Tackling the Climate Crises using Reduce

Reduce is Beyond Logic Consulting's response to climate change. It is a science based approach to voluntary behaviour change which empowers people to reduce their carbon emissions.
It has the potential to lower an individual’s carbon emissions by up to 30% while reducing air pollution,  relieving climate anxiety, improving health & wellbeing, and saving money on energy and transport.
Reduce has five key elements:
  • a Carbon database which provides data on the emissions generated by individual activities, and on the emissions reductions which can be achieved by different actions
  • a  Carbon survey used to collect data on current carbon emissions 
  • a Handbook which provides useful information and advice, along with over 100 practical actions you can take to reduce your emissions from home energy, transport & travel, food, and shopping
  • a personalised set of recommended actions which take into account personal circumstances and preferences;
  • a web based portal developed with environmental consultants Temple which provides easy access to survey results and the personalised recommendations.
STORY OF REDUCE
Reduce was born out of a frustration that (a) the warnings about climate change were not being taken seriously enough and (b) the solutions that were being promoted, such as CCUS, are ineffective, far too slow, uncertain, and expensive. The focus is very much on technology based solutions, apparently ignoring behavioural solutions which the Climate Change Committee has recommended. 

Having been involved with implementing and evaluating quite a number of travel behaviour change programmes (Sustainable Travel Towns, Local Sustainable Transport Fund, Cycling Towns and Cities, various Transport for London projects) I could see how what I'd learnt from these could be applied to climate change, with some adaptation. Following a thorough review of evidence regarding climate related behaviour and attempts to influence it, the Reduce approach was developed. 

Using a Behavioural Science framework was critical with one of the most important lessons being that the more salient the advice the better: general tips which don't resonate with the individual are worse than useless. Not only are they ignored, but they also cast doubt on the messenger and mean that subsequent communications, even if they are targeted better, may still be ignored. This led to the focus on providing personalised recommendations, and backing these up with information and support.

Equally important is focussing on actions which have the most impact, recognising that people lead busy lives and only have the capacity to make a limited number of changes. So the recommendations are tailored to the individual to take into account their circumstances, their current emissions, and their capacity for making changes. 

​If Carbon Capture and Storage isn’t the answer, is voluntary behaviour change?
​The recently released National Audit Office report on the UK’s Carbon Capture Usage and Storage (CCUS) programme  has again cast doubts about CCUS. Three telling conclusions are:
  1. The inherently challenging nature of CCUS remains
  2. Slower progress with getting Track-1 up and running means that DESNZ will struggle to achieve its 2030 ambitions for carbon capture
  3. The government does not have and is currently not developing a credible alternative pathway without the use of CCUS.
However, there is an alternative which is voluntary behaviour change – this could achieve a reduction of £45m tonnes a year, twice as much as the target for CCUS (which from the evidence so far is hopelessly optimistic) and at a fraction of the cost. Furthermore, it can be argued that CCUS has negative impacts from facilitating ongoing dependence on oil and gas, whereas a behaviour change programme would have positive benefits for participants in terms of lower bills and improve health and wellbeing, and would support a faster transition away from fossil fuels.

reduce!

Reduce! is a game in which your objective is to be the first to achieve your annual carbon emissions reduction target. It is designed to increase understanding of the major sources of carbon emissions and generate interest in what you can do to reduce them.
The game uses:
  • 38 Lifestyle cards which identify where you need to reduce your emissions across four aspects of your life: Transport & Travel, Home, Food, and Energy. 
  • 56 Action cards which show the actions you can take to reduce your emissions and hit your target.
  • 32 Random Event cards which  spell out what you need to do in response to a range of chance events.
  • Carbon Tokens which are the equivalent of money used in the game, and are the value of the carbon emissions being generated by your lifestyle activities and saved by your Actions to reduce emissions. 

REDUCE Quiz

How well informed are you about carbon emissions?
You can test your knowledge by answering the questions opposite.
Answers will be collated anonymously and results shared in the Library .

Useful links

UN Climate change: UNFCCC
WMO:  World Meteorological Organization | (wmo.int)
IPCC: IPCC — Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
World Economic Forum: Climate Change | World Economic Forum (weforum.org)
NASA: Global Temperature | Vital Signs – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet (nasa.gov)
Latest news on the Copernicus Climate Change Service: News | Copernicus
BBC: Climate change: Where we are in seven charts and what you can do to help - BBC News
NOAA Climate.gov: Global Climate Dashboard | NOAA Climate.gov
Climate Change Jargon Buster: https://www.clydeco.com/en/insights/2021/10/climate-change-jargon-buster