1 00:00:05,470 --> 00:00:09,060 Dallas Campbell: Hello and welcome to In-Orbit, the podcast exploring how 2 00:00:09,060 --> 00:00:13,150 technology from space is empowering a better world, brought to you by 3 00:00:13,150 --> 00:00:15,140 the Satellite Applications Catapult. 4 00:00:15,190 --> 00:00:18,670 I'm your host, Dallas Campbell, and today we'll be delving into 5 00:00:18,670 --> 00:00:20,390 the Carbon Accounting Project. 6 00:00:20,720 --> 00:00:25,805 I'm joined by Russ Hall, he's the lead for Reduction of Industrial Emissions and 7 00:00:25,815 --> 00:00:31,385 Net Zero at the High Value Manufacturing Catapult and Amy Peace, Innovation Lead 8 00:00:31,385 --> 00:00:33,625 for Circular Economy at Innovate UK. 9 00:00:34,125 --> 00:00:37,775 Carbon Accounting is the monitoring and measuring of any emissions produced by 10 00:00:37,775 --> 00:00:41,685 an organisation, whether that be on site, due to commuting or business travel, 11 00:00:41,855 --> 00:00:44,225 or through supply chain processes. 12 00:00:44,535 --> 00:00:48,325 The Carbon Accounting Project is focusing on the manufacturing industry with a 13 00:00:48,335 --> 00:00:54,165 goal to streamline the overly complex landscape of tools, methods and regulation 14 00:00:54,165 --> 00:00:59,065 of carbon accounting, positioning the UK as the place for green manufacturing. 15 00:01:00,543 --> 00:01:01,813 Hello, hello, welcome to the show. 16 00:01:01,833 --> 00:01:05,213 Maybe we could start a little, because I always find people's grand titles 17 00:01:05,323 --> 00:01:07,043 hide all kinds of interesting things. 18 00:01:07,413 --> 00:01:10,143 So maybe you could, in your own words, you could just explain 19 00:01:10,143 --> 00:01:11,156 a little bit about what you do. 20 00:01:11,276 --> 00:01:14,176 Amy Peace: So essentially kind of our role is there to be the 21 00:01:14,176 --> 00:01:19,576 technical leads on certain subjects for aligning government innovation 22 00:01:19,716 --> 00:01:22,506 funding to business led innovation. 23 00:01:23,136 --> 00:01:28,526 So my role is a bit of, sort of working out what sort of programs we should 24 00:01:28,526 --> 00:01:33,646 actually fund, what topics are relevant, but then the interesting bit is actually 25 00:01:33,646 --> 00:01:37,366 getting a little eye in on some of the projects that we do fund, seeing what 26 00:01:37,366 --> 00:01:41,576 learning's coming out of it, so we can affect what other programs we decide to 27 00:01:41,576 --> 00:01:45,371 put money towards or just seeing where there are connections between different 28 00:01:45,371 --> 00:01:47,171 projects that really need to line up. 29 00:01:47,171 --> 00:01:52,481 So on a good day, it's like having your own personal TED Talk, hearing so many 30 00:01:52,481 --> 00:01:56,501 different topics, obviously circular economy does cover all different sectors. 31 00:01:56,501 --> 00:01:57,516 Dallas Campbell: How do you mean it's a bit like having 32 00:01:57,516 --> 00:01:58,546 your own personal TED Talk? 33 00:01:58,566 --> 00:01:59,786 Like you're not doing the TED talk. 34 00:01:59,786 --> 00:02:02,871 Amy Peace: I mean, no, I mean, you are listening to people at the cutting 35 00:02:02,871 --> 00:02:06,586 edge of innovation and you know, one minute you're hearing about the battery 36 00:02:06,586 --> 00:02:10,366 recycling, the next minute about satellite technology, then you're on to things 37 00:02:10,366 --> 00:02:13,459 in sort of the textiles world and you can all have little bits of interest 38 00:02:13,459 --> 00:02:17,229 in it, but just some of the deep depths that you get kind of out of them is... 39 00:02:17,429 --> 00:02:18,209 Dallas Campbell: That's nice. 40 00:02:18,239 --> 00:02:20,689 Every day is a learning day for you, every day is a school day. 41 00:02:20,859 --> 00:02:23,489 Amy Peace: I mean, they're the good days, you know, the bad days, more of... 42 00:02:23,649 --> 00:02:23,989 Dallas Campbell: us about... 