The Zero Carbon petition

The Zero Carbon petition (with over 800 signatures from across the region) was introduced, and the following eight actions were recommended to move to a Zero Carbon region.

1)Divest the West Midlands Pension fund from fossil fuel investment.

2)Follow the lead being given by Swansea, Newport and Herefordshire regarding free public transport - let T4WM set up a feasibility study for its introduction in the West Midlands.

3)End the incineration of waste.

4)The WMCA should urge its residents to limit themselves to one return flight every two or three years, pending the development of zero carbon planes.

5)Local authorities within the WMCA area should promote proper climate and environmental studies in all schools.

6)Stop good money chasing bad with HS2 (apart from the environmental devastation it is causing, it is vastly over-priced, will not link to the European High-speed network and has three dead-end stations, London, Birmingham, and Manchester. The Solihull Interchange Station will churn up more green belt land and as for its aim to encourage more economic growth, our planet is not coping with the current level of economic activity, we certainly do not need more of it).

7)Trams are more accessible than buses and trains for disabled people and prams, but they are also very expensive to build and emit a huge amount of CO2 from cement and steel in construction - so the compromise is to stop new growth of this network and use the money to upgrade the current bus and train network instead.

8)As part of accelerating the domestic heating and insulation retrofitting program, can we have the plan for retrofitting published?

The other part of the petition was to call for an open regional forum to allow citizens to discuss the WMCA’s “Net Zero by 2041” plan. This has been agreed and the first meeting will take place on Thursday, March 31st from 6-8pm.

ZERO GHG ASAP!

The Zero Carbon petition is due to be presented to the West Midlands mayor and the West Midlands Combined Authority at its board meeting on Friday 19th November. It will be our reply to their “Net Zero by 2041” plan. The petition also notes the lack of democracy and public representation on the WMCA and Environment and Energy Boards and calls for inclusion.

The meeting takes place at 11am at the Civic Centre in Wolverhampton, and if those that are able could gather outside at 10.30am, it would be appreciated. The hard copies of the petition will be handed over. The threshold for the WMCA to take the petition more seriously is 250 and we have passed that, but of course the more names the better.

St Peter's Square, Wolverhampton, WV1 1SH

The online version of the Regional Petition is still gathering names. Please sign if you have not already done so.

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/p/ZeroCarbonWestMidlands

If you have hard copies already filled in, you can scan and email them back to westmidlands@cop26coalition.org, or a physical address can be provided. Please return them well before 19th November.

Remember,

The WMCA net-zero plan talks about insulating tens of thousands of homes. Very good, but we have well over a million to insulate in the region.

Their plan has measures to encourage people out of their cars, again very good, but the best measure, free, accessible public transport, is not mentioned.

Their plan will not fully phase out incineration of waste until 2036. Note that in Birmingham the Tyseley plant emits 300,000 tons of CO2 per year.

Divestment from fossil fuels is not to be completed for another 15 years, and the mayor is against it altogether, as ‘A good return on investments is more important’ (FoE hustings in April).

There is mention of net zero airports, but unless you use balloons, gliders, or broomsticks, how can this be done? Why not at least discourage rich frequent flyers and call for no airport expansion?

We have the £160 billion, environment-destroying white elephant being built – a mega-toy for the rich (while simultaneously cutting taxes for short haul flights!) It goes without saying that the WMCA supports HS2.

These are a few of the reasons why the net zero by 2041 plan is inadequate. As the COP26 declaration has just said, 'we need more urgent measures to rapidly de-carbonise'. The 'we' in this case includes the West Midlands.

Bob Whitehead

From excellent Eddy Morton and his success

Fantastic news !!! Our affordable housing project the Stourbridge PowerHaus has received planning approval from DMBC. This car free development that provides 11 affordable apartments with solar panels, roof garden, a shared home working space and air source heat pumps is built To Passiv House standards using sustainable building methods with U values down at 0.18 due to the closed wood panel construction and higher levels of build quality. Our philosophy is that affordable rent and energy creates more disposable income for tenants living in the town, which in turn will be spent in the local economy. This not only addresses issues of affordability and the local economy and High street but our ambitions around greater home working to reduce commuter miles and support the retention of creative, enterprising young people and key workers within the town. All of these measures help in our progress towards zero carbon, the challenge of reducing carbon emissions and other localised issues such as air quality and traffic problems.

Affordable rent will create an additional £1000 a year disposable income per resident which equates to 11,000 a year across the whole development that can be spent in the local economy.

Affordable energy will create an additional £3000 a year disposable income per resident

which equates to £33,000 a year across the whole development

Total increase in disposable income available to the local economy is £44,000

Over the total 25 years investment horizon of the Stourbridge PowerHaus development approx £1 million pounds in disposable income is made available to spend in the local economy .

Housing can be a huge driver in the re energising of local economies whilst addressing the issues of climate change and the local environment.

join us in the Re evolution.