Tim has invited piece in Nature-Energy

Nature-Energy has just published an invited “News and Views” piece by Tim.

 

The article “Public engagement: Building energy futures” discusses issues around the need for both greater public engagement and greater consideration of the social realm within the development of future climate and energy scenarios.  The piece is linked to a research article by Christina Demski and colleagues at Cardiff University which examines the influence of different framings in the use of the UK government’s 2050 calculator.

Tim’s article: http://www.nature.com/articles/nenergy201730

Demski et al.’s article http://www.nature.com/articles/nenergy201727

 

Everyday Futures essay in ACM Interactions journal

Tim has just had an essaypublished in the ACM journal Interactions.

The essay , co-written with Georgia Newmarch at Lancaster University, is titled “The Future is Already Here…It’s Just not Very Evenly Distributed”  is a quote from  sci-fi author William Gibson.  The essay twists the original intended sentence to examine how the rectification of current social inequalities needs to play a greater role in the development of future climate change and energy scenarios.

http://interactions.acm.org/archive/toc/march-april-2017

 

 

 

Ben speaks about air pollution in Welsh on S4C

Ben spoke about air pollution visibility on 'Newyddion 9', the Welsh language TV station S4C's 9 o'clock news programme on Tuesday. Huw Brunt, a PhD student within the AQMRC was also interviewed in his capacity as a Public Health Wales representative.

Jo on Radio Bristol re CAZ feasibility study

Jo was up early this morning for a live studio interview with Claire Cavanagh on BBC Radio Bristol talking about the £500k Defra Air Quality Grant that Bristol City Council have just been awarded to undertake a Clean Air Zone feasibility study. The programme will be available to listen again shortly for up to a month: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04s1bjb

Enda nominated as UK representative to LivAGE Cost Action

Enda has been nominated to be the UK representative on an EU COST Action on Ammonia and Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Animal Production Facilities. http://www.cost.eu/COST_Actions/ca/CA16106. The main objective of LivAGE Action is to enhance international discipline cooperation for exchanging ideas and knowledge, sharing good practices, assess technologies that could result in reducing the emissions of GHGs and ammonia from livestock buildings and thus to lead to a more environmental friendly and sustainable livestock production. Some secondary objectives are the estimation of emission factors, the impact of the applied diets, prevailing microclimate and ventilation schemes on emissions, the assessment of integrated monitoring systems, the improvement of CFD applications, the assessment of mitigation techniques and the environmental analysis of the proposed techniques and solution. This action links with the recent work that Enda has been undertaking with University College Dublin for the Irish Environmental Protection Agency on the emissions of ammonia and its impact on Natura 2000 sites.

Media storm over EU 'final warning' on NO2 exceedences

Following the European Commission's announcement that they are progressing their legal proceedings against the UK government (and Spain, Italy, France and Germany), Jo was called upon to speak to the BBC on three occasions last week. First up was a live interview at the BBC Bristol studios for the Radio 4 Today programme, where Jo was interviewed alongside Matthew Pencharz (former Deputy Mayor of Environment) by Nick Robinson. The interview can still be caught on iPlayer (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08g96yn#play) at around 2:38 for the next 25 days. That evening, Jo was back to the BBC studios to record a TV interview for the regional evening news programme, Look North, as Hull was one of the areas listed in the 16 zones and agglomerations for which the government are in breach for not preparing action plans. The next day it was a pre-recorded interview via Skype for BBC Click on the use of personal monitors and the government inaction on air quality, which will be going out at Breakfast on 4th March (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08gml61).

New paper on Financial Implications of Car Ownership

 

Tim has just had a new paper published in Transport Policy in a special issue on Transport Poverty.

 

The paper is called “Financial Implications of Car Ownership and Use: a distributional analysis based on observed spatial variance considering income and domestic energy costs

 

Chatterton, T., Anable, J., Cairns, S. and Wilson, R. (2017) Financial implications of car ownership and use: A distributional analysis based on observed spatial variance considering income and domestic energy costs . Transport Policy. ISSN 0967-070X [In Press] http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tranpol.2016.12.007

 

The paper is an output from the Motoring and vehicle Ownership Trends (MOT) project led by Jillian Anable at ITS, Leeds www.MOTproject.net

 

·         If the paper is of interest, there is also a ‘follow-on’ conference paper with some additional analyses considering travel to work costs, and a segmented analysis based on  ONS Output Area Classifications. Chatterton, T., Anable, J., Cairns, S. and Wilson, R. (2016) Financial implications of car use and the drive to work: A social and spatial distributional analysis using income data and area classifications . In: DEMAND Conference 2016, Lancaster, UK, 13-15 April 2016. Available from: http://eprints.uwe.ac.uk/28729

 

Abstract

This paper presents a new perspective on assessing the financial impacts of private car usage in England and Wales using novel datasets to explore implications of motoring costs (principally Vehicle Excise Duty and road fuel costs) for households as part of the overall costs of their energy budget. Using data from an enhanced version of the Department for Transport ‘MOT’ vehicle test record database, combined with data on domestic gas and electricity consumption from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (formerly the Department of Energy and Climate Change), patterns of car usage and consequent energy consumption are investigated, and the costs of Vehicle Excise Duty and road fuel examined as a proportion of total expenditure on household direct energy consumption. Through the use of these new datasets it is possible to analyse how these vary spatially and in relation to levels of median income. The findings indicate that motoring costs are strongly regressive, with lower income areas, especially in rural locations, spending around twice as much of their income on motoring costs as the highest income areas.

