A visualisation of Greystoke’s proposed Elsham Tech Park in north Lincolnshire. Photograph: Elsham Tech Park brochure
Emissions understated by factor of five in Essex plans for tech giant, while Greystoke’s Lincolnshire plans show similar error
Developers working for Google have significantly misstated how much carbon two proposed AI datacentres will contribute to the UK’s total emissions in planning documents reviewed by the Guardian.
The tech company wants to build two huge datacentres – one 52-hectare (130 acre) project in Thurrock and another at an airfield in North Weald, both in Essex. To do so, developers are required to submit planning documents calculating how much carbon these projects will emit as a proportion of the UK’s total carbon footprint.
In both cases, they appear to have compared one year of the proposed datacentre’s emissions with the UK’s entire five-year carbon budget, understating the significance of their emissions by a factor of five, according to experts at the tech justice nonprofit Foxglove.
Greystoke, a company planning to build another datacentre in north Lincolnshire, one of the largest in the UK, also appears to have misstated the emissions of its project in the same way. Taken together, the three developments will account for more than 1% of the UK’s carbon budget in 2033. This is the equivalent to the emissions of a mid-sized city such as Bristol.
“Google has serious questions to answer about its dubious datacentre pollution figures,” said Tim Squirrell, the head of strategy for Foxglove, which discovered the errors. “By comparing one year of datacentre emissions with five years of UK emissions, they’re making the environmental impact look five times smaller than it really is.”
Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Demonstrators wave a giant Palestinian flag outside Greece’s Foreign Ministry in Athens, April 30, 2026, during a rally to protest the interception of Gaza aid ships by Israeli forces near Greek waters
THE activist-led mission attempting to sail to Gaza with humanitarian aid set sail for Turkey today, eight days after the Israeli military kidnapped some of its members in a much-criticised raid in international waters off the coast of Greece.
The Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF), a collection of about 57 mostly small sailing ships, had to stop and take stock on the Greek island of Crete after the Israeli raid on April 30.
During the raid 180 members were taken to an Israeli ship, where, the flotilla activists said, many of them were subjected to beatings and torture before they were handed over to the Greek authorities.
Two men, Saif Abukeshek — a Spanish and Palestinian citizen — and Thiago Avila from Brazil were taken to Israel, where they have been held in detention on trumped-up terrorism charges.
Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
UN Special Rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese gives a press conference at the UN City in Copenhagen, February 5, 2025
FRANCESCA ALBANESE has been awarded Spain’s highest civilian honour for her work “documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza.”
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez presented the Order of Civil Merit to the UN’s special rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territory at a ceremony in Madrid on Thursday.
In a post on social media Mr Sanchez said: “Public responsibility also entails the moral obligation not to look the other way.
“It is an honour to award the Order of Civil Merit to a voice that upholds the conscience of the world.”
Ms Albanese said: “Thank you, Mr President, for this recognition, for championing a Europe that belongs to its peoples, in accordance with international law — not above it or in defiance of it — and for solidarity, the lifeblood of the human family.
Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/Donald Trump sings and dances, says that it’s fun to kill everyone …
I don’t often write articles about myself and my own experiences … but FM this wall to wall election BS is insufferable. Days and days of election commentators talking BS, excluding everything else …
Asbestos was widely used as a building material in the 1970s. People recognise it as being fireproof but it was also used simply as a bulking filler. Boy-abusing paedo politician Cyril Smith had close ties with Turner and Newall Ltd, a major asbestos company and promoted it despite health dangers becoming apparent.
Since asbestos was widely used as a building material, many buildings built in the 60s and 70s era still have a lot of asbestos in them. It is not particularly dangerous unless it is disturbed – particularly using power tools like drills and sanders – and fibres are released into the air. It is accepted practice to isolate and encapsulate discovered asbestos to prevent it from being disturbed.
My social housing flat – let’s call my provider BCC – was built in the 70s when asbestos use was widespread. Many of the floors were originally tiled using tiles containing asbestos on bitumen oil-based adhesive containing asbestos. The tiles were removed previous to me moving in and the bitumen adhesive was notionally isolated and encapsulated in a self-levelling ‘latex’ flooring to make it safe. Except that it wasn’t.
My social-housing provider BCC signed my flat off as fit for habitation before I moved in and actually before any work was done to make if fit for habitation. There was bare bitumen exposed where the flooring hadn’t been done. After that was resolved I tried painting the floors using a roller and the floor was so thin that it came away attached to the roller.
My social-housing provider BCC agreed to redo the floor in my lounge after this nonsense. It was done by a company – let’s call them FF. FF redid the flooring in my lounge on a Thursday but the following day it was cracked throughout. The guy redid it on the Friday but it was poorly finished because he was doing 2 floors at different locations and rushing between them and needed to finish to get home and go to the pub.
So the ‘latex’ concrete flooring isolating the oil-based bitumen adhesive containing asbestos is a rushed job so that it is uneven with high and low points and the door doesn’t open or close properly. The floor is left as bare concrete because that’s what the regulations allow. Installing vinyl tile flooring would involve a big premium because the floor is so poorly finished i.e the floor would have to be repaired or replaced.
