COP27 and climate change: what did get agreed?
- Reaching agreement on a new funding arrangement on loss and damage. The establishment of a pooled fund for countries most affected by climate change has been described as the most important climate advance since the Paris Agreement of 2015. As always, getting countries to honour their commitments will be the next challenge.
- A failure to commit to emissions peaking before 2025 with no clear follow through on phasing down coal; no agreement to phase out fossil fuels and a reference to “low emission and renewable energy” which allows for continued gas production as a lower emitter than coal
- A continuing commitment to limiting temperature rise to 1.5C although it is acknowledged that there is a 50:50 chance that we will exceed that in the next 5 years and pass it permanently by 2031.
Lots of coverage can be found in the newspapers and on the BBC website. A useful article can be found on The Conversation website. COP28 will be held in Dubai next year.
Curlew TV
The Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority arranged a Curlew Action webinar on 8th November. It can be watched on Youtube.
DalesRunner Partnership with Sustainable Swaledale
DalesRunner, which operates running events within Swaledale, has decided that rather than handling out awards to race winners, it will partner with Sustainable Swaledale and plant trees alongside a dedication plaque with the winners’ names. The idea is that the trees will be somewhere readily accessible to the runners to visit and might even include arranged tours of the planting sites. Much of the detail is still to be confirmed.
Facebook statistics
We now have over 250 signed up members for the Sustainable Swaledale Facebook site with 134 signed up to receive the monthly newsletter via email. Thank you to everyone who keeps in touch!
New public rights of ways in Yorkshire Dales’ largest created woodland
Nearly seven miles of bridleways and footpaths of a mile in length have been created at High and Low Greenfield in Langstrothdale and Cam Woodlands. The new bridleways link to the Pennine Bridleway and provide a loop for riders through conifer plantations covering 1,258 hectares. A chance to visit a conifer woodland which was controversial when first planted but is now home to red squirrels and other wildlife.
Source: Richmondshire Today article
New woodland created at Heggs-Castle Cluster, Arkengarthdale
Richmondshire Today interview with Liz Sutcliffe about plans to create a new woodland in Arkengarthdale. The creation of a new woodland is being sponsored through the ‘Grow Back Greener’ woodland creation programme and the ‘Tees-Swale: naturally connected’ programme. 74 acres (30 hectares) of mixed woodland will be created by planting 25,000 trees using a mixture of plastic and compostable tree guards. It is hoped that the publicly-accessible woodland will help prevent flash flooding by slowing down rainfall run-off.
Other projects mentioned include natural flood management works, eco-systems research and hay meadow restoration. If you would like to find out more about what is going on and opportunities for volunteering, please visit the Heggs-Castle Renaturing Project website where you can find out about the leaky dams which some Sustainable Swaledale members helped to create in October and the Tree Nursery workshop where volunteers from Sustainable Swaledale created seed boxes for a local tree nursery project with the help of the Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust,.
The renaturing project was also covered in the Yorkshire Post article: ‘Yorkshire Dales neighbours join forces to create new woodland after flash floods’, 5th November.
Rural communities in North Yorkshire face challenges
A North Yorkshire Taskforce has reported that rural communities in North Yorkshire face considerable challenges. Existing challenges ranging from a lack of affordable housing, poor public transport and poor mobile and internet coverage have been recently joined by the cost of living crisis, rising livestock feed costs and the prices of fuel and energy. The Commission has put forward a number of proposals including a levy on the owners of second homes, an overhaul of the Government funding formula for education and housing, support for a local devolution deal and a focus on the green energy sector.
More information can be found in articles in Richmondshire Today and the Darlington and Stockton Times
Tree planting opportunities for volunteers
There is still time to volunteer for tree planting in December. All sessions start from 10am and run to about 2pm with a break for lunch with a mixture of weekday and weekend dates.
All equipment is provided, just turn up dressed for the weather with suitable footwear. If interested, please book through the Sustainable Swaledale Facebook page or contact t4t@muddhouse.uk.
There will also be further planting after January so let us know if you want to be notified about opportunities in 2023 by contacting t4t@muddhouse.uk.
Core Group Meeting
The December meeting will take place 1st December at 7.00pm. Please get in touch if you’d like to join us.