Jeremy Williams's Blog, page 113

What we learned this week

This week Britain’s Conservative government brought sanctions against a handful of Saudi Arabian officials, in response to human rights abuses. Then it privately phoned the Saudis to apologise for doing so, and the following day resumed arms sales to the country.

I’m doing a half hour webinar for Bristol University Press this coming Thursday on what the coronavirus has taught us about a fair and sustainable economy, and whether it is easier now to imagine a grown-up economy that puts wellbeing f...

A tale of two investors

The new video explainer from Carbon Tracker shows why divesting from fossil fuels isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s a better investment decision too. To prevent runaway climate disruption, building renewable energy won’t be enough – fossil fuel production has to decline. That means stranded assets and billions wasted. Invest in the transformation of the economy instead.

What we learned this week

How are supermarkets doing on workers’ rights? Oxfam’s Behind the Barcodes campaign has published its latest update, showing how none of the supermarkets are scoring over 50% on measures to protect workers in their supply chains.

Climate Change News has a list of countries with net zero targets in law. Many more are discussing them at the moment. A useful companion to the list of countries with falling emissions that I published this week.

Chesapeake, one of the most high profile companies in th...

Levels of concern about climate change around the world

Do people in other countries worry about climate change? A study from the Reuters Institute and the University of Oxford asked 80,000 people in 40 countries this year, and the results are fairly impressive. Globally, 69% of people consider climate change to be extremely or fairly serious.

In most countries, the number of people who say they’re not concerned is below 3%, with the United States having the highest rate of unconcerned citizens at 12%.

Among the most concerned countries were Chile a...

Decarbonising heating with heat as a service

Renewable heat is a major challenge for countries in Northern climates, a thornier issue than clean electricity. Where power is generated by the energy companies and there’s no change to what comes into your home, heat is generated where it is needed. That means home-owners need to make the changes themselves, and that’s not going to be popular. 85% of homes in Britain have gas boilers, and that is an awful lot of people who need to be somehow persuaded to make substantial and disruptive changes...

Ten developing countries with falling CO2 emissions

In order to hold global warming to a safe temperature, global development needs to show two sustained trends. First, countries with high carbon emissions need to get them on a downward trajectory. And second, countries that are industrialising need to transition to cleaner forms of development and stop their emissions rising.

Britain is in that first category, and along with most of Europe, emissions have been falling – not fast enough, but going in the right direction. There are high income cou...

Book review – #FutureGen: lessons from a small country, by Jane Davidson

In 2015, Wales passed a piece of legislation called the Future Generations Act, making them the first country in the world to write responsibility for future generations into law. It didn’t make many ripples in Westminster at the time, but it’s been admired around the world for the scope of its ambition. Several countries are considering similar acts and there is real interest in studying the Welsh model, leading its chief architect, Jane Davidson, to write a book about it: #FutureGen – Lessons ...

What we learned this week

Why climate change is a civil rights battle, an article from Eric Holthaus at The Correspondent, is a great explanation of how climate change and race intersect, and contains many of the arguments I’m exploring in my new book.

A minor thing by comparison, but the government has announced that it will start adding a green ‘flash’ to zero emission vehicle licence plates from the autumn. Here’s my article on why that’s a useful idea, from my transport innovation series from 2018.

I’ve enjoyed highl...

Green America’s Climate Victory Gardens

‘Dig for victory’ was a slogan from the Second World War, calling people to plant vegetable gardens in support of the war effort. The idea has been turned over by Green America, who have been encouraging people to plant .

The project has been running for a couple of years now, and it connects climate change and gardening in a useful way, empowering people to do something local in their own areas. It also shows the difference between sustainability and regenerative practice...

Brexit could undermine every aspect of Britain’s environment

A coalition of green organisations has warned that every aspect of Britain’s environment could be put at risk by Brexit. Britain has relied on the EU for its environmental laws for decades. As it leaves the EU, it will no longer be bound by those laws, potentially stripping away decades of gains in protecting the natural environment.

Of course, the government could write all EU law into British law and maintain the same standards. That would provide continuity for businesses as well as protectin...