7 Climate Actions Local Councils Need to Take
Councils of all sizes have a great opportunity to tackle the climate emergency, and to use their skills and resources to empower their staff and citizens to take action.
Scientists Warning Europe aim to drive real, science-led change, in every walk of life. We believe councils can lead the charge in making our towns and cities a greener place to live, as well as being a great example of how to balance sustainable living and a thriving local economy.
On 25th March 2021 Scientists Warning Europe hosted a series of online events designed to help Local Councils and Council staff take action. With 5 expert speakers and over 500 guests in attendance, the session provided lively debate and some great advice from our guest speakers. We summarise key takeaways below:
What can local councils do to tackle climate change?
1. Reduce energy consumption
Energy is fundamental to how we deal with critical and interlinked challenges. Most people are in complete and blissful ignorance of an impending, multi-layered catastrophe, hoping for a "back to normal" post-covid.
“Over 80% of our energy is still fossil fuelled. To meet low emission targets we need an 8-fold increase in renewable energy investment.”
Scarce rare metals like Lithium and Cobalt in microchips needed for the exponential growth in IT and electric cars will raise supply issues.
It is likely less energy will be available to us in the future, so using less energy overall is the best "low-carbon" solution. Energy efficiency and re-localisation reduces demand for oil, builds community resilience and reduces supply chain vulnerability. Switch off lights and discourage leaving shopfront doors open with downdraft heating convectors, on cold winter days.
Retrofit existing building stock to improve insulation and develop local energy production. See the Reading Hydroelectric example of energy reduction. (Andy Tunstall)
2. Generate less waste
Councils need to encourage less waste and generate less waste all round. Incineration of waste, which is currently the most common way of disposing of waste throws away two-thirds of energy.
Recycling waste is a bit better than incineration, but the best way to reduce waste is to reduce creating it in the first place. Councils should encourage and support industry to reduce industrial and packaging waste, as well as helping consumers make better and more informed environmental purchase to decrease post-consumer waste.
3. Rethink our green spaces and mow less
We have the opportunity to turn our our cities, towns and villages into a network of insect reserves.
Save maintenance costs and Allow rewilding in our towns and cities. - Barcelona has adopted rewidling its city in a big way.
Councils should foster bee pollination corridors.
“We must reimagine weeds as wildflowers!”
We must take action to save our pollinator bees today, and remember that they are are a vital part of the food chain. – watch Averting the Insect Apocalypse by Professor Dave Goulson.
You can become a Pesticide free town and help biodiversity - see Pesticide Action Network as an example.
4. Find space for more allotments.
Small-scale local food production is more resilient than massive farms. Councils must strive to increase small-scale food production, utilising land for allotments and empowering their citizens to grow their own food.
See Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) think tank: https://www.ippr.org/ (Professor Chris Rhodes)
These small-scale food production spaces are also great for wild vertebrates. We need to act in this area because the global wild vertebrate population is down 68% since 1970! And there are more than 93 fewer birds every hour in the UK.
A sad statistic shows that UK ecological ‘intactness’ scored 189th of 200 countries.
5. Rethink our diets
Education people on the benefits of a healthy, low-carbon diet helps (such as a plant-based diet)– but studies suggest that taxes are a bigger driver of behaviour change. Taxes help change consumption behaviour, but not in gift of councils. If you double availability of vegetarian meal choices you get a 40% positive response from consumers. Councils can introduce more more vegan choices in schools, council staff canteens and social care settings.
Food Nature and Consumption – Climate Emergency Action Plan for Councils
Animal agriculture uses 83% of agricultural land. 25% of species at risk of extinction.
Food systems are a leading driver of biodiversity loss – chemical use, land clearance, mono cultures, all have a climate impact.
“Food production needs to shift to plant-based diets with more fruits, legumes and organic farming.”
A change in farming may is not without its challenges, as commercial vertical farms are expensive and are only economically viable work for high value produce.
“We need a 90% reduction in red meat consumption and 60% reduction in white meat and dairy to stay within planetary boundaries.” says Dr Mano Springman.
“The NFU (National Farmers Union) needs to play a major role” Says Professor Andrew Bamford “…but it doesn’t reflect all farmers thinking.”
6. Save your carbon sinks.
Did you know that Peat is a fantastic carbon sink? We must stop sale of Peat (often found in compost available to purchase) and leave it in the ground as a carbon sink.
Take excess CO2 out of the environment with direct air carbon capture and recycle profitably where possible - as alternative fuels and artificial limestone rock.
Methane gas - a short-lived pollutant abundant in Arctic permafrost and seabed is escaping with rising polar temperatures but its climate impact is 3x more polluting than CO2.
Seaweed Kelp forests in coastal waters are good stores of CO2 but have declined drastically around UK shores due to chemical runoff from land and harmful fishing practices. Mature native trees store far more carbon than young trees. We must protect them. Methane gas from farm animal digestion is a further issue. They can be fed digestive improvers to reduce their emissions. (Professor Peter Wadhams)
7 Net Zero Innovation Programme – A Local Government Association/ UCL collaboration. .
What can we do to maximise interaction between academic experts and local government to scale up learning on pathways to net zero?
Some local authority case studies:
Cambridge CC looks at emissions calculations in procurement practice.
Lewes Council – funding Solar farms with community bonds.
Colchester City Council – education outreach in schools.
Worcestershire CC – Active transport policies and skills training in retrofit insulations.
Herts CC – Energy efficiency in care homes.
Cornwall CC - Climate change impacts on community health.
(Dr Kris de Meyer, Neuroscience specialist)
Finally, watch our Local Council Climate Action briefing pack here.