Future Cities · Sustainability, Energy, Innovation, Climate Change, Transport, Housing, Work, Circular Economy, Education & Environmental Solutions

Can we imagine a world where we leave half the earth to the natural environment and use the other half for ourselves? Can we change history and protect the Indigenous, the vulnerable, and the very poorest in society? Mark Maslin is a Professor of Earth System Science at University College London. Maslin is a leading expert in understanding the anthropocene and how it relates to the major challenge...

Happy World Oceans Day! Today we’re streaming voices of environmentalists and artists with music courtesy of composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Erland Cooper. Voices on this episode are GIULIO BOCCALETTI Author of Water, A Biography Natural Resource Security & Environmental Sustainability Expert Chief Strategy Officer 2016–2020, The Nature Conservancy PAULA PINHO Director of Just Tra...

"Putting design first, it really enables us to shape a future that we don't yet know. But we need to be super tactile and practical about it as well. And then seeing that is something that design very much has the ability to do. And at the same time, having this growing frustration that wherever you go, wherever you talk about sustainability, it was a compromise. It was something that meant uglier...

Happy World Environment Day! Ditte Lysgaard Vind is a renowned circular economy and design expert and author of Danish Design Heritage & Global Sustainability (Routledge 2023) and A Changemakers Guide to the Future. She is the Chairwoman of the Danish Design Council and founder of The Circular Way. She is known for pioneering new materials as well as business models, while sharing the kno...

Today we’re streaming voices of environmentalists, students, and teachers with music courtesy of composer Max Richter. All voices in this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast or reflectors of our participating students. Voices on this episode are BRITT WRAY Author of Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis Researcher Working on Cli...

“Those who define the world based on money, industry, and production capacity have seemingly been spared from acquiring an understanding of biology, geology, or ecology. They calculate statistics and feel optimistic. What’s fatal to the Earth and unsustainable for the future is hidden by the words ‘favorable economic outlook’. Increased oil production is positive for the economy; doubling aluminum...

Andri Snær Magnason is an award winning author of On Time and Water, The Casket of Time, LoveStar, Dreamland and The Story of the Blue Planet. His work has been published in more than 35 languages. He has a written in most genres, novels, poetry, plays, short stories, non fiction as well as being a documentary film maker. His novel, LoveStar got a Philip K. Dick Special Citation, and the Grand Pri...

"The Inland Sea came out in 2020. And in that period as I was writing it, I would keep noticing each year would be 'the worst on record.' Like the hottest day on record, the most fires on record. And there was a sort of strangeness to having written the book in a period of Black Summer fires that burned for nearly six months and just decimated huge sways of land. In 2020, I had gone back to t...

Madeleine Watts is an Australian writer based in New York. Her first novel The Inland Sea was published in 2020 and was shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award and the UTS Glenda Adams Award for New Writing. Her essays and stories have been published in Harper’s Magazine, The Believer, The Guardian, The White Review, and The Paris Review Daily, among others. She teaches creative wri...

Sagarika Sriram is currently a student at Jumeirah College in Dubai. She founded the organization Kids4abetterworld when she was 10 years old with a mission to educate and encourage young children to lead a more sustainable life and reduce their carbon footprint. Children are the worst affected by the effects of climate change,  yet most children do not participate in climate change discussio...

Listen to Part 4 of this Special Series with music courtesy of composer Max Richter. All voices on this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast: INGRID NEWKIRK, Founder & President of PETA - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals JEFFREY D. SACHS, President of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Director of Center for Sustainable Dev...

Listen to Part 3 of this Special Series with music courtesy of composer Max Richter. All voices on this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast: PAULA PINHO, Director of Just Transition at the European Commission Directorate-General for Energy PIA MANCINI, Co-founder/CEO of Open Collective - Chair of DemocracyEarth Foundation , YGL World Economic Forum JEN...