 

Jo on BBC Radio 4 World at One

Jo was interviewed by Martha Kearney on BBC Radio 4's World at One this lunchtime, discussing the recent air pollution episode in the UK. You can hear the clip on iPlayer (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0890kf8) from around 36:12 - 39:20.

Three papers at 49th UTSG Conference

Tim was involved in three papers presented at the 49^th Universities Transport Study Group conference held in Dublin in January.

 

The papers al related to aspects of work done within the EPSRC Motoring and vehicle Ownership Trends (MOT) project www.MOTproject.net

 

 

·         Phillips, I., Anable, J., Cairns, S., Emmerson, P. and Chatterton, T. (2017) A spatial typology of car usage and its local determinants in England . In: 49th University Transport Studies Group Conference, Dublin, Eire, 04-06 January 2017. Available from: http://eprints.uwe.ac.uk/30781

·         Mattioli, G., Philips, I., Anable, J. and Chatterton, T. (2017) Developing an index of vulnerability to motor fuel price increases in England . In: 49th University Transport Studies Group Conference, Dublin, Eire, 04-06 January 2017. Available from: http://eprints.uwe.ac.uk/30778

·         Morton, C., Anable, J., Wadud, Z. and Chatterton, T. (2017) Greening the fleet: A spatial analysis of the local and global emission factors of the car fleet of the United Kingdom . In: 49th University Transport Studies Group Conference, Dublin, Eire, 04-06 January 2017.

 

Tim presenting st LSx event on NICE guidance

On Monday 17th January, Tim will be giving a presentation and sitting on an expert panel on Air Quality and Behaviour' at a London Sustainability Exchange event discussing the recent NICE guidance on air quality.

http://www.lsx.org.uk/news/events.aspx?id=3747

Enda and ClairCity in the Horizon Magazine

Enda was interviewed before Christmas for the EU Horizon Magazine on the ClairCity project (www.claircity.eu). The article was just published and can be found here https://horizon-magazine.eu/article/reducing-air-pollution-begins-home-say-scientists_en.html

Tim participant at closed ESRC Behaviour Change workshop

On Wednesday 11^th January, Tim was an invited participant at the final event of the ESRC Behaviour Change seminar series http://www1.uwe.ac.uk/bl/research/csbci/esrcseminarseries.aspx

The central purpose of the seminar was to discuss, in a closed forum of people working at the interface of academia and policy, the nature of the evidence-policy problem in the field of ‘behaviour change’ and possible ways of moving towards a solution that met the needs of policy whilst also representing the wide range of academic approaches that are now engaged in the field.

 

It is hoped that the workshop will result in a number of publications aimed at a variety of audiences.

Tim presenting at Centre for Transport and Society Winter Conference

On Wednesday 14th December, Tim will be giving a presentation at the CTS Winter Conference at UWE.  The presentation on "Putting people at the heart of air pollution issues" will cover elements from three recent or current projects: Disruption-Unlocking low carbon mobility (www.disruptionproject.net / www.fleximobility.solutions), MOT (www.MOTproject.net) and ClairCity (www.ClairCity.eu)

Enda interview by Horizon Magazine

Wearing his ClairCity Technical Director hat, Enda was interviewed for the European Commission’s Horizon EU Research & Innovation Magazine for an article on current and recent EU-funded research into public awareness and attitudes to air pollution. ClairCity was one of only two projects suggested for inclusion by Commission. The article should be published shortly.  For more information on ClairCity please visit www.claircity.eu

 

Policy, poverty, green infrastructure and better places

On 24^th November, Tim had a busy day up in London. 

