Published
Whilst those in the industry have been banging this drum for over 20 years (“Environmental concern is increasingly becoming the King of this Country” 1999 Major Projects Association Report on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link), it does really feel as if CoP26 (31st October-12th November 2021) is a pivotal moment in the modern history of mankind.
The Major Projects Association is gearing up for this event with a series of Roundtables to explore how we move from a position of risk mitigation to one in which our major project activities, which have hitherto largely been all about build, make and grow, can be transformed to become part of the solution, rather than an irreconcilable part of the problem.
Collectively, these Roundtables have been given the name ‘Don’t mention …’ because we are now daring to speak the unspeakable about things such as concrete, road and rail infrastructure and travel, and nuclear power.
We’re hopeful that we can reconcile these complex issues – and fast. There are ideas already in practice that highlight extraordinary innovations, for example, the move away from concrete in favour of wood (It’s time to put our buildings on plant-based diet); the use of hydrogen instead of coal in steel production (Green Coal: Swedish Company Ships First Batch Made Without Using Coal) but there are also hard and potentially transformational decisions to be made (Stop Building Now).
The organizations that make up the Major Projects Industry, governmental and private, are front and centre in finding these innovations, adopting alternative practices or technologies and even in the most painful decision-making processes that will change ‘build, make, grow’ into ‘recycle, renovate, refit, reuse, reduce’.
Join us:
On 30th September for Don’t Mention Concrete
On 13th October for Don’t Mention Road and Rail
On 27th October for Don’t Mention Nuclear