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UTILITY WEEK | 4TH - 10TH DECEMBER 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; Assistant editor (insights): Jane Gray, t: 01342 332087, e: jane.gray@fav-house. com; Associate insights editor: Mathew Beech, t: 01342 332082, e: mathew.beech@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 Standing up for progress If there were any doubts that the Chinese are close to taking their place at the top table of the world's developed econo- mies, two events this week should have dispelled them. The first is China's currency, the renminbi, at last being accepted by the International Monetary Fund as an official reserve currency. The second is the less well publicised but equally important opening of one of the world's most sophisticated loos, the Fih Space public toilet facilities in Bejing. According to a floorplan dis- played outside the building, the spacious beige-tiled restroom has 11 sections, including male toilets, female toilets, unisex toilets, accessible toilets, baby- change facilities, an e-com- merce area and an ATM room. The entire area is Wi-Fi enabled and there are vend- ing machines selling so drinks. Each toilet or urinal is equipped with a flat-screen TV. Visitors can also pay their utility bills in the toilets using multi-purpose public phones. It was not so long ago that public toilets in China were notorious for their unsavouri- ness, being little more than open plan brick buildings with holes in the floor. Now you can stand at a urinal watching TV. Disconnector can't help but wonder what the older genera- tion will make of the changes. Money to burn China's advance is an incred- ible turnaround for a country that just 60 years ago was so desperately trying to match Great Britain's steel output that Chairman Mao ordered com- munist party officials to scour the countryside confiscating any metal they could find, including peasants' cooking pots. That proved counter- productive because it didn't deliver any usable steel and contributed to mass starvation because overzealous officials had stripped the peasantry of all its agricultural tools. These days, it is the British who are wrestling with auster- ity – only managing to stave off economic disaster by the expedient wheeze of quanti- tive easing, whereby money is spirited into existence, given to the country's banks, and loaned out to the people at low interest. The Chinese, mean- while, have so much cash lying around that they're burning it to generate elec- tricity. According to the People's Daily, this year alone no less than 1,800 tonnes of money with a face value of almost £18 billion has been burnt to generate electricity in Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province. Because a new 100-yuan banknote has rendered previ- ous iterations of the note obso- lete, every month the Biomass Power Company incinerator in Yancheng City turns about 30 tonnes of money, mixed with straw, into electricity. It's a sobering thought, but if Disconnector emptied his bank account and gave the proceeds to the Biomass Power Company, it probably wouldn't generate enough juice to charge a mobile phone. Musical meters Smart Energy GB – the body tasked with raising awareness of smart meters in the UK – has decided to move upmarket for its latest campaign. It has commissioned British musician and filmmaker Gary Tarn to write a piece of music called A Requiem For Meters, and hired the Royal Philhar- monic Orchestra to play it – on instruments fashioned from obsolete "dumb" meters. The orchestra recorded the piece at London's Abbey Road Studios on electric meter vio- lins, cellos made from empty gas meters and a timpani drum constructed from 18 gas meters welded together. You can see the results on Smart Energy GB's website or the ubiquitous YouTube. Disconnector William Marchant @richonlyinname Ooh. There's a new licensed supplier called Girl Power. I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want. *shrugs* Accurate bills. Climate Reality @ClimateReality #ScienceSunday: "Global warming" and "climate change" are related, but mean different things. Wayne Dupree™ @WayneDupreeShow How did all the climate change superpowers get to their conference? Solar wind? Sea turtles? Wormhole portal? Nope. #hypocrites UN Environment @UNEP "It is time for all of us to wake up and take action together." Archbishop Desmond Tutu on #ClimateChange #COP21 StollmeyerAlice @StollmeyerEU The #UK – formerly known as "the greenest government ever". #EnergyUnion #EU2030 #COP21 #climate #CCS Earth in Brackets @earthinbrackets "Humanity faces many threats but none is greater than climate change." Prince of Wales Hallie Sacks @HallieJ "Never before has a responsibility so great been in the hands of so few." @CFigueres to #COP21 negotiators. Callum McCaig MP @callum_mccaig What the best thing about being an MP? Definitely getting to wear a crown at work. Paul Massara @MassaraPaul Electric cars and batteries are the future – shows govt don't have joined up thinking – solar, onshore wind. Bill Gates @BillGates Cheap, clean energy will help us fight poverty and climate change. That's why I'm investing in energy innovations. Seth MacFarlane @SethMacFarlane "Whoever capitalises on renewable energy first is gonna be so rich" is science's version of "open wide, here comes the broccoli airplane!"