Sustainable Bristol

Visions

Bristol is striving to be the UK’s green capital, a low carbon city with a high quality of life; green open and social.

Big Green Week Programme Details

by Paul Rainger

01 February 2012

Bristol’s BIG Green Week 2012 outline programme details reveal a packed schedule of world class talks, art, and entertainment.

Peter Madden, Chief Executive of Forum for the Future, who helped develop  BIG Green Week said:

“Bristol’s BIG Green Week is a celebration of green ideas and action which aims to challenge and motivate people to engage with the sustainability issues we face. It is also a fantastic opportunity to hear some world class speakers, get involved in some fun activities and enjoy the buzz in one of the UK’s greenest, most dynamic cities.”

And organisaers of the nine day festival say to watch out for more confirmed speakers and event news over the next few months.

Saturday 9 June:

Love Life, Love Local Food – the UK’s biggest ever Farmer’s Market (in association with the Soil Association) radiating out from the famous St Nic’s covered market hall in Bristol’s old medieval centre.

Sunday 10 June:

Love Life, Love My Bike – the first-ever World Electric Bike Championships with a time trial race on Park Street in the centre of Bristol. The world’s top manufacturers, with celebrity riders, competing for the top crown for electric bikes; plus a gravity powered downhill ‘soap-box’ Go-Kart Grand Prix, and electric bike ‘taster sessions’ for the public.

Monday 11th to Friday 15th June:

A daily stream of events, including:

7.45 – 8.45am The Morning Muse (Green Talk) Colston Hall

– an eight-minute breakfast time provocation and open discussion (also to be broadcast online).

9 – 10am Thought for the Day, Bristol Cathedral

– a chance to reflect on the spiritual side of our connections with the natural world.

10.30am – 12pm, Wonders of the Planet, at the Watershed

- a week-long film programme screening some of the BBC’s greatest hits produced by Bristol’s world famous Natural History Unit over the last 40 years.

12.30 – 1.30pm Festival of Green Ideas Colston Hall

– a lunchtime think-a-thon, with short talks followed by Q&A.

2 – 4pm Film Documentaries & panel discussion Watershed

6 – 7.30pm The BIG Green Lecture (Schumacher) Council House

- our BIG daily daddy of an event, with keynote guest speakers, with virtual link ups with speakers overseas. Plus live poetry or music. Webcast live by Bristol City Council.

8 – 10pm The BIG Green Event (various venues)

– music at St Georges, comedy at Colston Hall, poetry at the Bristol Old Vic, Green Talks at the Arnolfini.

10 – Midnight Late Lounge (various venues)

- hosted by the bar of the venue for that evening’s BIG Green Event (above). Have a drink, mingle and discuss.

Saturday 16, Sunday 17 June: the Festival of Nature

- Europe’s biggest free nature festival held in a tented village across the Bristol harbourside (with schools’ day of the Friday).

Sunday 17 June: Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride

- this annual traffic-free family ride, organised by Bristol City Council, starts and ends at the Festival of Nature giving a huge finale to BIG Green Week.

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Bristol Big Green Week’s outline programme released

by Paul Rainger

19 January 2012

Britain’s leading green city, Bristol, will be hosting the UK’s festival of environmental talks, art and culture in June.

The outline programme, released today, for Bristol’s BIG Green Week 2012 which runs from 9–17 June – reveals a packed schedule of world class speakers, art, entertainment and family fun, kicking off with a celebration of local food with the UK’s biggest ever Farmer’s Market on Saturday 9 June, followed by a Sunday showcase for electric vehicles.

From Monday to Friday (11-15 June), BIG Green Week will host a daily stream of speaker events to explore the latest green thinking, including the Morning Muse, Thought for the Day, the Festival of Green Ideas, a daily Big Green Lecture and evening entertainment at the Big Green Event.

Wildlife lovers will have the chance to see some of the BBC’s Natural History Unit’s greatest films, with daily showings at the Watershed; there will be art on display at the Royal West of England Academy; BIG Green Week exhibits and activities at the Arnolfini, Colston Hall and the M-Shed; a packed programme of Fringe events; and outside art and audio installations will transform the public space.

