The Greater Brighton City Region last week launched its GB10, ten pledges on environmental action and clean growth, which it will work towards as part of a major programme of projects.
Backing kelp forests at sea, low carbon heating and cutting public building energy consumption by 2030 were just three of the pledges. A new website section outlining all the pledges and a film backing the campaign was also launched and can be found here https://greaterbrighton.com/GB10.
At the meeting of the Greater Brighton Economic Board which governs the city region, members individually pledged their organisations to the programme of works that sits underneath the GB10 pledges. They also agreed for regular updates on progress.
Here’s what the individual members said in support and a practical example of what they were doing towards the goals.
Cllr Daniel Humphreys, chairman of Greater Brighton Economic Board and Leader of Worthing Borough Council, said:
“We will continue to play our part as can be seen with our work with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and other partners in developing a heat network aiming to decarbonise heat in our town centre buildings.”
Cllr Neil Parkin, Leader of Adur District Council, said:
“We have just bought New Salts Farm a large green field site purchased so we can look to preserve and enhance the area for future generations.”
Cllr Dr James Walsh, Leader of Arun District Council, said:
“We fully back these pledges and support the agenda. We are especially enthusiastic in providing EV charging points across Arun, working with West Sussex County Council to create a unified network to make moving around West Sussex sustainable and carbon free.”
Cllr Phelim Mac Cafferty, Leader of Brighton & Hove City Council, said:
“We support the ambition to become carbon neutral by 2030. This supports our ambitions on energy including retrofitting council homes. We have big bold ideas and want to develop our city as a hydrogen fuel hub. We need to play our part in achieving carbon neutrality as soon as possible.”
Cllr John Alcock, Deputy Leader of Labour Group, Brighton & Hove City Council, said:
“We see a key commitment in becoming a carbon neutral city by 2030, we back EV charging points and have 200 in the city already while we continue to decarbonise our vehicle fleet.”
Cllr Zoe Nicholson, Deputy Leader of Lewes District Council, said:
“We sign up to these pledges as they focus us on helping us to achieve our own targets but also critically by ensuring we really focus collective efforts on recovery and development after Covid. I am excited about making sure we decarbonise housing stock.”
Cllr Jonathan Ash-Edwards, Leader of Mid-Sussex District Council, said:
“Our partnership with Homes England to build 3.500 new homes at Burgess Hill is an exemplar in sustainable development because it makes sure recycled water is used throughout.”
Professor Debra Humphris, Vice Chancellor of University of Brighton, said:
“We are using our research expertise to support work on this. Our Centre for Aquatic Environments is working on carbon sequestration projects involving sea marshes and kelp forests and a core value of our own sustainability programme is to make sure our own estate is carbon neutral.”
Professor Adam Tickell, Vice Chancellor of University of Sussex, said:
“We have the largest solar power capacity of any university in the UK, we’ve built grassland on campus using excavated chalk rubble and we are mapping our strategy against United Nations Sustainability goals with a new team that reports directly to me.”
Andrew Green, Chief Executive of the Greater Brighton Metropolitan College, said:
“We back the GB10 and have signed up to the Further Education sector’s roadmap of action on climate change, working with staff and students to achieve that.”
Claire Mason, board member of Coast to Capital Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP), said:
“We back the GB10 and recognise alignment with many areas of our work, particularly our ‘build back stronger smarter and greener’ strategy for economic recovery, delivering a South to East tri-LEP energy strategy to support clean growth, and supporting hydrogen engine development.”
Andrew Swayne, Chairman of the Adur & Worthing Business Partnership, said:
“I back the GB 10 pledges as they have a good balance of projects which support the communities where we live and their economic and environmental sustainability. There are many opportunities for local businesses around the green recovery, I would like to highlight Low Carbon Heating which should create high quality local jobs.”
Gavin Stewart, Executive Director of Brighton & Hove Economic Partnership, said:
“We support the GB10 as an excellent practical programme to support green growth and sustainable development.”
Henry Powell, Chairman of the Coastal West Sussex Partnership, said:
“We pledge our support for GB10. My own company Inpress Plastics signed up to the Climate Change levy opt out scheme beating our target by three years, and we are committed to halving that energy usage again.”
Trevor Beattie, Chief Executive of the South Downs National Park Authority, said:
“We fully support the GB10, which aims to protect and enhance world class environment which is one of the distinct advantages that Greater Brighton has, a real commercial edge that we need now more than ever. We are working on rewilding projects with a range of partners including Southern Water and Brighton & Hove City Council. Our Bee Lines project to grow nectar and pollen sources across the Downs shows there is a lot of work we can do with all the partners to give us this commercial and environmental edge.”
To see the video and find out more about the pledges visit: https://greaterbrighton.com/GB10/