th 2008

The pro-wind lobby always dismisses the externalities of wind power when discussing it. No other form of power requires quite so much space to create so small an amount of energy, an average of between 22.4 and 34.5 hectares per MegaWatt. [i]

In some countries that may be an appropriate use of land but in many others it is simply a waste of space. It is interesting that those countries that have moved toward wind energy – Denmark, Spain, Germany, Portugal and Ireland – are all in Europe. Geographically small nations with economies that can support an interesting experiment and with an infrastructure that allows for diverse additions to their power supplies.

Wind is simply not a serious option for most of the world, it is a rich nation’s toy. In most nations, either where land is a premium or where development costs for the transition between technologies are prohibitive, wind cannot be the solution.

[i] Denholm, Paul et al., ‘Land-Use Requirements of Modern Wind Power Plants in the United States’, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, August 2009, p.10

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Wind turbines represent a threat to the local wildlife habitat

Although the issue of the impact on bird populations has been somewhat exaggerated there is no doubt that wind farms has an impact on bat populations and some impact on birds [i] . [ii]

There are also indirect impacts on local populations of wildlife as a result of the disturbance caused to otherwise remote wildlife communities as a result of the construction and maintenance of wind power sites.

Wind farms impact on migratory routes as they need to be based in areas where there is little human habitation or activity. This is simply humans as a species taking over land which has been the preserve of other creatures which already have few enough areas to live in, away from the voracious implications of human consumption.

[i] ScienceDaily, ‘Why Wind Turbines Can Mean Death For Bats’, 25 August 2008

[ii] Bat Conservation Trust. “Wind Turbines”. February 2007.

Experience teaches us that the natural environment responds to changes in human activity and rebalances itself. By contrast a shift in the entire climate, driven by human activity, would have devastating implications for all species. We know that migration routes can change over time and that, for example, bat colonies can move. However, a shift in climatic process would destroy migration patterns [i] and cause untold damage to wildlife populations.

Dealing with the effects of climate change is not just a responsibility that humanity needs to take on for itself but for all species on the planet. The tiny impact of individual wind farms on local populations is as nothing compared to the catastrophic implications of a significant and mostly unpredictable shift in the climate of the globe.

[i] Alasdair Fotheringham. “Is this the end of migration?” The independent. 18 April 2010.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Wind energy is unreliable and provides only an irregular source of supply – and even then only in some countries

Wind will only ever be a useful additional technology to provide extra capacity at time of high demand. We know it to be both unreliable and unpredictable. We know that unreliable technologies are fraught with expensive difficulties. As a result relying on such a technology would be reckless.

To take one example, the only way of building in a capacity for wind into a regular energy network would require the construction of ‘battery capacity’ such as hydro-power. Developing such a capacity would be both hugely expensive and unreliable – it’s useful if the wind fails to blow for a few hours, if the doldrums last for a few days, then everything grinds to a halt.

Nobody disputes that any energy strategy will have to include a shift away from the way much of the developed world depends on energy. Clearly energy conservation must be part of the process, but so should micro-renewables. In both categories wind power is the best available option – cheap to build and easy for small scale energy users to use as an when they need it and when built in the right place is reliable, in the UK wind energy is generating 75-85% of the time. [i] Moreover any worries over reliability can be alleviated by building numerous wind farms over a wide area as the wind is always blowing somewhere. [ii]

Battery capacity is easier to build on a smaller scale and surplus can be exchanged internationally relatively easily. All power supplies require backup [iii] . Power outages apply just as much in the supposedly stable world of fossil fuels; surplus capacity is built into any system.

[i] RenewableUK, ‘Wind Energy’, 2010

[ii] Green, ‘Wind Power Unreliable? Build More Turbines’, New York Times, 20 January 2010

[iii] Wind Energy Myths. “Wind Powering America Fact Sheet”. May 2005.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
The financial support required to further develop wind technology would be better deployed in more consistent processes such as geo-thermal and nuclear

Realistically, there is a set pot of funding to deal with this energy crisis and it is essential to use on technologies that have long term benefits. Several environmentalists have talked about the difference between ‘bridge’ technologies which can provide a temporary solution and long term, sustainable technologies.

There is a broad agreement that nuclear fills the first category and geo-thermal and tidal powers fulfil the latter. Wind simply doesn’t feature.

Both tidal and geo-thermal are untried technologies and have significant environmental implications in their own right.

It also seems highly unlikely that deploying nuclear as a ‘bridge’ technology would be anything like that, certainly the history of energy production does not suggest that industries are likely to plan for their own extinction in favour of more environmentally sensitive technologies.

This is especially true of nuclear power; it simply is not a short-term technology as the reprocessing and containment schedules are enormous. A decision to use nuclear even for a matter of decades would have implications that would run for longer than the history of human civilization to date.

