Skip to main content

What happened when students handed in a divestment petition to the University of Bristol

Image
By
Students handing in a divestment petition to Hugh Brady, Vice Chancellor of
the University of Bristol
On 9 November 2015, Fossil Free Bristol University handed over their petition asking for fossil fuel divestment to the Vice Chancellor, Hugh Brady. The petition has been open since March and collected over 2,200 signatures. It was presented along with a Student Union motion and letter in support of the campaign, as well as a report on the case for divestment to be presented to the Pro Vice Chancellor at a follow-up meeting.

Students are hoping that the University of Bristol will capitalise on the city's status as Bristol Green Capital and show subsequent Green Capital cities and universities what an important role universities can play in public climate change discourse. They are also keen that the university take positive moves towards divestment in the run up to COP21, and demonstrate to governmental leaders that they support strong action on climate change targets and regulation of the fossil fuel industry.

Students are keen that the university take positive moves towards divestment in
the run up to COP21, and demonstrate to governmental leaders that they support
strong action on climate change targets and regulation of the fossil fuel industry.
Fossil Free Bristol University was joined outside Senate House by Bristol University Sustainability Team (BUST), the Friends of the Earth Society, Bristol Energy Network, the local Fossil Free Bristol campaign and Bristol Left student society. It was a really positive and colourful event with loads of students turning up to show their support. As well as decorating their stalls with placards and banners created at the local arts centre the People's Republic of Stokes Croft the students ran interactive information stalls and fun and games including pin the nose on the climate change sceptic.

The Vice Chancellor gave the campaign a fairly positive response, he talked about sustainability areas that the university was working on and said divestment was one area being investigated, and that we can expect a policy announcement in January. Fossil Free Bristol University will be keeping up the pressure on the University in the mean time.



------------------------------
This blog is written by University of Bristol student, Rachel Simon from Fossil Free Bristol University.

Related links

Students in Bristol Uni divestment demands - Bristol 24/7

Open letter to the University of Bristol requesting divestment from fossil fuels

Read more about the petition hand in to Vice Chancellor Hugh Brady.

Watch the divestment petition hand in on Made In Bristol TV at minutes 5 - 7 of 'The 6 09.11.15 Part 1' News.

Read the Bristol Green Capital post.
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Converting probabilities between time-intervals

By
This is the first in an irregular sequence of snippets about some of the slightly more technical aspects of uncertainty and risk assessment.  If you have a slightly more technical question, then please email me and I will try to answer it with a snippet. Suppose that an event has a probability of 0.015 (or 1.5%) of happening at least once in the next five years. Then the probability of the event happening at least once in the next year is 0.015 / 5 = 0.003 (or 0.3%), and the probability of it happening at least once in the next 20 years is 0.015 * 4 = 0.06 (or 6%). Here is the rule for scaling probabilities to different time intervals: if both probabilities (the original one and the new one) are no larger than 0.1 (or 10%), then simply multiply the original probability by the ratio of the new time-interval to the original time-interval, to find the new probability. This rule is an approximation which breaks down if either of the probabilities is greater than 0.1. For exa...
Read more

1-in-200 year events

By
You often read or hear references to the ‘1-in-200 year event’, or ‘200-year event’, or ‘event with a return period of 200 years’. Other popular horizons are 1-in-30 years and 1-in-10,000 years. This term applies to hazards which can occur over a range of magnitudes, like volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis, space weather, and various hydro-meteorological hazards like floods, storms, hot or cold spells, and droughts. ‘1-in-200 years’ refers to a particular magnitude. In floods this might be represented as a contour on a map, showing an area that is inundated. If this contour is labelled as ‘1-in-200 years’ this means that the current rate of floods at least as large as this is 1/200 /yr, or 0.005 /yr. So if your house is inside the contour, there is currently a 0.005 (0.5%) chance of being flooded in the next year, and a 0.025 (2.5%) chance of being flooded in the next five years. The general definition is this: ‘1-in-200 year magnitude is x’ = ‘the current rate for eve...
Read more

Coconuts and climate change

By
Before pursuing an MSc in Climate Change Science and Policy at the University of Bristol, I completed my undergraduate studies in Environmental Science at the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. During my final year I carried out a research project that explored the impact of extreme weather events on coconut productivity across the three climatic zones of Sri Lanka. A few months ago, I managed to get a paper published and I thought it would be a good idea to share my findings on this platform. Climate change and crop productivity  There has been a growing concern about the impact of extreme weather events on crop production across the globe, Sri Lanka being no exception. Coconut is becoming a rare commodity in the country, due to several reasons including the changing climate. The price hike in coconuts over the last few years is a good indication of how climate change is affecting coconut productivity across the country. Most coconut trees are no longer bearing fruits and ...
Read more