The week will culminate in the Festival of Nature on 16-17 June – Europe’s biggest free nature festival held in a tented village across the Bristol harbourside, and Bristol’s Biggest Bike Ride on Sunday 17 June when thousands are expected to join the family ride. Read the full press release here to find out what’s in store for June 2012.

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Major Green Festival for Bristol in 2012

by Helen Burley

18 November 2011

The city of Bristol is to host a world-class festival of sustainability from 9^th – 17^th June 2012, bringing together leading global experts and thinkers to share ideas and inspiration on developing a green future.

Bristol’s BIG Green Week will include a strong cultural element with music, theatre and comedy performances, a film festival, and new art, all reflecting an environmental theme. Street art and exhibitions will transform the city centre. And the week will culminate in the Festival of Nature, Europe’s largest free natural history festival.

Bristol is one of the UK’s leading cities for sustainable development and Bristol’s Big Green Week – the first week of its kind in the UK – will tap into the city’s rich resource of green expertise and practical experience. The event is jointly curated by Bristol Green Capital, Forum for the Future, and Bristol Natural History Consortium, and supported by Bristol City Council.

Confirmed speakers include: the IPCC’s chair, Rajendra Pauchauri,  TV’s Grand Designs presenter Kevin McCloud; National Trust chief executive Fiona Reynolds; leading green writer and thinker Jonathon Porritt; the Eden Project’s Tim Smit; author and thinker Sara Parkin; campaigner and writer Tony Juniper; and author and activist Andrew Simms.

Peter Madden, CEO of Forum for the Future, said:

“We want people to come to Bristol’s Big Green Week to be educated, inspired and have fun. We’re banishing environmental doom and gloom, and offering instead a rich programme of inspiration, with culture, talks and performance. Our goal is to create a world-class event, mentioned in the same breath – and attracting the same buzz – as the Edinburgh, Hay and Cheltenham Festivals.

Bristol City Council Leader Barbara Janke said:

“Bristol is an ambitious and vibrant green city so it is a fitting location for such an exciting, landmark festival. Bristol’s Big Green Week will act as a showcase for the city’s many environmental organisations and projects, and reinforce our credentials as one of the leading green cities in Europe.”

Alastair Sawday, chair of Bristol Green Capital said:

“Bristol is buzzing with imaginative projects and creative ideas, and the exciting programme of events being planned for Bristol’s BIG Green Week reflects that. The need for change has never been greater, and I’m pleased to say that Bristol is as the forefront. But we have much more to do, and it will be exhilarating to host people from across the UK and Europe to share good ideas. I’m looking forward to it.”

For more information about Bristol’s BIG Green Week see www.biggreenweek.com

 

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Bad news week…

by Helen Burley

04 November 2011

It’s not been the best week for progress on sustainability.  While the world’s political leaders meeting at the G20 in Cannes were focused on fixing the increasingly fragile global economic system, the US Department of Energy revealed that global carbon dioxide emissions increased by a “monster” six per cent last year.

While China and the US are the source of much of the increase, the European Environment Agency reported last month that Europe’s emissions rose by 2.4% in 2010.

Given that a proportion of China’s emissions come from manufacturing goods for export to Europe, the overall picture is not looking good.

Meanwhile at a national level, the UK Government’s announcd proposals for major changes to the Feed in Tariff, cutting the incentives available for people wanting to install solar PV electricity. The funding had been a key trigger for community schemes aiming to increase the take up of renewable energy and cut carbon emissions, including here in Bristol, but as proposed, the changes could have “devastating effects”, leave solar firms facing bankruptcy and affect 25,000 jobs.

Local initiatives on climate change appear to be suffering more generally as a result of the government’s austerity measures, combined with the new localism agenda. A Green Alliance report found that 37% of local authorities were deprioritising their commitment to climate change (or did not have a commitment in the first place).

A further 28% were reducing their commitment, often focusing just on cutting emissions, rather than a wider environmental agenda.

One officer reported: “the sustainability function within my local authority has been deleted and the climate change function has been discontinued”.

Better news is that 35% of local authorities remain firmly committed and think that they may do more as a result of the government’s localism agenda, with Local Enterprise Partnerships, such as the West of England Local Enterprise Partnership, and Neighbourhood Partnerships flagged up as potential opportunities.

In the same week that the Energy Minister Greg Barker announced his proposals to slash the solar panel incentive, he instructed the government’s Committee on Climate Change to investigate the role councils can play in cutting carbon emissions.

David Kennedy, chief executive of the CCC, said the report was likely to recommend some form of carbon targets for councils, but targets alone were unlikely to deliver deep cuts in emissions.

Local action is of course key to bringing down global carbon levels – but if we are going to make progress at the global level, local and national policies need to work together and encourage individuals, business and local authorities to move to a sustainable future.

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A future home for enterprise in Bristol: it’s going to be green

by Helen Burley

27 October 2011

Posted by Toney Hallahan

Businesses and organisations from across Bristol and the wider region converged on Temple Meads recently to set a vision for the Bristol Temple Quarter Enterprise Zone (TQEZ). This 70 hectare area is set to enhance opportunities for Bristol’s creative industries, and the good news: it’s going to be green!

In fact the challenge for the day, as set by the head of the West of England Local Enterprise Partnership, Colin Skellett was: “how do we make the TQEZ cutting edge sustainable and an exemplar of a green city?”

Barbara Janke, Bristol City Council’s leader spoke of the importance of digital and creative industries to the vision and Kevin McCloud of Grand Designs fame set us on our way with a reminder of why Bristol is already a green city, and an encouragement to “think like Brunel”.

The assembled crowd of creatives, architects, planners, and representatives from government, businesses and the wider community then formed into groups. Their mission: to discuss what makes Bristol a great place and to come up with core values for the zone- an area with the potential to create almost 17,000 jobs over the next 25 years.

Emerging ideas were shared and illustrated (team led by local artist Dave Bain). Ideas ranged from the detailed to the audacious, but the strongest themes running through the day were about building on Bristol’s strengths as green, creative, innovative and inclusive.

Work will be ongoing in refining the vision and we’ll be certain to stay involved- a green, digital and creative gateway to Bristol is on the way!

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Will Business embrace Lunchtime Allotments?

by Paul Rainger

12 September 2011

Growing your own is all the rage. With long waiting lists for allotment space, we’ve seen veg beds spring up in parks, guerrilla growers taking over derelict land and even veg growing on supermarket roofs.

The beneficial effects of reconnecting which nature through growing are well studied, from healthy eating itself, through to general improvements in health, happiness and even productivity at work.

So, could leading business embrace Lunchtime Allotments as the next must have staff perk? Will tomorrow’s young generation of more values led employees see an hour lunchtime break to tend their veg as another key differentiator between good and bad employers, just as secure bicycle parking and showers are for many today?

One company in Bristol, Arup, are already leading the way in the city. Staff in their city centre Bristol office haven’t let lack of space get in their way. They have simply taken over the nearby wide grass verge by the main bus lane.

What if every business played its part in greening our city?

Not the bland corporate shrubbery we see today, but the real veg growing of Lunchtime Allotments like this. Businesses would benefit from the improved productivity, health and wellbeing of their staff. And in these times of recession in the public sector, it may now be the best way of achieving the truly edible city.

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Bristol sets out its Green Capital ambition

by Paul Rainger

28 July 2011

Big ambitions need a big book. Bristol, the only UK city to have been shortlisted for the European Green Capital award, has now set out part of its stall to go on and win the Green Capital crown in a beautifully produced new coffee-table book.

Bristol – Inspiring Change has been published in partnership with Sawdays and the Bristol Green Capital Partnership, which includes Forum for the Future, whose sustainable Bristol projects are extensively referenced throughout. It celebrates the remarkable journey that Bristol, already recognised as one of the UK’s greenest cities, is on as it aims to become a European Green Capital.

The book is a 192-page, lavishly illustrated celebration of the city’s green successes, including those from the public, private, voluntary and community sectors, and the visionaries that have made those successes possible. With sections on the green economy, food, transport, citizenship, leadership and governance, it presents new ways that Bristolians are living and working together to make Bristol a greener and better city.

As well as highlighting green, ethical and sustainable success stories, Bristol – Inspiring Change also offers up future visions of this great city. A city at the leading edge of environmental innovations, with a vibrant economy that reduces carbon emissions and minimises the consumption of finite resources. Bristol aims to be an ‘Ecopolis’ that takes full advantage of clean and renewable energies and energy-saving building systems. A city-region with resilient local food chains and integrated public transport and cycle infrastructures, fit for its citizens to enjoy at work and play in a high quality, equitable, low-carbon city for all.

You can buy a copy of Bristol – Inspiring Change direct from Sawdays here.

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Summer celebration: Bristol’s first Carbon Champions

by Maddie Goodey

06 July 2011

This West of England Carbon Challenge Summer Celebration Event in July, hosted by Bristol Zoo, brought together over 70 businesses in Bristol who are collectively trying to cut their carbon emissions by 10%over four years.

The event saw the first Carbon Champion Awards, for Bristol’s best carbon cutters (At-Bristol, Burges Salmon and Coda Architects), heard from Bristol Zoo and Forum for the Future’s Jonathon Porritt, as well launching the 2011 report.

Michael Bothamley, Trustee of Bristol Zoo welcomed people to the event. In his role in business he spoke of ambitions of low carbon in the city. He said that the new Local Enterprise Zone will have an ambition of being a zero carbon development. You heard it first here.

Simon Garrett, Head of Learning at Bristol Zoo introduced the work of the zoo in combining conservation, entertainment, research and learning. He also demonstrated the mutual relationships between climate change and biodiversity with case studies from Avon to Africa.

Jonathon Porritt, Founder Director of Forum for the Future, gave his insights on where we are with tackling climate change. Taking us from the lack of action on international agreements through to the difficulty of getting past the Treasury agenda in our national government. He pointed to the importance of business leadership and innovation.

Simon Billing, Forum for the Future, introduced the 2011 report of the West of England Carbon Challenge. Over 70 organisations, representing over 77,000 staff or one fifth of the workforce in the region are now committed to the Challenge. 30 organisations have reported data so far for 2010, giving a collective footprint of 450,000 tonnes. Of the 25 who reported in 2009, 20 reported in 2010, year-on-year reduction of 1.3%. The report card is satisfactory, in the right direction but below the 2.5% per year target. So it’s a C/B, good work but room for improvement. The report includes some great examples of local action and can be downloads below.

The Carbon Champion Awards were then presented by John Pontin of The Converging World. All three award winners have achieved significant reductions year on year. What do they have in common. Interestingly, they share three things. One, they have got a real handle on the numbers and used it to drive the changes. Second, they have all successfully engaged their workforce. Third, they have all taken advantage of appropriate technologies to meet the reduction. They were:

• Burges Salmon made the savings through a night time switch off of all equipment, organised through a campaign which staff called the ‘The Big Switch off’, and through the virtualisation of
  their IT servers, which meant reducing them from 130 to 35.
• Coda Architects didn’t let the fact they’re based in a sub-let office put them off. They plugged in a simple energy monitor to measure their power consumption, and experimented with measures such as reducing lighting.
• At-Bristol initiated regular monitoring of energy use and set up an energy reduction group with staff from key departments, and fine-tuned their progressive building management systems.

Download the 2011WECC report here

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Leading Bristol’s Low Carbon Economy

by Paul Rainger

27 April 2011

The four Councils that make up the West of England (the Bristol bio-region) have long been taking collective leadership to develop the area’s low carbon economy, helping make Bristol a current leader in the UK for green jobs.

Last year, an opportunity arose for this West of England Partnership to collaborate with Forum for the Future to reassess planned actions, and to review appropriate leadership in tackling difficult climate change issues.

The UK has of course passed the world’s first long-term, legally binding legislation to tackle climate change. The Climate Change Act 2008 sets a legally binding target of at least an 80% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, and a reduction in emissions of at least 34% by 2020 (against a 1990 baseline). It also confers specific responsibilities on our Councils to adapt for the effects of climate change.

And the West of England is already a leading environmental technology centre, with the Partnership area home to over 300 world-class companies in renewable energy, waste management, recycling, energy control, sustainable transport, environmental consultancy and specialist services.

Much of the work of course falls to the four local Councils who make up the West of England, but the overarching role of the Partnership and, going forward, the area’s new Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) will be crucial to success in the common leadership needed between all four to create prosperous communities with good transport and growing green jobs.

The transition to a low carbon and resilient future provides significant economic opportunities which have the potential to play a key role in the economic recovery, resilience, competitive advantage and marketability of the West of England economy.

Though 2010, Forum for the Future’s founder director, Jonathon Porritt, led a series of workshops on leadership in tackling climate change with the Partnership’s Boards and the Joint Transport Executive Committee. 

These workshops enabled the Partnership to develop action plans specifically geared at addressing these issues, contained in a report – Collective Leadership for a Low Carbon Economy – which received the strong support of the Partnership Board at its meeting in February 2011.

This report, a key early reference document for the new LEP, sets out existing activities and initial action plans to guide activities at the West of England level which aim to:

• Decrease the energy intensity of the domestic, transport and business sectors.

• Accelerate the development of renewable and decentralised energy infrastructure.

• Stimulate growth in the Low Carbon and Environmental Goods and Services (LCEGS) Sector.

You can download a copy of the report Collective Leadership for a Low Carbon Economy here.

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Minister tours Bristol’s Green Businesses

by Peter Madden

12 March 2011

At the end of February, Chris Huhne, the Government Minister in charge of energy and climate change came down to Bristol to see what the city is up to.

He visited the wind turbines at Avonmouth. He drove Wessex Water’s ‘Bio-Bug’ (otherwise known as the ‘poo-powered car’). And he joined a meeting  hosted by Forum for the Future’s CEO, Peter Madden, to hear from the companies and organisations at the forefront of building the low-carbon economy in Bristol.

The Minister was visibly impressed by the enthusiasm and activity here. He heard from some of Bristol’s most successful green businesses: Garrad Hassan, the world’s biggest renewables consultancy; Marine Current Turbines, the global number one in marine and tidal energy; and Triodos Bank, who lend tens of millions for sustainable projects.

There were some strong messages to the Minister. Pretty much everyone in the meeting said he should set some clear, ambitious, policy goals and stick to them, rather than chopping and changing. Business needs certainty to invest, they said, so don’t suddenly shift the ground-rules – as his department has recently done on support for large-scale solar energy projects.

Mr Huhne was reminded that David Cameron had promised, in his first major speech as Prime Minister, to make Bristol a “centre for marine energy”. This is certainly an area where we could really be a global leader. Round here, we not only have some of the world’s top companies, two great universities, and lots of people skilled in advanced engineering, but off our shores we have some of the best tidal and wave energy to found anywhere. (For example, the River Severn has the second highest tidal range in the world, of up to 50ft, and this creates a great mass of moving water which is ideal for generating power).

We also talked about how to grow and expand our green businesses more quickly. In the UK, we tend to be excellent at the research and development and coming up with the ideas. But we are much less good at commercialising these ideas. Too often it seems to be the Germans or Chinese who end up with the manufacturing jobs that stem from our innovations. We seem to lack the investment to take the kind of small entrepreneurial companies, that Bristol has so many of, to scale.

Chris Huhne promised to work with Bristol-based companies and organisations on how we can grow our environmental businesses. We’re obviously incredibly well-positioned to be at the forefront of these industries of the future and to benefit from the thousands of skilled jobs that would bring. Now we need to get stuck in and grab the opportunities before somebody else does.

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