John’s Blog

The Good News EU lays out plan to cut greenhouse emissions by 90% by 2040Proposal is part of European Commission’s aim to become world’s first climate-neutral continent – Read the full article on The Guardian website It’s almost carbon-negative’: how hemp became a surprise building material How monitoring nature from space could keep Earth healthy […]

I have found it difficult to write my climate news blog this week as I wanted to reflect the above title and the season of joy! This Is difficult as you probably realise, with regard to the climate news as most of this type of news is usually not good. I assure you I always […]

Nearly 200 countries have agreed to a deal that calls for transitioning “away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science”. This sounds okay and at least fossil fuels was mentioned […]

Top tips for a sustainable Christmas from the WWF and How to have a greener Christmas from the National Trust will give you plenty of ideas. If you are thinking of getting books as Christmas presents for children I recommend checking books to help talk to your child about climate change. Cop28 Cop28 runs from 30th November […]

The UK has the longest queue to connect to the electricity grid of any country in Europe. There are about 200 gigawatts worth of electricity projects waiting for a grid connection, according to research by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, or enough to power 150m UK homes. In the past, National Grid –  the FTSE 100 […]

The good news is that it has been estimated that we could generate enough sustainable energy to meet demand as can be seen in the bar graph below. In fact we could produce almost double the energy demand by 2050 with solar and wind. It just needs the political will to prioritise sustainable energy over […]

I have just got back from Stockport Metropolitan Borough Councils ‘Climate Action Now Summit’ where we learnt about the climate action they are taking. Stockport and Manchester councils have been independently accessed by ‘Climate Action UK’ and their scorecards have been published. A summary of these scorecards are given below with links to the details. […]

The plants grown to satisfy global demand for cooking oils–including soybean, palm, sunflower, peanut, avocado, coconut, canola, and olive–now comprise nearly 25% of the world’s cropland. The planting and harvesting of these crops are significant contributors to the deforestation of old-growth forests, producing substantial carbon emissions. Zero Acre Farms, A California-based startup, is hoping to […]

The run up to a general election next year appears to have begun with recent pronouncements around net zero and climate change. As is the case with most political pronouncements they tell us that what they are suggesting is what the public want but is it? I thought it would be interesting to find out […]

If you come to the Seed Cafe informal weekly CAM meetings on Thursdays (Marple Methodist Church 10.00-13.00) where we discuss climate change, you have had a recent discussion about this topic. The recent speech by our PM may have also sparked some conversations about net zero and climate change. As you are reading this you […]