Scotland’s Innovation Centres have teamed up with The Herald for a special, one-day online conference on Tuesday, November 3rd 2020 to explore innovation, inclusive growth, cultural change around climate action, and ultimately how collaboration could achieve national net zero targets.
The ‘Scotland’s Countdown to COP26’ event will mark one year until COP26, the UN climate change conference taking place in Glasgow in 2021. It will be the first time a COP summit has met in the UK and one of the largest events Scotland has ever hosted.
Chaired by Scottish Enterprise’s Martin Valenti, the free, one-day conference will be packed with plenary speakers, themed sessions, presentations, panel discussions, Q&As, networking and virtual exhibitions. Each will explore the different opportunities COP26 will present for Scotland to take action and create a prosperous, safer, and greener world.
Kate Raworth from the University of Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute and Peter Lacy, Europe Lead for Accenture Strategy, will lead a list of high-profile speakers.
There will also be six climate-themed sessions covering construction and the built environment; energy; health and wellbeing; sustainable industrial processes; sustainable food from land and sea; and transport.
The event will be delivered by the seven Scottish Innovation Centres: CENSIS, the Innovation Centre for sensing, imaging and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies; Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (CSIC); The Data Lab; Digital Health and Care Institute (DHI); Industrial Biotechnology Innovation Centre (IBioIC); Precision Medicine Scotland (PMS); and SAIC, the Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre.
Launched in 2012, the centres accelerate technology advances by forging new collaborations between service delivery, businesses, and the research community, with a mission to create jobs and support inclusive economic growth.
There will also be support from the Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE), and the Scottish Funding Council.
New business models and lifestyle changes imposed by Covid-19 have resulted in a reduction in CO2 emissions and an improvement in air quality across the globe. At Scotland’s Countdown to COP26, Scottish businesses and organisations of all types will be challenged to come together, collaborate, and respond in the run up to the summit, delivering new products, services, and ways of working that will lead to a more sustainable future.
The Innovation Centres will subsequently lead follow-on activities in the 12 months after the event, aiming to create and deliver transformational collaboration and climate change programmes across multiple sectors within Scotland and beyond.
Paul Winstanley, chief executive of CENSIS, said: “The eyes of the world will be on Scotland when COP26 arrives next year. With that comes a responsibility to start conversations now and take action to make sure we grasp the opportunity that has been presented to us.
"The build up to COP26 will be very different to what it would have been had it gone ahead as planned this year, but even through the experience of Covid-19 there are lessons to be learned and opportunities to take when it comes to our relationship with the planet.
“Doing nothing is not an option anymore: the emission reductions witnessed in 2020 may just as easily rebound unless longer-term actions are established to bring lasting change. Achieving systemic change of this scale requires significant collaboration across all sectors of society and an agile approach to maximise net-zero opportunities.
“Put simply, a reset is required on the way we live and work and how we drive change from a reactive stance of managing problems to a proactive one of exploring opportunities. Encouraging the development and use of new technologies to tackle these challenges will be more important than ever.
“Set against the threat of climate change and the impact of Covid-19, Scotland must seize the opportunity to plan and deliver an inspiring and compelling response under the watching eyes of the world in a year’s time. We plan to kick that off at our Scotland's Countdown to COP26 event, which will spark conversations and, more importantly, challenge everyone in Scotland to take action and bring about positive change that can have a global impact.”
Join the conversation and take up the challenge by registering to join Scotland’s Countdown to COP26 HERE
The event takes place on Tuesday, November 3rd 2020, is free to attend, and will be accessible online.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article