Skip to content
Home » Features

Features

Beyond the news and information, beyond events and meetings – here’s a page that shows something a little different…


An Eco Hub for Sidmouth

The purpose to provide an ongoing presence in town to engage people on issues related to climate change… a place to have your say/find information/exchange ideas/learn what’s happening/volunteer

Drop-in sessions at the Tourist Information Centre and the Library every month

Pop-up in Market Square

Themes to address would include retrofitting to make homes energy efficient, reduce/reuse/recycle, calculating your carbon footprint, active travel, plastic, biodiversity

Films to be shown

What’s the impact of Sidmouth’s festivals? Questions: from the Sidmouth Air Show to East Devon’s festivals – Vision Group for Sidmouth


Going off-grid with solarpunk

There is something quite liberating about the SolarPunk movement:

Solarpunk provides a shining vision of a positive future, grounded in our existing world, one that emphasizes the need for environmental sustainability, self-governance, and social justice. Solarpunk imagines an inclusive, sustainable, possible future, where renewable technology meets ecological enlightenment…

SolarPunk: “where renewable tech meets socio-ecological enlightenment” – Sidmouth Solarpunk

One way to imagine all of this is through art – and here’s an inspiring project to watch on the other side of the world:

.

SolarPunk Public Art Competition Opportunities – ArtsHub Australia


The River Sid and climate change

The UK is getting more hot and more wet days – all of which will impact the state of our rivers:

East Devon schemes to reduce the risk of flash-flooding risk along the Sid and the Otter have been provided with substantial funds – to help create more climate resilient places.

And there are several local, targetted initiatives along the Sid which are all about longer-term planning.

For more, see: The River Sid and climate change – The Sid

Sid River catchment – The Sid


“Earth’s growing fever has obvious repercussions for human health.”

A lot of the effects of climate change seem rather abstract, from “harming health, through air pollution, disease, extreme weather events, forced displacement, pressures on mental health, and increased hunger and poor nutrition”, according to the UN.

Looking at exactly how global warming will harm human health and well-being is becoming clearer – as more unfortunate if not tragic events take place which can be seen as directly caused by changes in our climate.

One such dramatic example from today’s news is how passengers recall the horror onboard of the Singapore Airlines flight – with the Mail reporting that severe turbulence is set to get even worse thanks to climate change:

Now, scientists say climate change is making turbulence worse for planes – resulting in more sudden and violent movement, and increasing the risk of fatalities. Speaking to MailOnline, Isabel Smith, a turbulence researcher at the University of Reading’s meteorology department, warned that global warming makes jet streams – the narrow currents of fast-moving air that planes fly along to get a speed boost – more ‘chaotic’. 

‘The amount of turbulence is closely linked with the speed and velocity of the jet streams, the fast flowing bands of wind that propagate around the world,’ she told MailOnline. ‘As the jet speed increases, the instability of the jet increases, and air flow becomes more chaotic, leading to more turbulence.’

And over the last week there have been several reports on how the changing climate is having a direct effect on our health – from Europeans more at risk from tropical illnesses due to climate change and African health experts warning of climate change and rising vector-borne diseases – to climate change threatening brain health.

Global Warming Predictions Map.jpg – Wikimedia Commons

The weekly Imagine series from The Conversation looks at how a hotter world is likely to be a sicker world:

Earth’s growing fever has obvious repercussions for human health, like heatwaves that are hotter than our physiology can tolerate. Humanity’s departure from the stable climate it inherited will yield surprises, too, though. Some of those may be existing diseases appearing in new places or spreading with greater ferocity. And some, experts fear, may be new diseases entirely.

“Close contact between humans and wild animals is increasing as forests are destroyed to make way for agriculture and trade in exotic animals continues,” says Arindam Basu, an associate professor of epidemiology and environmental health at the University of Canterbury. “At the same time, the thawing of permafrost is releasing microbes hidden beneath the ice.”

In sickness and in health: the effect of the climate on our everyday lives – Vision Group for Sidmouth