Wind, by contrast, is a developed technology that has no implications for future generations.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

Most developed countries, including the United States and the member-states of the European Union, have regulations and laws which require the research methods that do not involve animal models should be used wherever they would produce equally accurate results. In other words, scientists are barred from using animals in research where non-animal methods would be just as effective.

Further, research animals are extremely expensive to breed, house and care for. Developed countries have very strict laws governing the welfare of animals used in research; obtaining the training and expert advice required to comply with these laws is costly. As a result, academic institutions and medical or pharmaceutical businesses function under constant pressure to find viable alternatives to using animals in research. Researchers have a strong motive to use alternatives to animal models wherever possible.

If we ban animal research even if research advances continue we will never know how much further and faster that research could have gone with the aid of experiments on animals. Animal research conducted today produces higher quality results than alternative research methodologies, and is thus it is likely necessary for it to remain in order for us to enjoy the rate of scientific advancement we have become used to in recent years. [1] Precisely because we never know where the next big breakthrough is going to come, we do not want to be narrowing research options. Instead, all options - computer models, tissue cultures, microdosing and animal experiments - should be explored, making it more likely that there will be a breakthrough.

[1] Ator, N. A., “Conducting Behavioural Research”, in Akins, C. Panicker, S. & Cunningham, C. L (eds.), Laboratory animals in research and teaching: Ethics, care and methods, (Washington, DC, US: American Psychological Association, 2005, Ch. 3.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

The opposition's conclusions can be attacked in three ways. First, countries that are less economically developed than wealthy North American and European states are not likely to support rules or laws similar to the 3Rs doctrine or Directive 2010/63/EU. In these countries, low animal welfare standards often mean that animal research is cheaper relative to the cost of non-animal methods such as computer models or cell cultures.

Second, across the world, researchers tend to specialise in certain fields. Animal researchers tend to involve animal work in most of their projects, meaning that they may be less aware of alternative methods that could be used. Essentially, an individual who has spent their entire career as an animal researcher is likely to see all scientific problems in their field of research as solvable through animal experiments.

Finally, toxicology work on new drugs (and sometimes other products) still legally requires animal testing in most countries of the world. The length of time it took to introduce the EU ban on animal testing for cosmetic testing shows the difficulties faced by governments in adopting new methods of regulating animal research.

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Animal research necessitates significant harm to the animals involved

Animal research, by its very nature necessitates harm to the animals. Even if they are not made to suffer as part of the experiment, the vast majority of animals used, must be killed at the conclusion of the experiment. With 115 million animals being used in the status quo this is no small issue. Even if we were to vastly reduce animal experimentation, releasing domesticated animals into the wild, would be a death sentence, and it hardly seems realistic to think that many behaviourally abnormal animals, often mice or rats, might be readily moveable into the pet trade. [1] It is prima fasciae obvious, that it is not in the interest of the animals involved to be killed, or harmed to such an extent that such killing might seem merciful. Even if the opposition counterargument, that animals lack the capacity to truly suffer, is believed, research should none the less be banned in order to prevent the death of millions of animals.

[1] European Commission, 1997. Euthanasia of experimental animals. Luxembourg: Office for official publications

Firstly, due to our larger and more sophisticated brains, one would expect the average human to have a great many more interests than any animal, for those interests to be more complex and interconnected, and for there to be a greater capacity for reflection and comprehension of the satisfaction gleaned from the realisation of such interests. Thus, we can ascribe greater value to the life of a human than an animal, and thus conclude there to be less harm in painlessly killing an animal than a human. Secondly, to the extent that research on animals is of benefit to humans, it is thus permissible to conduct experiments requiring euthanasia of the animal subjects. [1]

[1] Frey, R. G., “Moral Standing: The Value of Life and Specieism”, in La Follette (ed.), Ethics in Practice, (Malden, Mass; Oxford : Blackwell Pub, 2007)

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

The pro-wind lobby always dismisses the externalities of wind power when discussing it. No other form of power requires quite so much space to create so small an amount of energy, an average of between 22.4 and 34.5 hectares per MegaWatt. [i]

In some countries that may be an appropriate use of land but in many others it is simply a waste of space. It is interesting that those countries that have moved toward wind energy – Denmark, Spain, Germany, Portugal and Ireland – are all in Europe. Geographically small nations with economies that can support an interesting experiment and with an infrastructure that allows for diverse additions to their power supplies.

Wind is simply not a serious option for most of the world, it is a rich nation’s toy. In most nations, either where land is a premium or where development costs for the transition between technologies are prohibitive, wind cannot be the solution.

