Many thanks to Steve Matthews and Kim Young for these excellent summaries of the Environment conference held at Augustine House last Wednesday 23rd February, organised by C4B’s Environmental Group and The Canterbury Partnership Environment Group. As Kim suggests, perhaps this will prompt some discussion...
From Steve:
From Steve:
My (hopefully objective) notes from yesterday's conference as follows. Hope they're of use to people:
General
Very well attended with lots of exhibitors, businesses and community/ political people. The overall tone and focus of the event was quite mainstream, leaning more towards the "greening of business as usual", if you like, but good to see so many people out and involved, and lots of practical actions being taken.
Speakers
- Keith Gwilym, PVC Learning & Quality, Canterbury Christ Church University: talked about the university's commitment to sustainability and what it was doing, including the environmental credentials of the new Augustine's House itself (geothermal does 25% of the building's heating and cooling). The university has carbon reduction targets and plans to meet them, using the EcoCampus EMAS system for universities (ISO 14001). The new university Strategic Plan includes a commitment to education for sustainable development for all students (could be of interest to Transitioners).
- John Atkins, Chair, CE Murch: the person behind the Blean/ Challock woodchip heating/ power initiative, which has a small village heating scheme and fuel for boilers at Canterbury Innovation Centre and (soon) Canterbury City Council. Not suggested that could meet all the district's energy and heating needs, but can make a "meaningful contribution", and help bring about a cultural change, while using a local resource sustainably, with biodiversity benefits. Combined Heat and Power seen as the main opportunity.
- David Reed, Strategic Director at City Council: what the Council is doing, focused mainly on its Environment Policy, improvements to household recycling service from 2013 when new contract is let (includes "food waste" and glass collection), with increased recycling rates and less going to landfill. The Council has identified 5 trends that need to be addressed in adapting to climate change, including hotter, drier summers, milder, wetter winters, etc. An East Kent Green Infrastructure Plan is being developed to enhance biodiversity (presume this will be like the north Kent one, for example, and could be of interest to Transitioners).
- Adam Lacey, Streetcar: explained how car club model works. Seems mainly a big city thing and not clear whether it would work in a place like Canterbury. Some discussion about whether it could be brought to the city, including the idea of cheaper rates for students. Getting more businesses to use it would make it more viable by increasing Mon to Fri use. Might there be scope for a "less corporate" approach to sharing the use of cars, eg: friends and neighbours?
- Goran Loman, Vattenfall Wind Power. Goran is the project manager for the proposed Kentish Flats Wind Fram extension (up to 17 additional turbines at the current site). Talked a lot about the science of wind farms and the technology (eg: wind energy derived from a turbine is proportional the cube of the wind velocity). The Infrastructure Planning Authority will make the final decision and capacity would be installed some time in 2014, if it goes ahead.
The main promoters of the event were C4B, the business group, who have a green business group, and the Canterbury Partnership, which brings together public, private and voluntary sector groups. CP has its own Environment Group and is looking for new members. They are planning a "state of the district environment" report (developed collaboratively) and are looking into the idea of a "green tour" of the district where good green things could be showcased to visitors, residents and important people. Both of these might be of interest to Transitioners.
Very good City Council cotton bags provided - will be great for the (locally sourced) shopping!
And from Kim:
(Steve has done such a good job summing things up I will merely reinforce some of his points, or make some of our own observations): -
- Firstly, we were impressed with the venue. Augustine House is a comfortable building to be in: pleasant temperature, lots of natural daylight etc. What struck us was that we had no idea of the building’s eco-credentials until this conference, which is quite significant, considering we live a stone’s throw away, and also read the local paper on a regular basis. We were obviously not alone in our ignorance, because there was some fairly aggressive questioning. One of the questions related to the matter of lighting, namely: why are so many of the rooms lit up well into the night. Turns out, the lights are movement/heat sensitive; but as the building is only closed at 1.00am it appears it blazes for quite a lot of the night. My point in bringing this up, is that it seems there could be better communication between various local institutions and the public (a theme I will come back to later).
One of the more positive things I took away from Keith Gwilym’s speech was his pledge (as Christ Church University’s Pro Vice Chancellor) that all departing students would leave with a thorough understanding of the environment. Fairly or unfairly, there was considerable concern within the audience about students over a number of issues, namely: poor recycling, car usage, parking, and numbers in general.
- We particularly warmed to the second speaker, John Atkins, one of those small scale businessmen, who is prepared to put both time and money on the line in order to introduce a different way of doing business that is both good for the local economy and the environment. Having said that, he emphasised that the technology he is using (ie. generating energy from biomass) is certainly not a new technology. Interestingly, he said one of his biggest regrets to date was buying an English biomass boiler instead of a European one - the European technology being 10-15yrs ahead!
As a speaker, John Atkins probably had the most relevance from a Transition point of view. It would be really great to see him succeed.
