2021 review - Books & Audiobooks

I tend to read non-fiction as I feel as I am learning new things, but it is true that the one book I couldn't put down was a fiction one.

Fiction

🪐 Project Hail Mary: 5⭐️ I loved ‘The Martian’, I thought this one was better.

🌔 Artemis: 3⭐️ Something weird about this one, not bad just not his best.

🧎🏼‍♀️The Testaments: 5⭐️ I read the first one and this one right after and I loved it.

Cli-Fi

🥵 The Ministry for the Future: 4⭐️ Set in the near future, it tells a story of a society reducing emissions with elements of horror fiction, as climate change threatens the characters.

Non-Fiction

🌳 Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution: 5⭐️ A book written from the perspective of a meditating NASA climate scientist who has nearly eliminated his own emissions and found it satisfying

⚡️ The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations: 5⭐️ My first global politics book, on energy revolutions, climate battles, and geopolitics that are mapping our future, such as the American shale revolution or South China Sea.

🍭 The Good Ancestor: How to Think Long Term in a Short-Term World: 5⭐️ I loved this book. Acorn thinking or marshmallow brains? In an age driven by the tyranny of the now, with 24/7 news, the latest tweet, and the buy-now button commanding our attention, we rarely stop to consider how our actions will affect future generations.

📚 Don't Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change: 5⭐️ short easy to read climate change communication science chapters.

💵 How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs: 4⭐️ He explains the climate change science and facts pretty easily.

🏕 The Joyful Environmentalist: 5⭐️ A feel-good book.

📈 A New Reality: Human Evolution for a Sustainable Future: 5⭐️ Short book, showing the changes in human values shifting from unlimited availability of resources to those based on limits and cooperation and long-term.

Audiobooks

The New Climate War 5⭐️

Net Zero 4⭐️

What We Need to Do Now 4⭐️

Reuters Interview: Zero Waste Movement in the UK

Last week Reuters came to interview us on zero waste. To me the easiest message to convey on how to go zero waste is by refilling and reusing. Reducing is the first choice, but it is the hardest one to explain in a way. Refilling is linked to an activity that can be easily understood. Once you refill you can’t go back.

Before my recycling manager job in Hackney, I used to work in @greenpeaceuk , and I am keen to push their campaign to get supermarkets to include more refill points or ‘plastic free aisles’. These exists in other countries, and they have started to trial them in the UK thanks to Catherine’s team in @unpackaged The one thing I keep telling those that don’t have access and want refill points in supermarkets is to ask for it, demand change, show there is a market for it.

Happy Refilling!

Full video interview is available:

Reuters Russia

Reuters India

Reuters Canada

Italian TV News (00:24)

Podcast Interview - Circular with Katie Treggiden

Katie is releasing her new book 'Wasted' and her podcast series, Circular with Katie Treggiden. To coincide with these releases, I was interviewed alongside Hugo Tagholm @hugotagholm CEO of @surfersagainstsewage; Lucy Siegle ethical journalist and broadcaster @theseagull; Seetal Solanki designer, author and educator @seetalsolanki.

The podcast: "A podcast exploring the intersection of craft, design and sustainability. Join me as I talk to the thinkers, doers, and makers of the circular economy. These are the people who are challenging the linear take-make-waste model of production and consumption – and working towards something better. In this series, we’re talking about waste.

"Click on the image to listen to the podcast"

Her new book celebrates 30 optimistic and enterprising designers, makers and manufacturers who use waste as their primary resource, offering a rare glimpse into the world they inhabit. Accompanying these profiles, six in-depth and thematic essays will explore the societal, cultural and environmental implications of their work. As natural resources dwindle, designers are exploring the potential of increasingly plentiful waste streams to become the raw materials of the future — turning the legacy of the linear ‘take-make-waste’ model into something new, better and more circular. Wasted is available to pre-order* on Amazon now and will be in your local independent bookshop from 08 October 2020.