[i] Denholm, Paul et al., ‘Land-Use Requirements of Modern Wind Power Plants in the United States’, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, August 2009, p.10

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

An additional run-way would not necessarily result in a large increase in noise pollution as this would depend on where the runways are located. If the runway was established to the West of its current location incoming planes would cross over areas not occupied by as planes would fly over the M25, the Poyle industrial estate, the Wraysbury reservoir and part of Stanwell Moor. On the other hand all the runways could be moved to the other side of the M25 and closely spaced potentially reducing the noise level over what it is at the moment even with three or four runways. [1] Therefore the noise complaints argument is overstated. No airport will ever be silent but with proposals to increase the number of airbus A380s, which are half as noisy as the 747 when taking off and only produce a quarter of the noise when landing, the noise argument really does lose a lot of credit. [2] We should also remember that a third runway will ease capacity problems so potentially allowing the first and last flights to be at more sociable hours than is currently the case.

[1] Leunig, Tim, ‘A bigger and quieter Heathrow is the answer to our aviation capacity problem’, The Spectator, 5 October 2012, http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2012/10/a-bigger-and-quieter-heathrow-is-the-answer-to-our-aviation-capacity-problems/

[2] Heathrow Media Centre, ‘Heathrow set to more than triple its A380 fleet by 2020’, 25 October 2012, http://mediacentre.heathrowairport.com/Press-releases/Heathrow-set-to-more-than-triple-its-A380-fleet-by-2020-348.aspx

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Would send a positive social message, increasing animal welfare rights more generally in society

Most countries have laws restricting the ways in which animals can be treated. These would ordinarily prohibit treating animals in the manner that animal research laboratories claim is necessary for their research. Thus legal exceptions such as the 1986 Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act in the UK exist to protect these organisations, from what would otherwise be a criminal offense. This creates a clear moral tension, as one group within society is able to inflect what to any other group would be illegal suffering and cruelty toward animals. If states are serious about persuading people against cock fighting, dancing bears, and the simple maltreatment of pets and farm animals, then such goals would be enhanced by a more consistent legal position about the treatment of animals by everyone in society.

We do not have to justify cock fighting and other acts of animal cruelty as morally permissible. These are different acts to animal research in an important respect. It is not the intention of the researchers to harm the animals, but rather to produce high quality research for the betterment of human lives. Whilst it is true that in some cases harm to the animals is a reasonably foreseeable consequence of the research, this is minimised wherever possible, with pain killers, anaesthesia, and attempts to use other research means. There are many exceptions in law which maintain moral consistency due to the intention behind the act. For example, killing someone for money would be murder and illegal, whilst an exception might be made if you were killing in war, or self-defence, as the intention behind the act is held to be both different and morally just.

Voluntary measures have got much further than previous attempts to get a binding agreement – at least there is going to be a good working agreement to build on in future this time. The changes that could mean countries ultimately targeting 2C or even 1.5C are technological; if solar becomes the cheapest form of electricity generation, if electric cars become competitive with petrol, and biofuels taken up for aviation fuel. [1]

[1] Mathiesen, Karl, ‘Should we be aiming to keep global warming to 1.5C, not 2C?’, The Guardian,. 2 December 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/02/global-warming-climate-change-2c

London has a lot of runways in total because it has a lot of airports however Heathrow is the only one that has the benefit of being a hub airport as each of these existing airports only have one or two runways. Suggestions that short haul flights should go to other London airports misses the point of a hub airport which is that there should be quick transfers – something that would not be possible if the passengers from the feeder services have to cross London from one airport to another and there is not the demand to use larger planes on these routes. [1]

Of course we cannot be certain that passenger numbers will keep going up in line with predictions and long term trends. However we can be certain that the numbers using UK airports won’t go up if we don’t provide the capacity to enable them to come.

[1] Thomas, Nathalie, ‘Heathrow rejects Gatwick rail link plan’, The Telegrapoh, 29 October 2012, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9641105/Heathrow-rejects-Gatwick-rail-link-plan.html

Israel while it may be the only obvious modern example is a terrible analogy. The number of people from small island states is tiny compared to the number of Jews wishing to live in Israel/Palestine. Those from the small island state are unlikely ever to be in a position to dictate terms to those who are already living in the state so there will be cooperation not conflict.

Alliances create an oligopolistic market. The promotion of alliances creates two key market results – controlling supply and demand. Firstly, choice is restricted. Customers are restricted in what prices and services are available. Secondly, the market competitiveness is restricted. Different airlines are not able to compete with each other, but merely cooperate as the leading company takes the largest proportion of profits. Alliances fail to stimulate a competitive market or place companies on an equal platform to compete for profits.

