A Student Guide To Sustainable Living

Chubb today announced that Alexandra Waldman has been appointed Climate Sustainability Manager. Formerly the company’s Senior Environmental Program Manager, Ms. Waldman in her newly created global role will help to identify and implement opportunities for climate-related products and services, encourage employee engagement in climate sustainability issues and establish an objective, metric-driven framework against which to measure progress of the company’s sustainability initiatives. 

The focus on greenhouse gasses is typically on CO2, but we shouldn’t forget about methane. From the NOAA article Increase in atmospheric methane set another record in 2021 – Carbon dioxide levels also record a big jump (4/7/2022):  For the second year in a row, NOAA scientists observed a record annual increase in atmospheric levels of methane, a powerful, heat-trapping greenhouse gas that’s the second biggest contributor to human-caused global warming after carbon dioxide.  NOAA’s preliminary analysis showed the annual increase in atmospheric methane during 2021 was 17 parts per billion (ppb), the largest annual increase recorded since systematic measurements began in 1983. The increase during 2020 was 15.3 ppb. Atmospheric methane levels averaged 1,895.7 ppb during 2021, or around 162% greater than pre-industrial levels. From NOAA’s observations, scientists estimate global methane emissions in 2021 are 15% higher than the 1984-2006 period.  Methane data links are at the bottom of this Global Monitoring Laboratory page. There is also a methane project on the Calculus Projects page.

An ‘insane’ EU law forcing ride-on mowers to be covered by owners’ car insurance will be blocked by Parliament tomorrow.  Motorists would have had around £50 added to their annual insurance premiums as a result of the law, which would have also affected golf buggies and mobility scooters.  Transport Secretary Grant Shapps hailed Parliament’s move as a Brexit dividend.  Motorists would have faced £50 extra on car insurance premiums to cover mowers.  British drivers will be protected from the rules as legislation blocking the expansion of the number of vehicles that have to be insured is due to pass its final hurdle in Parliament tomorrow.

The Woolmark Company, On and SALEWA have announced the prize winners and 12 innovative finalists’ concepts for the Woolmark Performance Challenge 2021 – the preeminent ideas platform for the sports and performance market.  This year, the Woolmark Performance Challenge partnered with two brands for the first time: Swiss running specialists, On, and Italian skiwear experts, SALEWA. On challenged participating students to explore apparel innovations that respond to the highest demands of performance for modern outdoor runners, whist maximising fashion-forward wearability. Whilst SALEWA asked entrants to innovate low environmental-impact fabric technologies to create thermo-regulating apparel for mountain activities.  The Woolmark Performance Challenge is a world-leading incubation program for tertiary students. It encourages innovative thinking resulting in ground-breaking ideas whilst fostering the education and development of the next generation of game-changers. From more than 400 entries from across the globe, the 12 most promising ideas were selected as finalists, before judges selected the winners for each category.