Charlie Wilson visited the International Energy Agency in Paris to present research on the potential contribution of disruptive consumer innovations to accelerated energy-system transformation in line with the 1.5oC climate target. This follows the recent IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5oC which had a dedicated (if short) section on disruptive innovation. Have a […]
Charlie Wilson gave a public lecture at his old alma mater, the University of British Columbia, on new research showing how to meet the 1.5oC climate target by transforming energy services. Examples of potentially disruptive innovations that can significantly reduce the energy required to provide useful services include shared mobility, pre-fabricated whole home energy retrofits, […]
A new online platform is tracking potentially disruptive ‘mega-trends’ which can contribute to global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Launched by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the Research Institutes of Sweden (RISE), the ‘SDG Trend Scanner’ has data on trends ranging from ageing, automation, digitalisation to climate change, social instability, and vulnerable employment. As the […]
On his travels by boat and train across to Vancouver, British Columbia, SILCI project researcher Charlie Wilson stopped off in the prairie state of Saskatchewan where he spoke to the CBC about low-carbon travel as well as new research on low-carbon innovation and the 1.5°C climate goal. Fittingly, the day he was interviewed was the […]
Our newest member of the SILCI research team, Emilie Vrain, recently attended the Sunbelt conference in Utrecht, The Netherlands. Sunbelt (originally held in places such as Hawaii and Florida, giving rise to it’s name) is an annual event to bring together social scientists, mathematicians, computer scientists, ethnologists, public health experts and many others, who all […]
At the workshops we ran a year ago on disruptive low-carbon innovations, one of our keynote speakers, Kathryn Myronuk, made an interesting comment along the lines of: “I don’t get excited by the new stuff being invented, I’m interested in the stuff that’s been around for some time but is being combined in new ways […]
On the way home from Brussels on Eurostar, I picked up a copy of the Financial Times. The cover story was about how the number of millennials (born between 1980-2000) has overtaken the number of baby boomers in the US, marking a shift in consumer power as “millennials are now in the most important age […]
SILCI team member, Charlie Wilson, was one of the authors in a new study published in Nature Energy which shows how dramatic transformations in the way we move around, heat and cool our homes, and buy and use devices and appliances in our cities can help raise living standards in the global South to meet […]
During recent workshops in Norwich we explored the general appeal of different types of low carbon innovations using repertory grid technique (RGT). This method has been widely used in consumer research to segment markets according to how products are valued by consumers. Using cue cards and a grid, we talked to over 40 people about the general appeal of 12 different low carbon innovations, concluding with a rating exercise in which they scored […]
After two days ensconced with members of the public eliciting their perceptions of consumer-facing low-carbon innovations, the SILCI team adjourned to the pub for a well earned drink. (Please note: No public research funding was spent on this activity!). As well as generating reams of data, the workshops were an important reminder to us researchers […]