In this webinar, leading climate scientist Professor Kevin Anderson lays bare the scope, scale and urgency of the climate crisis, offering thoughts on what needs to happen at COP26 and beyond to create profound change. Hosted by CAT’s Zero Carbon Britain Hub team, the webinar includes an overview of their change making work. 

The recording was made 22 September 2021 at the time of the live webinar and took place as part of Great Big Green Week, a nationwide week of events from 18 to 26 September 2021 celebrating climate action. Great Big Green Week is organised by The Climate Coalition, of which CAT is a member.

The climate emergency

As climate change increasingly exacerbates extreme weather events around the globe, some government leaders are now using the language of a ‘climate emergency’. With the next international climate event (COP26 in Glasgow) just around the corner, there are widespread calls for urgent action to cut greenhouse gas emissions. 

In this webinar, Kevin Anderson looks beyond the language and framing of ‘climate emergency’ and ‘net zero’ and ask whether governments, companies and institutions are doing enough or if they planning for little more than incremental adjustments to business-as-usual. 

He lays bare the sheer scale, scope and urgency of emission cuts now required to meet our Paris climate commitments, and the fundamental questions this creates about almost every area of modern society. 

Kevin finishes by providing a flavour of a Paris-compliant policy landscape in line with the ‘climate emergency’, and how initiating such profound change needs to be central to negotiations at the November COP26.

This webinar is also a great opportunity to get to know CAT’s Zero Carbon Britain team and work. Anthony Hurford, Amanda Smith and Anna Bullen provided an overview of the Zero Carbon Britain Hub and Innovation Lab’s work to date, including Innovation Labs with several UK councils, and climate solutions training for hundreds of young people and adults. 

Meet the Speaker

Kevin Anderson

Kevin is professor of Energy and Climate Change at the Universities of Manchester (UK), Uppsala (Sweden) and Bergen (Norway). Formerly director of the Tyndall Centre, he engages widely with governments and remains research active with publications in Climate policy, Nature and Science. Kevin has a decade’s industrial experience in the petrochemical industry, is a chartered engineer and fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. He is a regular guest lecturer with CAT’s Graduate School of the Environment.

More information on Kevin can be found on his website, and he tweets from @KevinClimate  

Amanda Smith

Amanda Smith leads CAT’s climate solutions training as the Zero Carbon Britain Training Manager. She has over 20 years’ experience in teaching, school leadership, adult training and organisational improvement, with Qualified Teacher status and the National Professional Qualification for Head Teachers

Anthony Hurford

Dr Anthony Hurford is the Zero Carbon Britain Hub Project Manager. He has 20 years’ experience of managing research and consultancy projects across academia, engineering consultancy and field research in Indonesia. His PhD and post-doctoral research developed stakeholder-led, design-thinking approaches to managing complex resource systems under climate change, to better balance social, environmental and engineered benefits. He leads development of CAT’s Resource Hub – freely available online inspiration, tools, reports, guidance, training, webinars and more, support action on net zero.

Anna Bullen

Dr Anna Bullen is the Zero Carbon Britain Innovation Lab Manager. She has an academic background, with a degree in Environmental Management and Resource Development, an MA in Space, Place and Politics and a PhD in Sustainable Citizenship and is particularly experienced in facilitating processes that bring together a wide range of stakeholders with diverse views and supporting them to move forward in developing solutions.

More Online Events and Webinars

From practical building tips to in-depth explorations of how we can rise to the climate emergency, our newly developed webinars, online short courses and online events cover a wide range of topics relating to sustainability.

More dates and events are being announced regularly. If you see anything you like make sure you book quickly as we are regularly booking out.

To see what online events are coming up click here