43 00:02:23,989 --> 00:02:25,749 Amy Peace: Public sector bureaucracy, but you know. 44 00:02:27,118 --> 00:02:29,568 Dallas Campbell: And Russ, Russ Hall, you're at the High Value 45 00:02:29,578 --> 00:02:32,968 Manufacturing Catapult, lead for reduction of industrial emissions, 46 00:02:32,968 --> 00:02:35,618 that's fairly self explanatory, is it? 47 00:02:35,638 --> 00:02:36,868 Or is there more to it than that? 48 00:02:37,123 --> 00:02:38,613 Russ Hall: So I have two roles. 49 00:02:38,613 --> 00:02:42,273 One is for the High Value Manufacturing Catapult as a whole, which is the 50 00:02:42,683 --> 00:02:46,323 lead for the reduction of industrial emissions and I'm the lead for Sustainable 51 00:02:46,333 --> 00:02:49,173 Manufacturing and Circular Economy at Warwick Manufacturing Group, which is 52 00:02:49,173 --> 00:02:52,733 a, one of the centres that makes up the High Value Manufacturing Catapult. 53 00:02:53,223 --> 00:02:59,536 My role really is to help industry understand why reducing its carbon 54 00:02:59,536 --> 00:03:04,463 emissions is important, but also to help them understand how they can do 55 00:03:04,463 --> 00:03:08,543 that and how they can measure those reductions year on year to show that 56 00:03:08,553 --> 00:03:11,953 they are making the improvements that they need to do for the UK to meet 57 00:03:11,953 --> 00:03:13,523 its legal obligation for net zero. 58 00:03:13,658 --> 00:03:14,098 Dallas Campbell: There we go. 59 00:03:14,318 --> 00:03:15,608 You both sound really optimistic. 60 00:03:15,608 --> 00:03:19,709 I mean, the race to net zero or getting to net zero, I mean, just on 61 00:03:19,709 --> 00:03:23,579 a general question before we start, I'm interested in how optimistic you 62 00:03:23,579 --> 00:03:29,119 are or are things going to plan or do we need a big kind of boost in this? 63 00:03:29,119 --> 00:03:30,719 I'm sort of curious from where you're sitting. 64 00:03:30,894 --> 00:03:34,274 Amy Peace: I mean, from my perspective, I see lots of things 65 00:03:34,304 --> 00:03:36,304 that could really help us get there. 66 00:03:36,674 --> 00:03:40,834 The barrier does seem to be not necessarily on the technology side. 67 00:03:41,350 --> 00:03:44,030 But the people and societal side, implementing these... 68 00:03:44,190 --> 00:03:45,785 Dallas Campbell: People are messy, this is the problem, people 69 00:03:45,785 --> 00:03:47,325 are so messy and difficult and 70 00:03:47,640 --> 00:03:50,910 Amy Peace: Exactly, and just assuming that, well, we've got the right things, 71 00:03:50,920 --> 00:03:54,130 surely logic will prevail and we'll end up with the right things in the right 72 00:03:54,130 --> 00:04:00,050 place and I think the fact that, looking at some of these things 20 plus years 73 00:04:00,050 --> 00:04:04,957 ago, when I sort of started my career and we're still kind of, don't feel like 74 00:04:04,957 --> 00:04:09,277 we've moved the curve enough yet and it is going to take proper industrial 75 00:04:09,277 --> 00:04:13,887 revolution scale change to get us there and we've gone from being able to do this 76 00:04:13,897 --> 00:04:17,747 nice and gently, to looking at the curve for where our carbon emissions need to go 77 00:04:17,747 --> 00:04:20,087 and it's an absolute cliff face precipice. 78 00:04:20,987 --> 00:04:25,165 So it's nice to have technologies and things there, but just to get that kick 79 00:04:25,195 --> 00:04:26,775 that we need to get us down that cliff... 80 00:04:26,880 --> 00:04:27,810 Dallas Campbell: That cliff face is... 81 00:04:27,815 --> 00:04:28,615 Amy Peace: ...makes me nervous. 82 00:04:28,615 --> 00:04:31,667 Dallas Campbell: Do you mean when you say the cliff face, that sort of time 83 00:04:31,807 --> 00:04:34,577 period, Oh, we can take our time, we've got loads of time to do this, 84 00:04:34,757 --> 00:04:38,617 nice curve downwards has now turned into a cliff face because the... 85 00:04:38,752 --> 00:04:39,962 Amy Peace: Because we've used up our budget. 