Mac-using tree-huggers can download the very cool, and free OS X Planet, to keep an eye on what’s going on around the world.

Even if you don’t believe that changing global weather patterns are influenced by human activities, there’s something quite hypnotic and addictive about having this running on your Mac desktop, where it displays a constantly updating image of the position of day and night on our planet, cloud patterns (updated, by default, every three hours), volcanic eruptions, storms and even satellites and the International Space Station.

The space station moves remarkably quickly. In the five minutes between updates (my choice of refresh - you can pick shorter or longer) it went from west of Ireland and somewhere close to Munich. Five minutes after that it was over Iran.

That picture below shows it running on the second monitor connected to my Mac. As it’s technically just an ever-updating desktop background (’wallpaper’ in Windows parlance’ it doesn’t interfere with your applications, which is why the iChat window you can see running in the bottom left hand corner works entirely unimpeded.

Whether you’re green, or out for software on a budget of zero, it’s a top download for Mac users. Find it here.

When it launched its online petitions site, the government can have had little idea of the trouble it would be letting itself in for.

Almost 1.8m British citizens signed up to the campaign against distance-based road charging. The government promptly said it would ignore them, so you have to wonder what was the point of the site anyway.

A quick hunt through the currently active petitions, though, shows that there are several green causes up for debate, and in particular focus is the energy inefficient lightbulb debate. Typing ‘bulb’ in to the petitions search engine turns up seven relevant campaigns, several of which overlap each other, effectively splitting the vote and counting against each other.

To ensure that they each get a fair hearing, I’d encourage you to follow these links and add your details to each of the campaigns below, all of which are in favour of long-life, low-energy bulbs. Note, however, that these petitions are only open to British citizens:

Petition to levy a tax on energy inefficient light bulbs so that their long term financial and environmental cost is visible in their retail price
Old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs contribute to climate change, and cost more in the long term for the consumer. New fluorescent bulbs are better for the environment, and the pocket. We would like the Prime Minister to make these long terms costs visible in the retail price of lightbulbs. This would be done by levying a tax on inefficient bulbs, and subsidising efficient bulbs. (this petition currently has the most support, so if you sign up to only one, make it this one)

Petition to Remove VAT on energy efficient electronics and ban energy in-efficient devices
VAT on energy efficient devices such as low-energy light bulbs and white goods rated “A” or above should be removed. This will promote the buying public to buy these. In addition VAT should be removed on solar-thermal panels, solar-electric panels and wind turbines. In parallel, a ban on normal light bulbs must be in place by 1st January 2009. Lastly, white goods with an energy rating of “D” or below must be phased out by 1st January 2009.

Petition to persuade the EU Commission to abolish Regulation (EC) No 1470/2001 imposing import duties on Chinese low-energy bulbs
EC Regulation 1470/2001 imposed anti-dumping duties on imports of compact flourescent lamps (low-energy bulbs)from China of up to 66.1%. EC By Regulation 866/2005 this was extended to cover imports from the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the Republic of the Philippines. There was a slight revision in 2006 by EC Regulation 1322/2006. Given the overwhelming scientific evidence of global warming, the Prime Minister and the EU ought to scrap such duties to encourage the greater up-take of this technology.

Petition to Ban the sale of non-efficient light bulbs in the UK
While individual energy-efficient bulbs are more expensive, the total cost of ownership is less as they fail less often and use less electricity. There now exist such bulbs that retain the traditional look and quality of light of normal bulbs.

Petition to Ban non-energy efficient light bulbs
Let’s ban the sale of non-energy efficient lightbulbs and make a real difference. And before anyone asks.. it will cost me too - I’ve just moved into house with halogen bulbs! I know the argument will be that it will punish people who can’t afford energy efficient light bulbs (even though they are much cheaper in the long run) but the government has forced people to switch from analogue to digital television, meaning that everyone has to buy a set top box - and yet we still have the option to buy lightbulbs which are (by the governments own admission) causing global warming. The government are always banging on about energy savings in the home being the key to saving us from disaster - make the decision for us.. ban non-energy efficient light bulbs!

Petition to mandate energy efficiency in consumer electronics
Currently some consumer electronics (for example washing machines) are sold with efficiency ratings. But the majority of household goods are subject mainly to safety regulations only. By creating a set of permissible guidelines for efficiency for a range of goods starting at some set point in the future - manufacturers will have a clear target at which to aim for. This might be in the form of maximum standby current, or maximum power consumption for each category. High power consumption items (such as incandescent light bulbs) where more efficient alternatives are already available should be banned altogether. The aim of this is to lower the average household energy consumption; the advantages of this are obvious.

Petition to legislate for local authorities and housing associations to provide at least one energy efficient lightbulb to its tenents
In order to decrease the amount of CO2 generated within the country social housing providers (local authorities, the church and housing associations and the government (armed forces housing) should given the funding to provide their tenants with at least one energy efficient light bulb.

Ever wondered why so many people bad-mouth Nestle? Not sure where to go for an ‘ethical’ mortgage? Can’t decide whether it’s better to buy local food, or support developing nations by picking up imports?

