I was on a flight or month or two back, eavesdropping on a conversation between a couple of businessmen in the seat behind me, one of them being a quite high ranking South Asian fund manager. The conversation turned to EVs, and he was explaining that they were simply not practical in India, that the purchase or outlay was beyond even the Indian middle class, and that he felt strongly that the opinion forming middle classes in Europe simply had no conception of the realities of life elsewhere in the world when it came to environmentalism.

Now India has just landed a probe on the moon for less than the cost of a public enquiry into a reservoir here, so if anyone can find cost-effective solutions I'd bank on them. But I was nodding along with the analysis. Unless you think the lamentable weather here this summer while the rest of Europe was painting its weather maps ever more alarming shades of russet was a gift from Gaia to reward the UK's better than most record on carbon reduction, the problem is global, it requires a global solution, and individual gestures here are futile and likely to be counter productive.