86 00:04:40,272 --> 00:04:43,322 There's a limited amount of carbon we could put in the atmosphere and every year 87 00:04:43,322 --> 00:04:46,922 we'll put it in more and more and it's not just about putting in less and less. 88 00:04:46,942 --> 00:04:49,142 It's like absolutely putting the brakes on. 89 00:04:49,307 --> 00:04:51,387 Russ Hall: It's with reference to the one and a half degree limit. 90 00:04:51,387 --> 00:04:54,760 That's the amount of carbon that we can put into the atmosphere in order 91 00:04:54,760 --> 00:04:59,650 to limit the climate's temperature increase to one and a half degrees 92 00:04:59,980 --> 00:05:02,482 on top of, the original benchmark. 93 00:05:03,322 --> 00:05:04,432 Is it a cliff face? 94 00:05:04,779 --> 00:05:07,756 It is if we're not careful, and if we don't act now. 95 00:05:07,876 --> 00:05:13,756 So we need to do things faster in order to make sure that we don't put so much 96 00:05:13,766 --> 00:05:17,483 carbon under that one and a half degree limit is breached, because once it is 97 00:05:17,483 --> 00:05:19,713 breached, there may be no coming back. 98 00:05:20,266 --> 00:05:25,410 So in reference to manufacturing, what manufacturing needs to do, it needs to 99 00:05:25,705 --> 00:05:29,675 reduce the amount of carbon emissions from manufacturing either in its supply 100 00:05:29,675 --> 00:05:33,755 chains or directly on site and it needs to do it as quickly as it possibly can. 101 00:05:34,165 --> 00:05:38,085 If we wait, then there is a danger that we go past that cliff face. 102 00:05:38,475 --> 00:05:42,465 We step off the edge and we fall into a climate change abyss 103 00:05:42,515 --> 00:05:43,695 and that would be bad, right? 104 00:05:43,735 --> 00:05:44,565 Be bad for everyone. 105 00:05:44,565 --> 00:05:45,015 Dallas Campbell: Yeah. 106 00:05:45,015 --> 00:05:45,805 Russ Hall: So we need to act. 107 00:05:45,805 --> 00:05:48,943 We need to do it now and the technologies that we've been discussing as part of 108 00:05:48,963 --> 00:05:52,536 this podcast are some of the things that will help us to get there. 109 00:05:52,902 --> 00:05:56,262 When we talk about the carbon cliff face, we're really only talking about emissions 110 00:05:56,492 --> 00:06:01,712 and emissions reduction, net zero, is a small part of overall sustainability. 111 00:06:01,882 --> 00:06:05,646 So if we look at sustainability, it's really supported in basic terms by 112 00:06:05,666 --> 00:06:08,816 three pillars and they are, there's a social pillar, there's an economic 113 00:06:08,816 --> 00:06:12,646 pillar, and there's an environmental pillar and net zero falls into a piece 114 00:06:12,646 --> 00:06:16,599 of the environmental pillar and why is that important is a good question. 115 00:06:16,609 --> 00:06:24,339 So if you look at something like E-waste, if we start to recycle more tech, whether 116 00:06:24,339 --> 00:06:27,779 that could be electric motors, it could be laptops, could be mobile phones, 117 00:06:27,779 --> 00:06:32,129 could be generators from wind turbines, anything would fall into that category. 118 00:06:32,959 --> 00:06:36,445 What do we do by moving those sorts of things forwards? 119 00:06:36,682 --> 00:06:40,422 We get a social benefit to it because to do all of those things 120 00:06:40,422 --> 00:06:43,262 will bring jobs and it will bring investments and it will bring growth. 121 00:06:43,922 --> 00:06:47,902 We get an environmental benefit, which is obvious because we're recycling. 122 00:06:47,902 --> 00:06:51,178 So what we're not doing is digging things out of the ground, that's one example 123 00:06:51,208 --> 00:06:54,888 and then obviously we get an economic benefit because if we are generating 124 00:06:54,888 --> 00:06:59,318 new businesses we're giving people new work, we are bringing new investment, 125 00:06:59,548 --> 00:07:01,058 then obviously we get an economic growth. 