CATEGORY - ECO-HOMES & TOWNS

Indy - Buying an eco-home: Finally something's clicked

Indy - Better than new: Give you home an eco facelift

As I have created the category already, but now need to add a complement (though creating a more eco house is very different to an entire new custom town, there are obvious similarities):

ECO-TOWNS

Guardian - Eco-towns are the greatest try-on in the history of property speculation

Indy - Protesters' fury as ecotown shortlist targets 'unsustainable' locations

Guardian - Now that's my kinda town - good point on the tokenism of the ten.

Times - Just the spot for a new Milton Keynes - I still take some persuading a town is better than no town in purely enviro terms.

Times - Government must clarify its eco town policy - As do these guys

Indy - We're ready to rise up against eco-towns - I'm guessing 'not keen'

Times - Whitehall to force through eco-towns - May the force be..?

Times - Ecotowns: for and against

Indy - What are eco-towns, and how green are they in reality? - Looking at the 'Yes' and 'No' summary above, and comparing them with the main body text, it seems more that 'where there is a 'will there's a 'may'', and even that downward spiral of confidence in the enviROI can be soon extrapolated downwards as those with boxes to tick adjust their targets.

The Register - Tories pledge to flush away eco slums - Safe to say they are not keen.

Telegraph - Time to talk about eco-towns

BBC - Eco-towns plan 'may be unlawful' - From driving to knives, and now this, it rather worries me, as a law-abiding citizen, when those who might be expected to know better about what consitutes breaking 'em use words like 'may'.

BBC - Newsnight - tip off from poster. Missed it and may not get time to catch up, but the blog might point places.

COI - Eco-towns set to face toughest ever green standards

Gaurdian - Put away your prejudices - ecohomes are not ugly - Must be today (5 Aug 08) but all the Guardian Greens are knocking spots off each other for being not green enough or too rich to care about what it costs... odd).

Telegraph - Government paid charity to produce eco-town 'fact' leaflets - Now I have pretty much put anything on a leaflet on the high-irony side of eco-awareness already, but such as this does rather expand the list of those I wouldn't trust even further.

Indy - Eco-town's green benefit exaggerated, ASA rules - The ASA weekly list is a good, if depressing source of Grenwash. I almost passed on this, but as the Indy did not...
No mention of how 'eco' it might really be, mind.

Gaurdian - Green and unpleasant - Still not feeling the love

Gaurdian - We are not nosy parkers - we simply need to measure success - '...we simply need to measure success' . I merely ask, but is that how the way studies work is phrased?

I know bonuses depend on meeting targets, and meeting targets mean pointing at 'success', but wouldn't it be better to set out to discover what the overall enviROI of these things is, good... or.... not so much?

FT - Only one eco-town site classed as suitable - Bearing in mind what has already been consumed to get to this point, is this ratio... acceptable as a measure of the ongoing competencies of those who would claim to lead in these areas?

Gaurdian - Red faces over green towns

Guardian - Eco-towns' death throes - The headline invites a Twainian response, but.... oops! I wonder how many well-meaning folk and how much money was suckered into this one?

Telegraph - Eco-towns bill soars to more than £3m before a house is built - but think of the boxes that got ticked!

Telegraph - NEW - Country diary: the folly of eco towns