Our Blog
Welcome to our blog
This is a collection of our thoughts around climate change and our community. We try to keep it updated monthly, but you know how it is… enjoy.
The Plot in the park is 10!
Transition Keynsham’s Veg Plot in the Park is celebrating its 10 year anniversary next month. The green fingered volunteers will be marking this milestone with cake on 3rd September, starting at 2pm on the plot, which is beside the café in Keynsham Memorial Park....
Make do and Mend
Mending and repairing things we love or find useful is a hopeful and healing act. Sharing skills and stories, joy and hope are really powerful acts of community. We’re lucky to have a band of dedicated volunteers in Keynsham who hold a Repair Café the second Saturday...
The Big Plastic Count
How much plastic packaging do you throw away every week? I’ve been counting mine as part of the Big Plastic Count. The aim of the count is to create the UK’s biggest nationwide investigation into household plastic waste; to find out how much plastic is passing through...
Creating back garden habitats
Researchers from University College London recently found that our warming climate and intensive agriculture have a catastrophic effect on insect species. Their research showed that in areas with high-intensity agriculture and substantial climate warming, the number...
Engaging in peaceful protest is powerful
What does it take to bring about political and social change? Armed conflict or non-violent protest? At a well-attended Keynsham Extinction Rebellion event in February, a speaker told the audience that their aim is to get 3.5% of the UK’s population engaged in...
Let’s pick the right path
As the world faces multiple geopolitical and environmental shocks, most notably the awful war in Ukraine, humanity finds itself between a rock and a hard place. The rock is our reliance on Russian oil and gas (an acute crisis), and the hard place is climate change (a...
In praise of trees
Over the past two years, many people have found that being in nature supports our wellbeing. Numerous scientific studies support that, and scientists have also found that being in nature – specifically trees – also has a positive effect on our physical health. In one...
Seven sustainable New Year resolutions
Two years ago, a group of influential scientists identified 2030 as the date by which we need to transition to a low carbon economy to save the planet. With a mere eight years to go, this month’s column offers six suggestions for New Year resolutions to help us...
Christmas trees
Every year, around eight million Christmas trees are sold in the UK. But what’s the best option for the climate – real or artificial? Both create emissions through transportation, but artificial plastic trees have a higher environmental impact. If you buy a new...
Reflecting on the Eco Festival
This week I’ve been thinking about the Eco Festival talks at The Space. Each talk – on how food, energy, nature and money affect (and are affected by) climate change – was interesting. But what really struck me was the connections between them. We heard that our...
Keynsham Community Eco Festival
We are delighted to be able to share some more details for the upcoming Eco festival on the 17th & 18th of September. You can keep up to date through their Facebook page: Click here We will be there with a stall, come and say hello!
Beautiful weeds
I have been reading a book called Silent Spring. Published in 1962 by US scientist Rachel Carson, it inspired the modern environmental movement and sparked environmental protection laws across the world. Carson wrote that “the beauty of the living world I was trying...
Ecosystem restoration
It’s world environment day on June 5th, and to mark it, the United Nations Environment Programme is launching a decade of action on ecosystem restoration. Ecosystems support all life on Earth. The healthier our ecosystems are, the healthier the planet – and its...
Feeling positive
The clocks have gone forward, and we can all feel the benefits of more daylight. Our vulnerable members of society have been vaccinated against Covid-19, and this month – finally – we can meet up with friends and family again. I don’ t know if it’s because spring is...
COP26
In November, the UK hosts COP26, a summit of the 197 countries that are part of the UN’s climate treaty. Governments and negotiators will discuss how to prevent the climate crisis from causing even worse catastrophes than we’re already seeing across the world....
Sitting in nature
In a recent podcast, David Attenborough said that in the past half-century we have been given the mechanisms of poisoning and destroying nature beyond the powers of any human previously on Earth. We use this power to take what we want from nature without a care....
Hope for the future
It’s no exaggeration to say that 2020 was a terrible year, and I fervently hope that in 2021 we’ll turn the tide on coronavirus and be able to live freely again. We’re by no means out of the woods, but I believe there are many reasons to be optimistic, on top of the...