126 00:07:01,145 --> 00:07:04,876 So the way I always try to put this across is that sustainability is 127 00:07:04,966 --> 00:07:08,756 the lever to give us the economic investment we need in order to make 128 00:07:08,756 --> 00:07:10,626 society better in every possible way. 129 00:07:10,626 --> 00:07:10,876 Dallas Campbell: Right. 130 00:07:10,876 --> 00:07:16,346 Russ Hall: There is a really good example that is being created by Coventry City 131 00:07:16,346 --> 00:07:20,326 Council at the moment and that example is a tech recycling project and what 132 00:07:20,366 --> 00:07:24,551 that will look to do is to take laptops from people like the NHS, the big 133 00:07:24,561 --> 00:07:29,246 corporate businesses around the Coventry area and it will look to recycle those 134 00:07:29,246 --> 00:07:32,416 laptops, not in a physical recycling, so it's not going to crush them and 135 00:07:32,416 --> 00:07:34,156 then extract the material from them. 136 00:07:34,516 --> 00:07:37,602 It's going to take them in, clean them, make them secure, make sure 137 00:07:37,602 --> 00:07:38,812 there's absolutely no data in there. 138 00:07:38,812 --> 00:07:41,592 There's no loss of information, no one's going to lose, you know, the 139 00:07:41,592 --> 00:07:44,352 trust barriers aren't going to be broken, but then it's going to put them 140 00:07:44,352 --> 00:07:45,962 back out into the community for free. 141 00:07:46,126 --> 00:07:49,441 So there's obviously, there's an environmental solution being done there 142 00:07:49,591 --> 00:07:52,801 because we're not crushing those laptops up and putting them into landfill. 143 00:07:53,641 --> 00:07:56,841 But it really does answer a very big social need under 144 00:07:56,841 --> 00:07:58,261 the sustainability banner. 145 00:07:58,721 --> 00:08:01,615 Nine percent of Coventry doesn't have access to the internet, twenty seven 146 00:08:01,615 --> 00:08:04,945 percent of Coventry's only got access to the internet through mobile devices. 147 00:08:05,535 --> 00:08:09,345 So that's things like your mobile phone and you think about how limited that 148 00:08:09,375 --> 00:08:12,815 is, it's actually really hard to do your gas bill through your mobile phone. 149 00:08:12,815 --> 00:08:14,065 It's a lot easier if you've got a laptop. 150 00:08:14,185 --> 00:08:18,015 So if we can get that out, get those laptops out into society for free, we 151 00:08:18,015 --> 00:08:23,005 have got an environmental benefit that comes immediately from the reconditioning 152 00:08:23,005 --> 00:08:26,245 of those laptops and we've got a social need that's being sorted and 153 00:08:26,245 --> 00:08:30,485 at the same time, what we're doing is generating a new business for Coventry. 154 00:08:30,810 --> 00:08:33,750 There will be new jobs associated with that, albeit it's not going 155 00:08:33,750 --> 00:08:34,970 to employ thousands of people. 156 00:08:35,250 --> 00:08:37,570 It may only employ four or five, but there are four or five 157 00:08:37,570 --> 00:08:38,790 jobs that didn't exist before. 158 00:08:38,790 --> 00:08:39,007 Dallas Campbell: Yeah. 159 00:08:39,023 --> 00:08:42,693 Russ Hall: So that's sustainability in practice, that's what it's about and 160 00:08:42,693 --> 00:08:46,323 in relation to the Carbon Accounting Programme, we can then measure the 161 00:08:46,323 --> 00:08:50,373 emissions improvement that come from recycling those laptops, as opposed 162 00:08:50,373 --> 00:08:54,027 to making new ones and what we'll see is there'll be an emissions 163 00:08:54,027 --> 00:08:56,557 reduction to an improvement for the environment that can be measured. 164 00:08:57,085 --> 00:09:00,525 Dallas Campbell: Okay, the term net zero, I actually think is not the 165 00:09:00,525 --> 00:09:03,222 best term because I actually think people get confused about the net bit. 166 00:09:03,345 --> 00:09:06,065 It is a kind of odd term really, what do we mean by net zero? 167 00:09:06,280 --> 00:09:08,850 Amy Peace: Yeah and in different contexts, it means different things, 168 00:09:08,850 --> 00:09:11,340 you know, in some bits of society, it's acceptable to go, well, we'll 169 00:09:11,340 --> 00:09:15,150 just offset the emissions we can't deal with and we'll have all these strange 170 00:09:15,170 --> 00:09:20,240 accounting details where we'll kind of just make those emissions disappear. 