The Carbon Buddy Manifesto
LATER IS TOO LATE
There is no shortage of information and advice available about what action individuals and households should be taking to reduce their carbon footprints. So why is it that large numbers of ordinary citizens, whilst broadly agreeing that climate change requires urgent action, report feeling overwhelmed by the challenge, or place it guiltily on one side in the ‘later’ box?
POOR UNDERSTANDING OF OBSTACLES
Seeing and learning from how the world has reacted to Covid, I have become ever more convinced that the worryingly patchy and slow response at the individual and household level is THE unseen climate change obstacle that will eclipse much of the rapid progress being made on all other fronts. While increasingly large investment is going into international cooperation, business transformation and new research and technologies (all good things), very little investment is going into the poorly understood barriers to effective individual behaviour and lifestyle change. Identifying and overcoming these invisible practical, financial and psychological obstacles will be the key to nudging the large majority of the world’s population towards green living solutions.
WHERE’S THE SENSE OF URGENCY?
Policy makers, government departments, researchers, and all business sectors all need to build in greater psychological insights and interventions into their proposals, policies and products. Whilst the UK’s CCC (Committee on Climate Change) has given more visibility to the importance of consumers’ behaviour change in its most recent report, I can as yet see nothing of substance. I’m missing the sense of sense of urgency to mobilise the necessary resources to focus on and find workable solutions. Time is short and solutions will not be quick to take root. The effort needs to be scaled up now.
THE UNSEEN CHALLENGE
Since the launch of The Carbon Buddy Manual exactly a year ago it has been a tough time during which, on several occasions, I came close to abandoning ship! But gradually over time a plan emerged out of the fog. This manifesto describes the key challenge and amounts to a relaunch of the manual in a different form and to a much wider international audience.
CONSUMER REALITIES
The Carbon Buddy story going forward will be told from the viewpoint of individual consumers and households dealing with the day-to-day realities of trying to respond adequately to climate change. In particular, it will shine a light on the obstacles, practical, financial and psychological, that distract and derail even the most persistent, and will link together those who should own the problems with those who might have answers.
BARRIER BUSTING
It will be the effort put into understanding these barriers, and the creativity and innovation through which they can be overcome, that will dictate the scale, speed and effectiveness of individual behaviour and lifestyle change. The Carbon Buddy Manual is a small contribution, providing readers with a step-by-step process for navigating through the obstacles and sustaining motivation, a tool both for getting started and for keeping going.
Colin Hastings
Author of The Carbon Buddy Manual
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