David Lepper, Brighton Pavilion Labour and Co-operative MP, has been told the government is reviewing the guidance it gives to local councils about conservation areas to see if it can be made more compatible with energy effciency devices and renewable energy devices.

The Welsh Liberal Democrats will put the spotlight on the Assembly Government's green credentials in their minority party debate next week.

Welsh Liberal Democrat Leader Lembit Opik MP, who will open a groundbreaking new exhibition at the Centre for Alternative Technology today, has backed his colleagues in Cardiff Bay, and called on Labour to be bold where they have been timid and do more to make Wales a powerhouse of the green economy:

"The green economy can bring enormous benefits to Wales. Labour should embrace green technology, not shy away from it."

The Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Bill will reappear in the House of Commons tomorrow (Friday), after it was wrecked by filibustering Tory MPs last Friday.

Despite huge support amongst the public, environmental pressure groups and politicians this legislation, was "talked out" in its Report Stage - one of the final hurdles.

Bath's MP, Don Foster, has rearranged his diary so that he can attend the debate and vote in favour of the Bill.

Alan Whitehead, MP for Southampton Test, says that if the tactics of two maverick MPs are not curbed tomorrow, it could have disastrous consequences for the Climate Change and Sustainable Energy Bill.

The Bill which had its Report Stage and Third Reading last week with all-party support was once again subjected to the juvenile actions of two Conservative MPs, one Mr Christopher Chope, a former Southampton MP, the other the Rt Hon Eric Forth. Between them they spoke for a total of three and a half hours out of five, an attempt to deliberately delay the Bill's passage preventing progress through the Bill's remaining clauses. This tactic effectively prevents the Bill from proceeding.

Man, here's a dichotomy. A Mississippi man who owns four McDonald's franchises has converted his Ford pickup and his VW Beetle to run on excess grease from his stores; the four locations dispose of 10,000 gallons a year, giving him basically unlimited supply of food. According to him, it's about environmental sustainability and independence from foreign oil, yet ironically, dude owns four McDonald's franchises; rainforests are being clearcut for land to raise cattle to satiate the world’s appetite for meat, and all those cows release volatile organic compounds out their bums, which leads to air-quality problems like we see in the Southern San Joaquin Valley. That said, we’re a vegetarian and our car has a V-8. We'll shut up now.

Mary Rayner, from the consumer watchdog magazine The Ethical Consumer, believes many of us are, and thinks we should be aware of the potentially harmful ingredients many of these cleaning products contain. "In an attempt to make us shell out for the latest products - promising ever faster and shinier results - many manufacturers [seem to be] adding more and more toxic ingredients to their cleaners without much regard for the effect they might have on the environment or the consumer," she says.

The appeal of next-generation hydropower is hard to miss. "It's local, reliable, renewable, and clean. Plus, it's out of sight," says Trey Taylor, president of Verdant Power LLC, the Arlington (Va.) startup developing the East River site. Adds Roger Bedard, ocean energy leader at the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), the industry's research-and- development arm: "Offshore wave and tidal power are where wind was 20 years ago, but they'll come of age faster." By 2010, Bedard predicts, the U.S. will tap about 120 megawatts of offshore wave energy -- enough to power a small city -- up from virtually zero today.