Transition Culture

31 Mar 2010

Transition South East Gathering Film and Report

A few weeks ago now I mentioned the upcoming Transition South East conference, and showed you their wonderful poster.  By all accounts it was a quite wonderful day, you can read a write-up of the event here, and watch a fantastic film of the event (it’s so great when people do this) below.  We’re seeing more and more of these regional Transition events now, its a great thing to be happening.  Thanks to Ian Lawton of Act on CO2 for creating this record of the day.

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31 Mar 2010

A Couple of Days in Dublin…

Readers of my Twitterfeed thing will have been following the trials and tribulations, as well as the highlights, of my trip to Dublin.  Invited by Ashoka Ireland for their Social Entrepreneurship Forum and Awards, it was also an opportunity to catch up with the Transition Ireland folks and to have an incredibly packed day full of meetings which, in spite of ever-present toothache, was very exciting and useful. 

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26 Mar 2010

An Interview with Neil Adger: resilience, adaptability, localisation and Transition

Professor Neil Adger is a lecturer and researcher at University of East Anglia.   He is a researcher and teacher who specialises in social vulnerability, resilience and adaptation to environmental change; on justice and equity in decision-making; and the application of economics to global environmental change. He is a member of the Resilience Alliance, and is involved in a range of climate change research projects, including the IPCC and work for the Tyndall Centre.  He has written many papers on the subject of resilience, and so, for the research I am doing, I was thrilled to be able to interview Neil about resilience, Transition, peak oil, and localisation.

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25 Mar 2010

Martin Crawford and me speaking at the Launch of ‘Climate Friendly Food’

A while ago, at Schumacher College, Climate Friendly Food was launched, an innovative approach to getting farmers measuring the carbon implications of their farming, definintely worth supporting and checking out.  There were some great speakers, including a particularly in-form Martin Crawford of the Agroforestry Research Trust.  Here is his talk, and below it, mine.  Regular readers will know that Martin is a great hero of mine, and his forthcoming book ‘Creating a Forest Garden’ is eagerly awaited at Hopkins Towers.

…and here’s mine….

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24 Mar 2010

Government ‘Peak Oil Summit’ Starts the Process of Government Acknowledging Peak Oil?

On Monday Peter Lipman and I represented Transition Network at an event which could potentially be the day people look back to as the day when UK government finally starting to ‘get’ peak oil.  Fascinating and frustrating in equal measure, the event, “Policy Response to potential future oil supply constraints”, was billed as “a half-day workshop hosted by the Energy Institute in partnership with the Department of Energy and Climate Change, under Chatham House Rules”.  For those who don’t know what Chatham House rules are, it means that the contents of what was said can be discussed, but none of it can be attributed to anyone.  Although the event was meant to be private, it was leaked and reported in the Guardian that morning.  Jeremy Leggett was quoted in the piece as describing the importance of the meeting thus: “Government has gone from the BP position – ’40 years of supply left, the price mechanism works, no need to worry’ – to ‘crikey'”.  So, here is an account compiled from my notes of what went on behind closed doors, bearing those Chatham House rules in mind, meaning that I can’t attribute some of the comments that follow.

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