1: Changing Behaviours

The CACEIS Climate Change Briefing

How we adjust to the new realities of climate change is the central story in episode one of the Climate Change Briefing. Pat Sharman of CACEIS brings together Professor Lorraine Whitmarsh, Director for Climate Change and Social Transformation at the University of Bath and Chandra Gopinathan, a senior investment manager with Railpen, one of the largest and longest established pension funds in the UK.

We know that climate change is evolving rapidly. In recent years, the effect of climate change has made itself felt around the world with increasing frequency. However, this has not been enough to change our individual behaviours. The scale of the climate change challenge facing us as individuals can be overwhelming and previously, this has impeded our ability to take action.

Times are changing. At an individual level, public behaviour has now started to respond to the threat of climate change. In this episode, we explore how education and information has a role to play to help inform individuals on what are good choices and we look deeper at why information itself is not usually an effective means of driving change. We highlight other measures that can drive more success in changing behaviours.

We talk about the importance of climate education, linking the science to the day-to-day decisions that individuals have to make. And we tackle some important questions - are voluntary behaviour changes enough or do we need more regulation and government intervention? Should there be a carbon tax? And is climate change still a low priority when it comes to decision-making on the purchases that individuals make?

This idea of constantly being able to produce more things and that the resources are endless is something that is an impossibility. Tackling carbon emissions in fast moving fashion, for example, is a complex one – we outline some of the challenges and why social considerations of change also need to be considered.

Our contributors end the episode with their final thoughts on the way forward.

A Whistledown production for CACEIS