Preparing for Combustion Transition: A framework for accelerating our transition to Net Zero Webinar

Presented by Professor Simon Spooner, Principal Scientist, Atkins Infrastructure.

About this Webinar
We have grown prosperous and numerous by burning and consuming the products of biological systems of the past and present. We have now learnt how to get what we need without having to do this anymore. We just have to get on and manage the transition to embracing and stewarding our world instead of consuming it. In this talk I will set out some concepts and principles for this, some metrics to measure with and some plans and tools to help manage the transition. Then, as Water Conservators and Livery Companies, what might we be able to contribute here in the City? Can we develop alternative approaches to offsetting that will be more effective? Can the City lead in changing its infrastructure to eliminate combustion in our buildings and transport and so attain net zero?

About the Speaker
Prof Simon Spooner is an environmental scientist applying scientific models combined with social, economic, political and regulatory methods to address the challenges that we face and help build better infrastructure systems. Currently his main activities are: as a senior expert advisor on the UK
Health Security Agency programme to develop wastewater epidemiology based responses to the Covid-19 pandemic; applying his SimBasinQ river basin water quality model to address the impact of wastewater discharges on our rivers; and developing nature based catchment solutions to flooding,
water quality, water resources, biodiversity and carbon sequestration. He has developed the combustion transition framework, an innovative approach to integrating GHG emissions reductions and land-use based regeneration of natural processes with a framework of metrics and economic
tools to facilitate an accelerated transition to net-zero.

Over the last 30 years as a consultant with Atkins and before that Mott MacDonald he worked about half his time overseas, mostly in China, on major World Bank, EU and UK government projects in urban environment development, energy systems and environmental policy. He was Technical Director for water and environment for Atkins in China mostly delivering urban planning projects. More recently he worked in partnership with KPMG for the UK FCDO in China on the development of environmental governance processes and access to international financing for infrastructure projects under China’s Belt and Road programme. In the UK he mostly worked for water companies in wastewater and river basin management and in water industry regulatory processes.

He is an honorary professor at Nottingham university in Ningbo and UK campuses and a visiting professor at many universities in China as well as Cambridge University in UK. He has written and edited a number of books on water and environmental management, regulation and adaption of European approaches to China for OECD, FWR, EU and Chinese publishers. What he really enjoys is building on the latest science and digital systems to innovate and find simpler integrated solutions to complex problems.

Register for this event here: Eventbrite