Centre News

December 2011

Jonno Evans, a student in the Sustainability and Global Decarbonisation Research Group, produced a quite interesting article for the Guardian on the challenge of water in the Nile during a time of political and environmental upheaval. View the article...

November 2011

4CMR Director Doug Crawford-Brown met with the coalition government at 10 Downing Street to discuss energy supply and demand projects in the UK, along with senior leadership of Boots, Kingfisher, RBS, Royal Academy, Lombard, Linklaters...in a meeting coordinated by 4CMR Advisory Board member Karen Wordsworth of KPMG. The primary topic of discussion was identifying significant national projects that might marshal the will to significant carbon reduction, and to identify barriers to their development.

October 2011

4CMR Visitors

In part through collaboration with the Centre for Science and Policy, 4CMR has hosted a steady stream of visitors from national organisations wishing to learn about strategies to combat climate change. Recent visitors (or those who have hosted us) have included:

Robert Sorrell - Vice President for Public Partnerships, BP

Alice Raines - HM Treasury - Infrastructure Strategy Team, former Assistant Chief Scientific Adviser, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS)

Stephanie Hurst - Head of Planning Resources and Environment Policy Division, Department for Communities and Local Government

Aphrodite Korou - Head of Standardisation Policy, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

Liz Owen - Head of Customer Insight, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

Graham Pendlebury - Director of Greener Transport & International, Department for Transport

Miles Elsden - Head of Defence and Security, Government Office for Science

Philip Langsdale - Chief Information Officer, BAA

Gary Kass - Principal Specialist, Evidence & Analysis Team, Natural England

Brendan Dick - Managing Director, BT Regions

Chris McFee - Head of Civil Contingencies Team, Government Office for Science

Patrick Allcorn, David Purdy and Tom Slater - Department of Energy and Climate Change, Community Energy and the Green Deal

Joel Rogers - YouGov, Director of YouGov-Cambridge

Greg Barker - Minister of State for Energy and Climate Change

Peter Quarmby - Environment Agency's South East Flood and Coastal Risk Manager

Miles Parker - DEFRA's Director of Science

John Tesh - Deputy Director [Capabilities] in the Cabinet Office's Civil
Contingencies Secretariat

RICS and London Flood Risk

Doug Crawford-Brown joined Peter Quarmby (Environment Agency) in a presentation to members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and the Cambridge University Land Society. The 4CMR talk described the on-going ARCADIA project and strategies for reducing the vulnerability of the London economy to climate-related events.

The Zero Carbon Society Career Development Programme

At 4CMR, we are supporting the student-led Zero Carbon Society programme to bring career opportunities to the attention of University students so they can prepare for those careers. We are sponsoring two of these events each term, beginning with ones focused on Business and Law careers. Students interested in attending should contact the ZCS.

Launch of the CCfCS

The Cambridge Centre for Climate Science launched both its inaugural seminar series and website this month. The CCfCS brings together the science-based expertise in climate change from across the University and at the British Antarctic Survey, facilitating interdisciplinary study of the mathematical, physical, chemical and biological advances in understanding climate change. It provides a point of focus for collaborations with the social science and policy sides of the University organised through 4CMR's Cambridge Climate programme, as well as a resource for external groups.

September 2011

A retirement...but not a farewell

On 30th September Dr Terry Barker retired as Director (and founder) of 4CMR, with a well-attended reception in his honour at St Catherine's College. Dr Barker will still be working closely with 4CMR in the capacity of Senior Departmental Fellow. Professor Douglas Crawford-Brown has taken up the position as Director of 4CMR.

Ecological Economics: Sustainability in Practice

Stanislav Shmelev presented an overview of his new book, Ecological Economics: Sustainability in Practice, to the 4cmr seminar series. The talk included an overview of some of the key methodologies of ecological economics and an account of the latest applications to the problem of sustainability. For more details visit...

E3MG Model presented to Environmental Sociology Network

Paul Haynes presented an overview of the E3MG model, and how it enables the communication of climate change mitigation policy assessment to a range of different individuals from different academic and practitioner perspectives, to the European Sociological Society conference in Geneva on 8th September. The conference network included many of the leading figures in environmental sociology, including John Urry, Kris Von Koppen and Matthias Gross.

Environmental Competitiveness in the Chemicals Sector

Shunsuke Managi, School of Environmental Studies at Tohoku University & Fellow of the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES), presented a seminar on the topic of Environmental Competitiveness in the Chemicals Sector to 4CMR and other invited guests. Professor Managi (pictured) presented the recently published findings of research he undertook with Nagisa Ishinabe, Hidemichi Fujii as part of a short research exchange visit to the UK.