Carbon Capability

This is a slightly rambling discussion inspired by
Carbon Capability: understanding climate change and reducing emissions by Lorraine Whitmarsh, Saffron O’Neill, Gill Seyfang and Irene Lorenzoni, from The Hnadbook of Sustainability Literacy (2009) eds. Arran Stibble

Really interesting concept of Carbon Capability

'People are genuinely carbon capable they will understand the limits of individual action and the need for collective action and other governance solutions. Also, a genuinely carbon capable individual appreciates that there are barriers in current systems of provision which limit the ability of an individual to act, and that much consumption (and hence carbon emissions) is inconspicuous, habitual and routine, rather than the result of conscious decision-making (van Vliet et al. 2005)'

The article has got me thinking about a scheme we are trying to develop at the moment; Carbon Blind Date. The basic idea is to match people by their CO2 emissions for a valentines blind date / speed date. We are currently working on Cilla Black to make a viral video and are hoping to role the events out at universities across the country.

Q: How can the scheme contribute to over coming obstacles to low-carbon lifestyles, which range from insufficient knowledge about effective actions, perceived social inaction and the ‘free rider effect’, inadequate or unattractive alternatives to energy-intensive activities such as driving (Lorenzoni et al. 2007)?

A: On it's own it can't tackle all of these things but it could contribute. In particular the actual event could help with perceived social inaction if the messaging was right (Please comment on what you think this messaging could be). The information could be used to allow more targeted transition projects.

The findings that carbon calculator alone do not have very much effect on behaviour at an individual or household level (Whitmarsh et al., forth-coming). Is this due to lack of use of calculators or their inherent limits? This is pushing me to consider more the impact and relevance of this exercise as more than just a data gathering exercise. In order to address this issue it would could have some way of making people more carbon capable.

Being carbon capable implies knowledge of:
- the causes and consequences of carbon emissions
- the role individuals – and particular activities – play in producing carbon emissions
- the scope for (and benefits of) adopting a low-carbon lifestyle
- what is possible through individual action
- carbon-reduction activities which require collective action and infrastructural change
- managing a carbon budget
- information sources – and the reliability (bias, agenda, uncertainty, etc.) of different information sources; and
- the broader structural limits to and opportunities for sustainable

Q: The blind dating will take place over text messages before the night its self, could carbon capability be woven into this some how?

A: Some aspect seam to fit with what could be done but not all.

The food mention: 'very few people are aware of the significant climate impact of eating meat' is interesting as it fits into what we have found (62% of students don't know meat and dairy has an impact on climate change). This could be a good link into this particular behavior:
-Idea1: Get Cilla to make some lude comment about eating meat and climate change for viral video, not sure if she will go for this.
-Idea2: Could have a bot as one of the contestants in the blind date that makes lude but factual responses.

Information gain in calculator will be useful in developing this idea for the need to have interventions at different scale.

This is still all very information biased. How do you use it to incentivise? What benifits links to this all? is it good to link prizes to campaigning activity?

Maybe getting to meet Cilla for the best answer to the Cutting Carbon Activity or part of it.

comments welcome....

Lorenzoni, Irene; Nicholson-Cole, Sophie and Whitmarsh, Lorraine (2007) ‘Barriers
perceived to engaging with climate change among the UK public and their policy
implications’. Global Environmental Change, 17, 445-59.

van Vliet, Bas; Chappells, Heather and Shove, Elizabeth (2005) Infrastructures of
Consumption. London: Earthscan.

Whitmarsh, Lorraine; O’Neill, Saffron; Seyfang, Gill and Lorenzoni, Irene
(forthcoming) Carbon Capability: what does it mean, how prevalent is it, and how can
we promote it? Tyndall Working Paper. Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research,
University of East Anglia, Norwich.