Sustainability InSight: October's round-up of sustainability reading, listening and learning

From a stark film on the climate and nature crisis to a hopeful listen on batteries, Nigel shares his October reading, listening and learning picks.

 

1) The National Emergency Briefing

Nigel has recently seen the National Emergency Briefing, the film introduced by Chris Packham and based on a briefing given by experts to MPs last year. It’s now being shown nationally to demonstrate how serious the climate and nature crisis is. Sustainability professionals may not learn anything new, but Nigel found other people’s reactions stark. He encourages you to see it and, if you can, organise a showing for your business, colleagues, community group or church, because we don’t get action without awareness.


2) Cop17 at a glance: Everything you need to know about the UN’s nature summit

The Nature COP (COP17) has been taking place this month in Yerevan, Armenia, ahead of the next Climate COP (COP31) in Antalya, Turkey, next month. If you want to catch up on all things Nature COP before you get swept up in the Climate COP, Nigel recommends The Guardian’s COP17 coverage, which he finds consistently excellent.


3) The battery revolution

If you need some positivity after the climate and nature items above, Nigel suggests the BBC’s The Climate Question podcast episode on batteries. It includes an interview with Akshat Rathi from Bloomberg’s Zero podcast, whom Nigel always finds impressive. The episode covers the progress being made in improving battery performance, bringing down costs and rolling out the technology.


4) First cars, now trains: Batteries are coming for everything

If that podcast has put you in the mood to learn more about batteries, Nigel recommends this recent episode of Zero, which looks at where battery technology is heading next and features more from Akshat Rathi.


5) ISO adopts standard for managing SDG commitments

Finally for this month, Nigel has long advocated for organisations using the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to guide their sustainability commitments. He was pleased to see the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launch a formal framework for prioritising and measuring corporate SDG commitments. This Trellis Group article gives a good summary of the standard.

 

About Sustainability InSight

Sustainability InSight is Nigel's regular round-up of the most insightful sustainability content he's come across. The aim is to broaden understanding across the whole sustainability spectrum, not just environment and climate change, and help more people live and work more sustainably.

Come across something worth including in a future edition? Let Nigel know.