Applied Knowledge Exchange

Scotland’s Climate Change minister Stewart Stevenson is pushing the Scottish Government’s Low Carbon Mission agenda at the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen next week.

The Scottish Government’s Climate Change Act, passed earlier this year, has committed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 42 per cent from 1990 levels by 2020 and by 80 per cent by 2050.

At the weekend, Parliamentarians joined thousands of protestors as they took to the streets of Glasgow as part of Scotland’s biggest ever climate change demonstration. The Wave was organised by the Stop Climate Chaos coalition.

At Glasgow Caledonian University, vital renewable energy work is also high on the agenda.

Research is central to the School of the Built and Natural Environment’s activities, and it attained the top rating in Scotland in the category  “Architecture and the Built Environment” of The Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) for 2008.

The School of the Built and Natural Environment has a research partnership with Grameen Shakti , a not-for-profit company established to promote, develop and popularize renewable energy technologies in remote, rural areas of Bangladesh. The School of the Built and Natural Environment is collaborating with Grameen Shakti on the largest micro-generation renewable energy program in the world. A delegation of Grameen Shakti will also attend the Copenhagen Summit.   

Dr M. Asif, Lecturer in Sustainable and Renewable Energy Technologies at Glasgow Caledonian University, says: “In the backdrop of the environmental challenges Bangladesh faces , the work we are jointly undertaking is important and would be of interest to other developing and developed countries as well.”

Another important renewable energy initiative is being headed by Dr Alastair Sutherland, Dr Alan Williams and Susan Withers, of the Division of Biological/Biomedical Sciences. They have obtained £147,000 of funding from iTi Energy to study the anaerobic digestion of seaweed to produce methane. This is part of a new initiative to develop advanced biofuels for renewable energy.

Your business can benefit from the expertise available at Glasgow Caledonian University. Whether you are an SME, charity, multinational or public sector organisation, the Applied Knowledge Exchange can provide professional consultancy, specialist research facilities, and bespoke work-based education.

The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) are working together in a strategic partnership to explore potential for enhancing knowledge exchange in the arts and humanities in Scotland.

They are co-hosting an event that aims to bring arts and humanities researchers together with partners from related disciplines and organisations is taking place on 1 September, 9-5 pm, Surgeons Hall, Edinburgh. To attend this free event, please e-mail your details to knowledgetransfer@ahrc.ac.uk.

The idea behind the event is to explore how arts and humanities subjects can contribute to new perspectives on the experience of health and illness in Scotland and and new approaches to therapy and recovery in Scotland.

Philanthropist and founder of Ebay, Jeff Skoll spoke to Owen Bennett-Jones today on The Interview, BBC World Service.

Jeff talks about how he set up The Skoll Foundation to encourage social entrepreneurship, his venutres into making movies with a social message and why he chose to dedicate his time to social innovation.