- Some Transitioners will be familiar with the third speaker, David Reed (Strategic Director Canterbury Council) who came to talk to us about the Council’s Draft Environmental Policy a few years ago . (I was encouraged to see that he holds a First Class honours degree in Environmental Science from the University of London.) He talked about the imminent extension of our recycling scheme to include food waste and bottles, which is good news.
- Adam Lacey (Development Manager of Streetcar) spoke eloquently about the car hire scheme that has proved so popular in London. As non-car owners we were rather disappointed that it has only just been introduced to Maidstone, and to date there are no definite plans to introduce it in Canterbury. Needless to say, there was some strong feeling in the audience with regard to car usage, congestion and air quality.
- Basically, Goran Loman (Project Director of Vattenfall Wind Power) filled us in on the planned extension of the Kentish Flats, and also explained that this type of wind power holds its own with regard to efficiency, and for the time being is a valuable source of alternative energy. To a certain extent wind technology is still evolving, in that the need for repairs to turbines is being reduced with time.
Finally, there was a closing speech from Sue Davis, Chair of the Canterbury Partnership Environment Group, and again I thought this had special relevance for Transitioners. She talked about this Group being made up of ‘doers’ rather than ‘talkers’ and mentioned they are always in of need new members. Returning to the theme of communication I mentioned earlier, it seems quite significant, that Canterbury Transition started up 3 or so years ago, yet I for one, had no idea of the role of Canterbury Partnership. Was I alone in this? It occurred to me that maybe we could better bring about change through an organisation like this, either working with it, or becoming part of it.
Hope these observations will encourage some discussion, if nothing else.
And from Kim:
(Steve has done such a good job summing things up I will merely reinforce some of his points, or make some of our own observations): -
- Firstly, we were impressed with the venue. Augustine House is a comfortable building to be in: pleasant temperature, lots of natural daylight etc. What struck us was that we had no idea of the building’s eco-credentials until this conference, which is quite significant, considering we live a stone’s throw away, and also read the local paper on a regular basis. We were obviously not alone in our ignorance, because there was some fairly aggressive questioning. One of the questions related to the matter of lighting, namely: why are so many of the rooms lit up well into the night. Turns out, the lights are movement/heat sensitive; but as the building is only closed at 1.00am it appears it blazes for quite a lot of the night. My point in bringing this up, is that it seems there could be better communication between various local institutions and the public (a theme I will come back to later).
One of the more positive things I took away from Keith Gwilym’s speech was his pledge (as Christ Church University’s Pro Vice Chancellor) that all departing students would leave with a thorough understanding of the environment. Fairly or unfairly, there was considerable concern within the audience about students over a number of issues, namely: poor recycling, car usage, parking, and numbers in general.
- We particularly warmed to the second speaker, John Atkins, one of those small scale businessmen, who is prepared to put both time and money on the line in order to introduce a different way of doing business that is both good for the local economy and the environment. Having said that, he emphasised that the technology he is using (ie. generating energy from biomass) is certainly not a new technology. Interestingly, he said one of his biggest regrets to date was buying an English biomass boiler instead of a European one - the European technology being 10-15yrs ahead!
As a speaker, John Atkins probably had the most relevance from a Transition point of view. It would be really great to see him succeed.
- Some Transitioners will be familiar with the third speaker, David Reed (Strategic Director Canterbury Council) who came to talk to us about the Council’s Draft Environmental Policy a few years ago . (I was encouraged to see that he holds a First Class honours degree in Environmental Science from the University of London.) He talked about the imminent extension of our recycling scheme to include food waste and bottles, which is good news.
- Adam Lacey (Development Manager of Streetcar) spoke eloquently about the car hire scheme that has proved so popular in London. As non-car owners we were rather disappointed that it has only just been introduced to Maidstone, and to date there are no definite plans to introduce it in Canterbury. Needless to say, there was some strong feeling in the audience with regard to car usage, congestion and air quality.
- Basically, Goran Loman (Project Director of Vattenfall Wind Power) filled us in on the planned extension of the Kentish Flats, and also explained that this type of wind power holds its own with regard to efficiency, and for the time being is a valuable source of alternative energy. To a certain extent wind technology is still evolving, in that the need for repairs to turbines is being reduced with time.
Finally, there was a closing speech from Sue Davis, Chair of the Canterbury Partnership Environment Group, and again I thought this had special relevance for Transitioners. She talked about this Group being made up of ‘doers’ rather than ‘talkers’ and mentioned they are always in of need new members. Returning to the theme of communication I mentioned earlier, it seems quite significant, that Canterbury Transition started up 3 or so years ago, yet I for one, had no idea of the role of Canterbury Partnership. Was I alone in this? It occurred to me that maybe we could better bring about change through an organisation like this, either working with it, or becoming part of it.
Hope these observations will encourage some discussion, if nothing else.
--
Jules
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