the future – I am not God."

They were turning on the lights in the Barbican as I left the conference, slightly stupefied. When you consider the clever ideas the motor industry has come up with in recent years, including using electric cars and their spent batteries as peak demand-smoothing buffers, connecting houses, towns and transport links such as that being trialled by Toyota in its Home Energy Management homes in Nagoya, Japan, or some of the really interesting ideas for a hydrogen economy, the lack of foresight I saw here was amazing. It seemed as if the future is so occluded no one wants to make any decisions at all.

"There's a lack of transparency," said Lawrence Slade, chief executive of Energy UK . "It's clear up to 2020,Team New Zealand's defence of the America's Cup will be broadcast by TVNZ.

Team New Zealand have gotten an unexpected bonus from a heated bidding war for the free-to-air TV rights to broadcast the 2021 America's Cup in Auckland.

TVNZ saw off TV3 owners MediaWorks to win the rights but appear to have paid an over-the-top amount that could be close to $3 million for the honour.

Stuff understands there is also a strong element of Team New Zealand's sponsors being given on-air time under contra arrangements in the successful bid.

It is believed TV3 forced the state broadcaster to significantly increase their initial offer as they aggressively pursued the rights.

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