The UK has declared a 'climate emergency' and pledged to become carbon neutral by 2050. So how do we get there? Drawing on actions, policies and technologies already emerging around the world, Chris Goodall sets out the ways to achieve this. His proposals include:
- Building a huge over-capacity of wind and solar energy, storing the excess as hydrogen.
- Using hydrogen to fuel our trains, shipping, boilers and heavy industry, while electrifying buses, trucks and cars.
- Farming – and eating – differently, encouraging plant-based alternatives to meat
- paying farmers to plant and maintain woodlands.
- Making fashion sustainable and aviation pay its way, funding synthetic fuels and genuine offsets.
- Using technical solutions to capture CO2 from the air, and biochar to lock carbon in the soil.
What We Need to Do Now is an urgent, practical and inspiring book that signals a green new deal for Britain.
Chris Goodall is an economist working in energy technology and climate change action. He wrote the pioneering How to Live a Low-Carbon Life, Ten Technologies to Save the Planet and The Switch (on solar power). He was recently chair of one of the UK's leading car charging companies and is involved in several innovative businesses in the green economy.
"This is exactly the kind of mapping out that we need to make the zero carbon world happen. Chris Goodall's plan is well argued and delightfully readable."
– Mike Berners-Lee, author of There is no Planet B and How Bad Are Bananas?
"Chris Goodall is the kind of person we need to lead us to safety faced with climate change. I learned so much reading this book. It's crisp, superbly researched – and remarkably calm. We can do this."
– Tim Harford, author of 50 Things That Made The Modern Economy and presenter of More or Less