Wincanton's new climate change group needs a few additional champions (and a name)

The budding Wincanton climate change group had a successful first meeting on 15^th July. We haven’t got a name yet but it really needs to be the climate change, biodiversity and sustainable living group – which doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. Name to follow soon.

We’ve been a bit quiet over the last month due to holiday commitments but aim soon to be more visible with a website (and, possibly, a Facebook page) to give useful information.

The group was conceived in response to the Government’s declaration of an Environmental and Climate Emergency, and SSDC’s declaration of a Climate and Ecological Emergency. Rather than just wait for action from these two bodies we are looking at what we can do in our own lives and in Wincanton. Our aim is to motivate, promote and give information about what we can do ourselves and locally.

It has become evident that the way we live is causing climate change and a loss of biodiversity, and fast outstripping the Earth’s resources. If we all lived the way we do in Western Europe (and that includes the UK, Somerset and Wincanton) we’d need three planet Earths to support us. We’ve only got one.

So, we’ve got an emergency we need to address now, and a long term need to find a way of living sustainably - which we haven’t been doing. In other words, we need to find a way to “meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs” (The Charities Commission example objects – sustainable development May 2013).

At our last meeting, we continued to use the One Planet Living model as a framework and have now got champions for Zero Carbon Energy (renewable energy and energy efficiency), Zero Waste (recycling and reduction in consumption) Land & Nature (re-greening, biodiversity and land use) and Culture & Community (sustainable living). Some areas are already promoted by local bodies and initiatives but we particularly need more people to focus on the following areas:

• Travel and transport
• Local and sustainable food
• Sustainable water

If you’re interested in being actively involved in the development of the group and want to find out more, come along to our next meeting at 5pm on Thursday 15^th August in The Balsam Centre.

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