171 00:09:20,580 --> 00:09:24,765 But in others, it's actually, no we need to not just look at reducing what we're 172 00:09:24,765 --> 00:09:28,235 doing, but actually we've also got to develop the technologies that will reduce 173 00:09:29,155 --> 00:09:30,745 CO2 that's already in the atmosphere. 174 00:09:30,925 --> 00:09:33,545 So whether that's sort of direct air capture or some of 175 00:09:33,545 --> 00:09:35,165 the regenerative stuff, yeah. 176 00:09:35,175 --> 00:09:37,855 Dallas Campbell: Presumably on our getting to net zero involves 177 00:09:37,905 --> 00:09:39,495 removing carbon from the atmosphere. 178 00:09:39,685 --> 00:09:42,905 Even if you just turn the tap off, it's still not going to be enough. 179 00:09:42,905 --> 00:09:44,575 We actually need to get rid of it. 180 00:09:44,692 --> 00:09:45,482 Russ Hall: Yes, we will. 181 00:09:46,062 --> 00:09:48,858 On one end, we can reduce the emissions coming from processes, 182 00:09:48,858 --> 00:09:51,558 coming from the things that we do, whether that's domestically or 183 00:09:51,558 --> 00:09:54,798 industrially, we can reduce those emissions, but we'll never get to a 184 00:09:54,798 --> 00:09:56,088 point where those emissions are zero. 185 00:09:56,558 --> 00:09:58,838 So, we'll always be adding something to the atmosphere. 186 00:09:58,838 --> 00:10:03,208 So, for us to achieve net zero, we must be capturing carbon, 187 00:10:03,208 --> 00:10:06,608 either from the atmosphere or from industrial processes, in order to 188 00:10:06,608 --> 00:10:08,218 bring us to the net zero point. 189 00:10:08,558 --> 00:10:12,378 So, we can take away from above, but we must also capture whatever's left 190 00:10:12,378 --> 00:10:16,550 in order to get to that zero baseline mark and that is really important, that 191 00:10:16,570 --> 00:10:20,710 it's not ignored and it's something that things like satellite technology 192 00:10:20,710 --> 00:10:24,620 will be able to measure, because we'll be able to see where carbon capture 193 00:10:24,620 --> 00:10:28,980 is working and where it's not, using the technology that's been developed 194 00:10:28,980 --> 00:10:30,820 by places like the Sat Apps Catapult. 195 00:10:31,814 --> 00:10:34,979 And that stuff is actually really important because one of the things we 196 00:10:34,979 --> 00:10:39,069 have with manufacturers is that they are starting to realise that net zero for 197 00:10:39,069 --> 00:10:41,119 them, for their business is impossible. 198 00:10:41,679 --> 00:10:43,229 So that means they disengage with it. 199 00:10:43,515 --> 00:10:47,215 So what we need them to do is to just work on getting their emissions to be as 200 00:10:47,215 --> 00:10:51,359 small as they can possibly get them and then let technology sort the rest out. 201 00:10:51,917 --> 00:10:52,994 And that's where we need to be. 202 00:10:53,004 --> 00:10:55,043 If we can do that, we can win this war. 203 00:10:55,883 --> 00:10:57,066 But it's a hearts and minds thing. 204 00:10:57,066 --> 00:10:59,986 So we have to keep people involved as we're going and that is actually hard. 205 00:11:00,426 --> 00:11:03,231 Dallas Campbell: I really want to talk about this idea of carbon accounting. 