Open skies are also seen as a means to ensure safety and reduce the rising accident rates. The World Bank (2014) note accident rates would fall if African states use bilateral sanctions to ensure airlines meet safety standards; currently Africa’s aircraft hull-loss accident rate is more than 6 times higher than Asia and Latin America and 12 times Europe. Open-skies ensure bilateral collaboration and intervention.

To what extent will a competitive industry emerge if direct problems are not resolved? The issue is not simply a need to introduce more airlines. Airline prices cannot be reduced unless fuel prices are lowered. The cost of buying fuel for airlines remains higher in Africa; suggesting that it is not just the airline market but also the market in fuel supplies that requires change. There will be no opportunity for European style budget airlines so long as fuel is expensive.

Additionally, can a competitive airline industry emerge without transparency and good governance first? The fact good governance remains debatable in many African states raises a question of how the market will work. As new business opportunities arise who will be setting up new airlines? It is likely to be government cronies or those with support from the government rather than those with the most innovative models.

While there are sure to be some countries that won’t live up to their pledges this is also the case with binding agreements even if they have built in penalties. This has been shown by the European Union where Germany and France both flouted budget rules that allowed a maximum deficit of 3% at the start of the millennium despite the threat of fines. [1]

[1] Osborn, Andrew, ‘France and Germany to flout budget rules until 2006’, The Guardian, 30 October 2003, http://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/oct/30/theeuro.europeanunion

Each government has put in targets that they believe are realistic and that they are willing to try to reach. The countries involved are therefore much more likely to want to meet the target than if they had been imposed on them by a binding international treaty. Europe has found that binding refugee quotas are almost impossible to agree and equally difficult to implement. [1] Instead it has generally been accepted that only voluntary systems will work when it comes to taking in the majority of refugees with Hungary willing to take legal action to prevent mandatory quotas. [2] The same is the case on greenhouse gas emissions.

[1] Euractive, ‘Commission ready to drop mandatory quotas for refugees’, 17 September 2015, http://www.euractiv.com/sections/justice-home-affairs/commission-ready-drop-mandatory-quotas-refugees-317723

[2] BBC News, ‘Migrant crisis: Hungary challenges EU quota plan in court’, 3 December 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34998615

The pro-wind lobby always dismisses the externalities of wind power when discussing it. No other form of power requires quite so much space to create so small an amount of energy, an average of between 22.4 and 34.5 hectares per MegaWatt. [i]

In some countries that may be an appropriate use of land but in many others it is simply a waste of space. It is interesting that those countries that have moved toward wind energy – Denmark, Spain, Germany, Portugal and Ireland – are all in Europe. Geographically small nations with economies that can support an interesting experiment and with an infrastructure that allows for diverse additions to their power supplies.

Wind is simply not a serious option for most of the world, it is a rich nation’s toy. In most nations, either where land is a premium or where development costs for the transition between technologies are prohibitive, wind cannot be the solution.

[i] Denholm, Paul et al., ‘Land-Use Requirements of Modern Wind Power Plants in the United States’, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, August 2009, p.10

We need to be critical of what foreign business and multinational corporations can do for Africa. Earnings from foreign airlines will likely leave the continent rather than being used for African development. There will be some benefit with some local workers, particularly in airports, but the degree of power inequality between foreign airline owners and local people implies benefits will be unequally spread.

On another hand, what will incentivise foreign airlines to stay? Markets are volatile; therefore a long-term vision is required. What will ensure foreign investors buying airlines are encouraged to stay and actually build a stable, functioning airline market rather than simply taking advantage of the few routes where they can make a quick profit?

An additional run-way would not necessarily result in a large increase in noise pollution as this would depend on where the runways are located. If the runway was established to the West of its current location incoming planes would cross over areas not occupied by as planes would fly over the M25, the Poyle industrial estate, the Wraysbury reservoir and part of Stanwell Moor. On the other hand all the runways could be moved to the other side of the M25 and closely spaced potentially reducing the noise level over what it is at the moment even with three or four runways. [1] Therefore the noise complaints argument is overstated. No airport will ever be silent but with proposals to increase the number of airbus A380s, which are half as noisy as the 747 when taking off and only produce a quarter of the noise when landing, the noise argument really does lose a lot of credit. [2] We should also remember that a third runway will ease capacity problems so potentially allowing the first and last flights to be at more sociable hours than is currently the case.

[1] Leunig, Tim, ‘A bigger and quieter Heathrow is the answer to our aviation capacity problem’, The Spectator, 5 October 2012, http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2012/10/a-bigger-and-quieter-heathrow-is-the-answer-to-our-aviation-capacity-problems/

[2] Heathrow Media Centre, ‘Heathrow set to more than triple its A380 fleet by 2020’, 25 October 2012, http://mediacentre.heathrowairport.com/Press-releases/Heathrow-set-to-more-than-triple-its-A380-fleet-by-2020-348.aspx

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim