SD for real EAUC Jonathon Porritt 1 st

SD for real EAUC Jonathon Porritt 1 st April 2009

Forum For The Future • A registered charity committed to accelerating the building of a sustainable way of life • Solutions-oriented approach • Over 180 different partners from national, regional and local government, higher education, and business • Green Futures magazine Mission: To accelerate the building of a sustainable way of life by taking a positive solutions-oriented approach

IPCC Consensus Staying below 2°C means stabilising at 450 ppm CO 2 which means c. 80% cut by 2050

Copenhagen Conference, March 2009 • Sea levels will rise twice as fast as official estimates predict. Possibly by as much as 1 metre by the end of the century • Rising temperatures could kill off 85% of the Amazon Rainforest • Modest warming could unleash a carbon “timebomb” from melting permafrost • A failure to cut emissions could render half of the world uninhabitable.

Copenhagen Conference, March 2009 “Do the politicians understand just how difficult it could be? Just how devastating 4, 5, 6 degrees centigrade would be? I think not yet. Looking back, the Stern Review underestimated the risks and underestimated the damage from inaction” (Nick Stern, 12/3/09)

550 450 350

(Jonathon Porritt, Director of Friends of the Earth, Environment Now Magazine 1988)

Taken from Evening Standard 15 th January 2009

Making the Connections Global systems Unitary Authorities District Councils Each one of us International diplomacy Local communities National policy Regional drivers

Raising the bar EU Targets • 20% reductions in CO 2 by 2020 • 20% Renewables by 2020 Germany • 36 % reductions in CO 2 by 2020 UK Climate Change Act • 26% cut by 2020; 80% by 2050 • Independent Committee; annual report to Parliament • Carbon Reduction Commitment

Sticks and Carrots • Climate Change Act • Energy Performance of Buildings Directive • Zero Carbon Homes (2016) • Code for Sustainable Buildings • Carbon Reduction Commitment

Get a realistic price on a tonne of CO 2 just as fast as possible

‘Realistic’ Prices • EU ETS € 14 • DEFRA £ 27 • Treasury £ 70 • Stern > £ 100 • Hansen > $250

Climate change just one part of sustainable development

Sustainable Development as the CENTRAL ORGANIZING PRINCIPLE for everything we do • as a BIG IDEA • as an INTEGRATING FRAMEWORK • as a TOOL KIT

HE State of Play • Good Practice all over the place • Universities that Count (Bi. TC Corporate Responsibility & Environment Indices) • Universities in the Community • SD across the Curriculum • Mobilising for a different world (“Transition Universities”)

The World Ahead • From abundance to scarcity • From growth to wellbeing • From cornucopianism to frugality • From high-carbon to near-zero carbon • From global to global/local