Dr Richard Watkins was invited to give a lecture to MSc students at the Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT), Machynlleth, Wales on 20 September 2013. His talk, “Climate change and our built environment – what’s going on and what do we need to do?” was timely as the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change”) was about to publish its fourth assessment on global warming.
The students of CAT’s MSc course “Renewable Energy in the Built Environment” were presented with the theory and the evidence behind global warming and its attribution to mankind’s impact on the troposphere. The impact of the UK’s emissions of about 0.5 Gt CO2/year were put into perspective with the global emissions of 30 Gt/year. However, much of the UK’s emissions have been “exported” as much of our manufacturing is now carried out overseas in countries which often have poorer pollution control and less efficient power generation. It’s important for the developed countries to set an example in reducing the environmental impact of their built environment and their economies in general – unless we want the rest of the world to attempt to adopt our energy profligate ways, which would have devastating consequences.
Students were also given an insight into how the elevated temperatures of the urban environment (urban heat islands) should be viewed in relation to the current projections for future rising temperatures. Overall, the audience was advised to adopt a prudent approach and to design our future buildings to cope with a four degree rise in external air temperature this century.