Lorient & Plymouth #UniteBehindTheScience

On August 14, the young Greta Thunberg left the port of Plymouth aboard the racing mono hull Malizia II skippered by Boris Herrmann. On the immense sail was inscribed the words #UniteBehindTheScience that she had pronounced on July 23rd in front of the French National Assembly. After completing its mission and landing Greta in New York City on August 28th, the crew of the Malizia II reached the port of Lorient on September 23rd.

Coincidence? Since August 1st, the European project, SunPeople, of the Interreg France-Channel-England programme, has brought together the territories of Lorient and Plymouth to meet the challenge of decarbonising heat in residential and tertiary housing, which accounts for around a third of greenhouse gas emissions in the cross-border area.

The specific objective of the project is to technically demonstrate and commercially test, at 15 sites in Plymouth and Lorient, a competitive and sustainable heat energy servicebased on the complementarity of several low-carbon technologies – photovoltaics, solarthermal and heat pump – while being open to new models of the circular andcollaborative economy.

The English and French partners and stakeholders will jointly conduct feasibility studies, demonstrations and tests at their respective sites to explore the market potential of such an energy service. In the future, this type of service could be provided by local public companies governed by communities or citizen cooperatives.

From 1st to 3rd of October, representatives of the ALOEN association (the local energy and climate agency of Southern Brittany) and the Aezeo company, partners of the SunPeople project in Lorient, travelled to Plymouth to meet the English partners of the project, Plymouth City Council and the local community organisation, Plymouth Energy Community.

Responding to the call of the world’s youth and Greta Thunberg, the project partners and stakeholders in both territories are therefore proud to #UniteBehindTheScience to address the climate challenge together.

We are looking for participants, individuals or professionals interested in subscribing to a sustainable heat energy service and suppliers interested in contributing to its implementation.

Please click on the link below to read further information about the project and to register your interest.

You can follow the project twitter feed here.

“At current emissions levels, that remaining budget is gone within roughly eight and a half years. In fact, since I started this speech the world has emitted about 800,000 tons of carbon dioxide. And if anyone still has excuses not to listen, not to act, not to care, I ask you once again: Is there another Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change? Is there a secret Paris agreement that we don't know about? One that does not include the aspect of equity? Do you have a different budget for at least a reasonable chance of staying below 1.5 degrees of global temperature rise? Some people have chosen not to come here today, some people have chosen not to listen to us, and that is fine, we are after all just children. You don't have to listen to us, but you do have to listen to the united science, the scientists. And that is all we ask, just unite behind the science!”

Greta Thunberg, 23 July 2019,