Most people can answer ‘yes’ to all of those questions, which is why the Rough Guide to Ethical Living comes so highly recommended. Ethical Consumer magazine calls it ‘a great introduction’, New Consumer magazine calls it ‘indispensable’. The Blagger calls it ‘fascinating’.

Split into eight key sections covering every aspect of modern living, from food to clothing to travel, it’s more than just a preachy lecture or theoretical tome; it’s bursting with stats, and to make things simple it’s done the ethical maths, too. So, if you’re heading to Edinburgh any time soon, and wondering whether it’s better to drive a Mondeo, take the train or bag a bargain air fare, it’ll tell you (the train is best, in case you were wondering - beaten only by a 50cc Vespa, although it’s honest enough to point out that this latter option wouldn’t really be an option at all).

But while the breadth of its coverage is truly encyclopaedic, it’s also deep, as it goes into the backgrounds, catalysts and histories of various campaigns. It explains in detail Nestle’s practice of promoting artificial baby milk to the Third World, and why many see this as a decidedly bad thing, and in a section entitled ‘Boeing and Bombing’, it explains how most passenger aircraft are nothing more than converted bombers produced by the world’s biggest arms manufacturers. So, by flying, and hence ensuring a continued stream of income for the likes of Boeing and British Aerospace, you’re doing more than simply burning up the skies.

Yet while this book may be an easy guide to changing your life, it isn’t a manual for fanatical green campaigning. It’s very honest about how difficult some of these changes can be to make, and how little an effect they may have on the world. It also makes it obvious that some changes are not so clear cut, and that choices which may be seen as ‘ethical’ in one field are probably just as harmful in some other way.

If nothing else, though, it does act as a good leaping off point for anyone who wants to lead a greener, cleaner, more ethical life, and is laced with weblinks to aid further exploration once the cover is closed.

We weren’t too impressed that it took the opportunity to needle its biggest competitor - Lonely Planet - for continuing to produce a guidebook to Burma (Myanmar), as that smacks of self promotion and commercialism, but we’ll forgive it just this once, on the grounds that this volume, at a fairly chunky 330 pages, is entirely climate neutral. Here, at least, Rough Guides seems to be practising what it preaches.

The current edition of The Week shines a light on green gadgets. You know the stuff - clockwork radios, wind-up torches, energy efficient washing machines…

Most interesting of the lot, though, is the Electrisave, a digital monitor that tracks your energy consumption, measures your carbon footprint and could, the manufacturers claim, cut your energy bills by 25%.

In fairness, this last claim is a little difficult to quantify, as the Electrisave doesn’t actually do anything that would reduce the amount of power you consume. Instead, it tells you how much you’re gobbling up in the hope it’ll guilt you into using less (for the sake of your finances as much as anything else).

It’s an interesting gadget, and one I’d be keen to try out, as installation looks laughably simple and the receiver is wireless, so you can see from anywhere in your home what you’re using, allowing you to do a mobile audit. Carry it around your house or flat switching electrical items on and off, and it’s sensitive enough to measure the difference that something as small as extinguishing a 20W bulb makes to your current consumption (pun unintended).

It’s not a bank-breaker at £79 a pop, but it would be greatly improved if there was some way of downloading its measurements, perhaps into a spreadsheet or database, so you can track your use over time, and see how it changes between warmer and colder seasons.

The Archers has gone all green on us. The world’s longest-running soap, celebrating almost 60 years on air, is known for reacting quickly to changing world events, and even managed to incorporate a bird flu storyline into its regular narrative a couple of weeks back, when the disease cropped up at a Bernard Matthews farm in Suffolk.

Now, in the wake of the UN report on climate change, the characters are starting to take the changes in our weather more seriously.

For non-UK readers, the series started out as a short run of drama programmes for farmers, designed to help them improve their land- and animal-working skills, but proved to be so popular that it soon went national, and has run ever since. It has an audience of millions, most of which have nothing to do with farming at all.

Each 12-minute episode is largely fiction-based, but it has been known to dip into ethical and slightly preachy tones from time to time, so it’s perhaps no surprise that it is not talking seriously about the effect of wasteful consumption, and the small changes we can all make to green up our lives.

The BBC sends out a summary of every episode the following day. This excerpt from last Thursday’s edition, gives you an idea of the tack it is taking:

Caroline comes across Nigel in Underwoods. He’s musing on the shirts in the shop, all of which have come from abroad. Caroline is puzzled but later Elizabeth explains about how shocked Nigel was when he found out about the impact of climate change on the beech trees. Nigel makes a decision. He tells Elizabeth he wants to give up his car and get back on his bike. She is furious, but Nigel sticks to his guns. He’s going to do it. He’ll sell the car, and they’ll cope. He’s got to start somewhere.

The Archers is broadcast every weekday at 2pm and 7pm. The 2pm episodes are repeats of the previous day’s 7pm editions, which are considered the premiers of each programme. It is also broadcast on Sunday evenings at 7pm, while for those who have missed any episodes, an omnibus of all six editions from the previous week can be heard between 10 and 11.15am on a Sunday.

Readers outside of the UK can listen to The Archers through its pages on the BBC site.