So somehow my floor – I have no idea how – got wet. So I’ve got a cat that could have vomited on it or I had a friend who would visit who suffered from ADHD. I suppose that he could have spilled a drink and neglected cleaning it up, it’s the sort of thing he could do. So just living in my flat really. I didn’t notice because there was a sofa close to the wall hiding it.
The water gets into the bitumen and reacts violently damaging the floor. I complain to my social-housing provider BCC that my floor is not sealed adequately, that they are not managing and maintaining asbestos properly. BCC deny everything, says they and everything they do is perfect and actually tell me that this asbestos is “deemed safe”. As part of the complaints process I tell them that it is not a council surveyor’s place to “deem” asbestos to be “safe”.
So this complaint is now with the Housing Ombudsman after a year’s wait … The Housing Ombudsman notionally decides on complaints while what they really do is excuse social housing providers’ neglect. The “safe asbestos” shit will be coming from them – they serve as a ‘regulator’ providing examples to crap social-housing providers about what is acceptable. If it is excused by the Housing Ombudsman councils know the shit they can get away with.
Asbestos stuck to wall
So I have brown bitumen splashes on my wall at a height of a foot and more which have now dried exposing globs of white, fibrous material stuck to my wall. The social-housing provider BCC claims to have done nothing wrong and that the floor is perfect. The Housing Ombudsman will now decide in BCC’s favour and tell me that I’m wrong. The problem is of course, if BCC has acted so perfectly how is there asbestos stuck to my wall?
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Israeli forces carrying weapons, raid Nablus city of West Bank, Palestine on April 23, 2026. [Nedal Eshtayah – Anadolu Agency]
The UK Department for Business and Trade (DBT) has granted two new licences for the export of military equipment to Israel, including an £8.7 ($11.85) million licence covering “components and technology for targeting equipment”, the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) has revealed.
The licences were issued despite the British government’s September 2024 suspension of such exports over fears they would be used in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. CAAT’s analysis of UK export licensing statistics for the fourth quarter of 2025, published on 30 April, found that the UK issued export licences worth £20.5 ($27.9) million in total for transfers to Israel during the quarter.
The most significant of the new approvals was an Open Individual Export Licence for “components and technology for targeting equipment” — a category of export the UK government had publicly suspended eight months earlier, citing the risk of use in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. When questioned about the licence, DBT replied that it “covers items for re-export from Israel, and the Government of Israel is not an end-user or ultimate end-user. This is consistent with our suspension”.
CAAT said the defence rested on a legal fiction. The watchdog warned of the risk of “auto-diversion”: a process by which Israel can fail to retransfer military equipment to its declared destination and instead assign it to an unauthorised end-user, such as the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), for use in Gaza.
Such a move would constitute a breach of the export licence and a potential criminal offence under UK law. British ministers have previously said they would revoke any licence should “any evidence” emerge that exported equipment had not reached its declared destination, but CAAT noted that the UK government makes no known efforts to verify what happens to its military exports after they leave Britain.
The watchdog’s concerns are not theoretical. In March, an investigation revealed that an Elbit-owned subsidiary in the UK had shipped dozens of drone components, including Watchkeeper engines, to Israel over an 18-month period.
Israel had failed to retransfer the equipment to Romania as required by the licence, citing force majeure arising from its assault on Gaza. The contract with Romania has still not been fulfilled. Elbit announced it would start delivering the drones only two days after Romania threatened to cancel the contract.
A second new licence covers components for military training aircraft, and related technology, for transfer to France, Greece, Israel and Italy — likely supplied by the US aerospace firm Moog for the M-346 Lead-In Fighter Trainer produced by Italy’s Leonardo.
The M-346 is used in every phase of advanced and pre-operational training for Israeli pilots before they fly combat missions in Gaza, Iran and Lebanon using F-16 and F-35 jets. Israel has caused massive devastation with F-35 jets across Gaza, Iran and Lebanon. Similar components shipped by Moog from the UK were recently seized by authorities in Belgium, who have since opened a criminal investigation.
CAAT’s Research Coordinator Sam Perlo-Freeman said the new licences exposed the limits of the British government’s stated policy.
“These new export licenses show just how willing the UK is to continue enabling Israel’s genocidal assaults, while staying within the technical rule of a vastly insufficient and ineffective policy towards IDF war crimes,” he said.
“The targeting equipment for which DBT granted a license, for transfer to and re-export by Israel, could easily be used in Gaza. Given Israel’s history of weapons diversion and illicit transfers, and outstanding questions about Elbit drone components failing to arrive in Romania, there remains a grave risk that Israel will auto-divert the targeting equipment to the IDF for use in Palestine.”
Perlo-Freeman explained that the British government was leaning on a system of declarations it has no power to enforce. “DBT is relying on end-user undertakings that hold no legal force in Israel, which the UK government does not check up on and cannot enforce. The exporter is technically in-the-clear, so long as it can’t be shown they knew the end-user undertaking was false.”
Demonstrators wave a giant Palestinian flag outside Greece’s Foreign Ministry in Athens, April 30, 2026, during a rally to protest the interception of Gaza aid ships by Israeli forces near Greek waters