Listen to Part 2 of this Special Series with music courtesy of composer Max Richter. All voices on this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast: MANUELA LUCÁ-DAZIO - Executive Director, Pritzker Architecture Prize - Fmr. Exec. Director of Venice Biennale, Visual Arts & Architecture Dept. BRITT WRAY - Author of “Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an A...

Today we’re streaming voices of environmentalists, artists, students, and teachers. Enjoy Part 1 of this Special Series with music courtesy of composer Max Richter. All voices on this episode are from our interviews for The Creative Process & One Planet Podcast: MAX RICHTER INGRID NEWKIRK, Founder of PETA BERTRAND PICCARD, Aviator of 1st Round-the-World Solar-Powered Flight, Explorer, Founder,...

“I think the Pritzker Architecture Prize has the power to foster and enhance the discussion on the one end. And on the other end, it has also the power to involve a more global discussion. So it's not just limited to architects because ultimately architecture is what we live in and we use every day of our lives. So all of us should be involved in this discussion. It's really a common responsibilit...

Manuela Lucá-Dazio is the newly appointed Executive Director of the Pritzker Architecture Prize. In this capacity, she works closely with the jury, however, she does not vote in the proceedings. She is the former Executive Director, Department of Visual Arts and Architecture of La Biennale di Venezia, where she managed exhibitions with distinguished curators, architects, artists, and critics to re...

“It's all part of the same kind of mindset of trying to live lighter on the planet. We all know that cities are much lower energy consumers per capita. That is to say, city dwellers use much less energy than other people because of the density of housing, the transport is easier...So densification of human development is a huge climate benefit, and making cities more attractive and livable is a cr...

Armond Cohen is Executive Director of Clean Air Task Force, which he has led since its formation in 1996. In addition to leading CATF, Armond is directly involved in CATF research and advocacy on the topic of requirements to deeply decarbonize global energy systems. Prior to his work with CATF, Armond founded and led the Conservation Law Foundation’s Energy Project starting in 1983, focusing on en...

“ ‘The Question Concerning Technology’, in which Heidegger warned that nature had become just a source of resources for us, commodities, what he called standing reserves. Something that had no value other than for our ability to exploit it and mine it and use it for our use and purposes. Whether it's utilitarianism, which is sort of consequentialist ethics, always act in a way...

Harold P. Sjursen is an educator and administrator having served on the faculty of both a liberal arts college and school of engineering. His background is in the history of philosophy, but since childhood has sustained an interest in science and technology. His current research interests focus on the philosophy of technology, global philosophy, and technological ethics. His engineering education...

“So when we think about cities of the future, we need to think about systems change because you can't just change one thing in isolation. You need to rethink how we can create cities that are both resilient to environmental change, they can withstand environmental shocks better. So, for example, reducing the urban heat island. We know that cities are hotter than the surrounding rural areas and wit...

Andy Haines was formerly a family doctor and Professor of Primary Health Care at UCL. He developed an interest in climate change and health in the 1990’s and was a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for the 2nd and 3rd assessment exercises and review editor for the health chapter in the 5th assessment. He was Director (formerly Dean) of the London School of Hygiene & Tropi...

“In the context of cities, I think it's tough to answer. We hope that cities will become more sustainable. We hope that people living in cities will reduce their consumption of carbon-emitting fuels, but there is no global indication that the momentum in that direction is increasing appreciatively. The growth of the middle classes in large, developing economies of the BRICS countries, Brazil, Russ...

Mark Burgman is Director of the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial College London and Editor-in-Chief of the journal Conservation Biology.  He is author of Trusting Judgments: How to Get the Best Out of Experts. Previously, he was Adrienne Clarke Chair of Botany at the University of Melbourne, Australia. He works on expert judgement, ecological modelling, conservation biology and ris...

“So, as much as I would love to take the credit, Google Ads was a big team, and I was fortunate to be brought in as a director that managed the team. And I would also like to say the idea of attaching ads to searches, anybody could have had it. In fact, it was the most obvious thing. Just like on television, if you watch a car race, then it makes sense to have ads about cars. So I think the reason...