First off he gave an invited presentation at a Policy UK workshop on “Improving Air Quality in our Towns and Cities” http://www.policy-uk.com/event/2365/Improving_Air_Quality_in_Our_Towns_and_Cities__Implementing__lsquo_Clean_Air_Zones_rsquo___creating_sustainable_transport_system

Then he was an invited participant at a round table workshop on Transport Poverty, organised by the Institute of Transport Studies at Leeds University and the RAC Foundation

 

Finally, he attended a workshop hosted by the London Sustainability Exchange on Green Infrastructure and Air Quality http://www.lsx.org.uk/news/events.aspx?id=3743

 

Meanwhile, Jo gave an invited presentation on air quality at  Landor’s Better Places conference http://landor.co.uk/betterplacesparkingworld/Better-Places/programme.php

Jo invited to speak to global BBC reporters at New Broadcasting House

Jo has been invited by the BBC World Service to advise on air pollution and showcase AQMRC's research to a global audience of reporters at New Broadcasting House on Monday 5th December. She will be joining representatives from the World Health Organization, C40 and ClientEarth as part of the new Solutions-Focussed Journalism project at BBC News – tagged ‘So I can breathe’ - which is due to be launched next March. As the name suggests, the project is interested in the success stories that can be reported so that lessons can be learnt elsewhere. This is a great opportunity to demonstrate the impact of AQMRC's research and to put UWE more firmly on the global map with regards air quality research.

Jo speaking at Better Places and Parking World 2016

Jo spoke at the Better Places and Parking World 2016 conference at the Kia Oval in London yesterday. The event, which was organised by Landor LINKS, was attended by a broad range of professionals all seeking to improve urban design and the impact of road traffic. Jo's presentation, entitled "Beyond nudge and improving transport infrastructure: the real task of tackling poor air quality", led the 'Improving Air Quality' session, and discussed the role of social practice theory in understanding how emissions are generated and by whom, contextualized with examples from the EPSRC-funded projects, Disruption and MOT, and the new H2020 project, ClairCity. The novel approach presented was perhaps a challenge to traditional thinking on air quality and transport management and was met with a lot of interest from the diverse, and largely receptive, audience.

New paper on active school travel from TIm

Tim has just had a new paper published on active school travel in the Journal of Transport and Health.  The work was led by Sara Ahern at Bradford Institute of Health Research and involved colleagues from Newcastle University, Imperial College and the University of Leeds.  The paper was based around the application of a Theoretical Domains Framework, to understanding the challenges around active school travel (AST) in the West Yorkshire region.  The paper found that capacity for active travel to school was often compromised by the need for parents to combine the journey with other activities (particularly the commute to work) as was identified in other work such as Tim’s recent EPSRC funded Disruption project (www.fleximobility.solutions). Similarly, structural interventions such as better spatial planning and the making of school environments more AST friendly were seen to be necessary to developing a coordinated approach to encouraging more sustainable school travel.

Ahern, S.M., Arnott, B., Chatterton, T., de Nazelle, A., Kellar, I. and McEachan, R. (2016), Understanding parents' school travel choices: A qualitative study using the Theoretical Domains Framework. Journal of Transport & Health  http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jth.2016.11.001i  

Abstract

Traffic related air pollution is detrimental to health and creates a substantial attributable mortality burden. It is suggested that a shift from motorised transport to active forms of travel will therefore have significant health benefits. Currently 46% of school journeys for primary aged children are made by car and this figure has risen steadily. Understanding barriers to active school travel (AST) is an important first step in developing behavioural interventions to increase active travel. The purpose of this study was to explore parents’ experiences of school travel and their choices regarding travel mode with a focus on identifying barriers and facilitators to AST.

Twenty parents of primary school children (4–12 years) in the West Yorkshire region took part in semi-structured interviews regarding school travel, informed by the Theoretical Domains Framework. Framework Analysis was used to identify key themes in the data and to develop a comprehensive picture of parents' experiences of school travel at both individual and structural levels.

Distance was the biggest barrier to AST. Time constraints were reported as the main barrier to parents accompanying children in AST, while concerns about safety deterred parents from allowing children to travel independently. The need to incorporate multiple jouneys, such as the work commute and/or multiple school drop-offs, placed demands on parents' time, while difficulty getting children into local schools meant further to travel for a number of parents. Findings suggest that interventions to promote AST may be particularly effective if tailored towards working parents. However, also addressing factors such as distance to school and school travel at a policy level may produce more significant shifts in behaviour.

 

AQMRC in Amsterdam

Enda, Jo, Tim and Corra are all in Amsterdam for a two day ClairCity workshop (http://www.claircity.eu/). The workshop brings together project partners, advisory board members and other interested stakeholders (including Amsterdam policymakers, the national government, research institutes and city citizens) to discuss the air quality, carbon and health challenges that the city faces and how ClairCity can orientated its research to engage citizens in forming solutions.

Jo on the BBC national news

Air quality made the national news today (2nd November 2016) following the announcement of the High Court ruling supporting ClientEarth's case against Defra's Air Quality Plan. Mr Justice Garnham agreed with ClientEarth that the Environment Secretary had failed to take measures that would bring the UK into compliance with the law “as soon as possible” and said that ministers knew that over optimistic pollution modelling was being used. In an interview for the BBC News at Ten and Radio 4 evening news AQMRC's Dr Jo Barnes highlighted the impact that this ruling could have for public health if Defra are required to rewrite the Plan: "This is, hopefully, going to affect the potential health impacts for thousands, tens of thousands of people, hundreds of thousands of people and, potentially, save lives ultimately."