It's not in the slightest bit relevant. The UK for instance has a vast Wind resource, whilst the Scandinavian countries have cheap sources of wood for biofuels.

So the EU has given us an interactive map to show the sun shines more the closer you get to the equator. You don't say!

I must be in the wrong job, I have to actually work for a living..... Any vacancies in the EU department of stating the bloody obvious?

Just went to the solar irradiation site and spotted that

"This site was perpetrated by Thomas Huld and Marcel Suri"

Nice.

This shows what enormous untapped renewable energy resources are available just in Europe - even in the less sunny regions. If we add to this similar maps for wind, biomass, geothermal, tidal and wave generation potential it will be obvious that the only obstacles to generating and harnessing vastly more power than we use today are man-made and social obstacles of policy, not ones of availability or even technology.

So once we remove the policy obstacles (Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Nuke and the politicians who dance to their pipe and speak their lines) we might be able to use the energy for making life better.

Unless of course we remain saddled with policy-makers who don't want to make our lives better.

Hi, Yes, I actually work at the EU where colleagues produced the solar map, and strangely enough we ARE recruiting! (for the first time in a while)

The online web application form is at http://europa.eu/epso/ , the applications opened on March 28th and will remain open for the next twenty or so days.

the EU agent job link is found on this page http://europa.eu/epso/cast27/index_en.htm

Imagine if we could harness all that hot air coming from politicians to produce electricity. They might actually be of use for once!!!

Peter W: it's not a temperature map...

Trevor Watt: if it were a map of the bloody obvious then it would simply show a smooth transition of colour with latitude. Anyone who actually looked at the map before commenting would see that, although there is a general trend of increased solar radiation to the south, there are many local anomalies.

I hope that helps you with your job application, or puts you off applying for a position where work might actually be involved...

Matthew Marks

But first, we have to filter out the aromatic pollutants !!