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UTILITY WEEK | 2ND - 8TH OCTOBER 2015 | 31 Community Editor, Utility Week, and content director, Utilities: Ellen Bennett, t: 01342 332084, e: ellen. bennett@fav-house.com; News editor: Jillian Ambrose, t: 01342 332061, e: jillian.ambrose@ fav-house.com; Associate news editor: Mathew Beech, t: 01342 332082, e: mathew.beech@ fav-house.com; Assistant editor (insights): Jane Gray, t: 01342 332087, e: jane.gray@fav-house. com; Research analyst: Vidhu Dutt, t: 01342 332026, e: vidhu.dutt@fav-house.com; Reporters: Lois Vallely, t: 01342 332080; e: lois.vallely@fav-house.com and Lucinda Dann, t: 01342 332083; e: lucinda.dann@fav-house.com; Business development manager: Richard Powell, t: 01342 332062, e: richard.powell@fav-house.com; Business development executive: Sarah Wood, t: 01342 332077, e: sarah.wood@fav-house.com; Publisher: Amanda Barnes, e: amanda.barnes@fav-house.com. General enquiries: 01342 332000; Membership subscriptions: UK £577 per year, overseas £689 per year, t: 020 8955 7045 or email membership sales manager Paul Tweedale: paultweedale@fav-house.com. ISSN: 1356-5532. Registered as a newspaper at the Post Office. Printed by: Buxton Press, Palace Road, Buxton, Derbyshire SK17 6AE. Published by: Faversham House Ltd, Windsor Court, Wood Street, East Grinstead, West Sussex RH19 1UZ 3,580 Average circulation Jan–Dec 2014 Membership subscriptions: UK £577 per year. Overseas £689 per year. Email: paultweedale@fav-house.com Top Tweets Disconnector Naked truth National Grid should be applauded for letting staff donate a day's labour under the company's Volunteering Matters programme to assist charitable causes or schemes to help the local community. As an example of the good work that gets done, 39 of National Grid's finest were out last week helping 20 members of the National Trust clean up and re-chalk the Uffington horse in Oxfordshire. You know the one, that great big outline of a white horse carved into a hillside. It looks a bit like a cave painting, which is not surprising since it dates back to the Bronze Age. As it happens, Disconnector was passing another famous chalk outline recently, the Cerne Abbas giant in Dorset, and the great man (Discon- nector, not the giant) thought he could do with a refresh too. The naked stone age man waving a huge club and an equally oversized manhood was looking a little faded. Over to you, National Grid. Dirty lies Talking of coming clean, which in a roundabout way we were, Disconnector was intrigued to learn that "experts" have estab- lished that if you want to lie, the best time to do it is when you need to go to the toilet. Research has found that when people are dying to go for a wee, they are able to lie much more effectively, and the more urgently they want to go, the better the porky pies get. The experiment, conducted by researchers at California State University, involved load- ing up volunteers with varying amounts of water, not letting them go to the loo, and then getting them to lie to the researchers. Third parties were then brought in to watch videos of the volunteers and asked to judge who was telling the truth. It sounds improbable but apparently there's a perfectly rational explanation. Human- ity has a natural instinct to tell the truth and we have a natu- ral inhibition against lying. When we want to go to the toilet it activates our inhibition centre, which also suppresses our inhibition against lying. So the next time you're watching an interview on telly of a merchant banker or politi- cian or senior executive from a German motor manufacturer, for example, take a look at the background. If they're standing near a toilet, be suspicious. Think big Who says electricity pylons have to consist of identical triangular(ish) towers? Cer- tainly not Choi+Shine, the zany US architects who submitted a proposal to Icelandic transmis- sion operator Landsnet to turn their boring grey pylons into human figures (pictured). The idea is that no two 150 towers would be the same, since each would be moulded to fit its environment, and the visuals the designers came up with are certainly eye-catching. However, it's a moot point whether a pylon ought to catch the eye. Whatever. Landsnet isn't biting. Where there's muck… Sometimes you've got to stand up and be counted, at other times it involves falling down. Or slithering through mud… A team of intrepid desk jockies from Faversham House Group, the publisher of Utility Week, will be taking part in Tough Sh!t, a 10km-long tough mudder assault course, to raise funds for WaterAid, led by this magazine's editor, Ellen Bennett. Obstacles include the Sew- ers Canal and Toilet Toil, so no-one is expecting to emerge from the experience anything other than wet and, er, grubby. If you'd like to donate a few pounds to help give everyone in the world access to safe drinking water and clean sanitation, our Just Giving page set up for the event is: www. justgiving.com/utility-week. Disconnector George Smeeton @GSmeeton Andrea Leadsom will today "declare war on the green lobby for holding back fracking", according to the Sun *puts on helmet and flak jacket* HaveIGotNewsForYou @haveigotnews Tim Farron says 'a vast space' has opened up in politics, looking round the empty seats at the Lib Dem conference. Malcolm Cowing @atillatherover Lunacy of green energy taxes wrecking UK industry on show as Redcar steelworks closes with 2000 job losses. Ben Stewart @benstewart999 I wish Shell had ponied up six billion bucks for clean tech energy research, instead of pouring it down a hole in the Arctic Damien Owens @OwensDamien If NASA have found flowing water on Mars then we are faced with the tantalising possibility that the Red Planet could sustain a Starbucks. Lisa Nandy @lisanandy Nuclear power station delayed, new onshore windfarms blocked, solar support slashed by 90% & now govt's CCS strategy unravelling too. Solarcentury @solarcentury Wow. The CEO of the Ntl Grid says we don't need Hinkley type nuclear for baseload – "solar provides the base load" Angus B MacNeil MP @AngusMacNeilSNP Hugely significant announcement in the energy sector from Drax – investor confidence shaken by recent UK Gov actions William Marchant @richonlyinname Somewhat hypocritical of Drax to slag off Govt policy in same press release as pointing out it's seeking further subsidy for something else. Jeremy Leggett @JeremyLeggett "Shell continues to see important exploration potential in the basin" says director. 'We'll get you to 4 degrees come hell or high water'.