206 00:11:03,798 --> 00:11:07,685 People may have heard of carbon trading and all sorts of things that 207 00:11:07,685 --> 00:11:11,435 have happened, but carbon accounting from where you're sitting means what? 208 00:11:11,570 --> 00:11:15,940 Amy Peace: From my perspective, it is literally knowing how much carbon's 209 00:11:16,030 --> 00:11:21,810 gone into making stuff, because often we look at how do we decarbonise and a 210 00:11:21,810 --> 00:11:24,500 lot of people think, oh well I've got my solar panels, I've got this, and 211 00:11:24,500 --> 00:11:27,790 they just think about that kind of I have reduced my electricity use, I've 212 00:11:28,080 --> 00:11:31,760 gone from a internal combustion engine car to an EV or something, therefore, 213 00:11:31,760 --> 00:11:35,580 I'm kind of doing my bit and then they forget about all that, well, what 214 00:11:35,580 --> 00:11:37,730 are we using most of the energy for? 215 00:11:38,110 --> 00:11:40,610 And a lot of it is in making stuff. 216 00:11:41,586 --> 00:11:44,688 But until you actually know how much stuff Energy has gone into making that 217 00:11:44,698 --> 00:11:48,988 stuff, you don't really have a sense of, well, what benefit do we have 218 00:11:48,998 --> 00:11:51,468 from using product A or product B? 219 00:11:51,488 --> 00:11:55,328 This one's got less stuff in than that one or different types of stuff in this 220 00:11:55,328 --> 00:11:59,438 one and so it becomes this sort of very interesting sort of discussion, how 221 00:11:59,678 --> 00:12:02,988 initially when you engage in people on carbon, you start getting this discussion 222 00:12:03,128 --> 00:12:04,503 about the different scopes there are. 223 00:12:05,113 --> 00:12:09,133 Scope one is literally just what carbon emissions are coming from your site. 224 00:12:09,766 --> 00:12:12,996 If you've got a gas boiler, you can see exactly how much carbon 225 00:12:12,996 --> 00:12:14,606 will be sort of coming back. 226 00:12:14,606 --> 00:12:16,987 Dallas Campbell: And are we talking about companies would do carbon accounting. 227 00:12:17,007 --> 00:12:17,897 Is that the idea? 228 00:12:18,077 --> 00:12:18,357 Right. 229 00:12:18,382 --> 00:12:18,832 Amy Peace: Yeah, it is. 230 00:12:18,902 --> 00:12:22,472 I mean, you can do carbon accounting for your household if you wanted to, or sort 231 00:12:22,472 --> 00:12:25,947 of a much broader organisation, but in general, in this context, I think we're 232 00:12:25,947 --> 00:12:29,379 talking about companies, but then you kind of get onto the scope two, which is kind 233 00:12:29,379 --> 00:12:30,849 of, well, you're buying in electricity. 234 00:12:30,869 --> 00:12:33,219 So what's being used to generate that electricity? 235 00:12:33,249 --> 00:12:36,629 Is it coming from renewable sources or is it coming from still 236 00:12:36,639 --> 00:12:38,719 gas or even coal in some places? 237 00:12:39,149 --> 00:12:42,119 So that then adds an extra sort of burden on, of carbon, 238 00:12:42,119 --> 00:12:43,579 which you're responsible for. 239 00:12:44,239 --> 00:12:47,719 But then we get into the complicated bit of what we call scope three emissions. 240 00:12:47,729 --> 00:12:51,709 So these are all the stuff, whether it be actual physical resources 241 00:12:51,709 --> 00:12:54,919 or services that are also needed to make your business work. 242 00:12:55,949 --> 00:12:59,892 How much energy, and thus carbon, are they requiring? 243 00:13:00,302 --> 00:13:03,502 So all your kind of raw materials have taken energy to produce. 244 00:13:03,502 --> 00:13:06,782 You don't just get them coming in the door and like magic, we're 245 00:13:06,782 --> 00:13:07,822 going to do something with them. 246 00:13:08,302 --> 00:13:10,242 They have taken a lot of effort to get there. 247 00:13:10,262 --> 00:13:13,742 So in the circularity space, you know, some of the examples we talk about, if 248 00:13:13,742 --> 00:13:16,842 you're going to have to dig this resource out of the ground, use some really big, 249 00:13:16,842 --> 00:13:22,322 heavy mining machinery, you might expect that to have a higher carbon footprint 250 00:13:22,722 --> 00:13:26,762 than if you were to get some recycled material or not to have to start from 251 00:13:26,762 --> 00:13:30,222 scratch because you're not having to repeat all that sort of front end stuff. 252 00:13:30,592 --> 00:13:33,722 So to be able to sort of knowing what's the journey that that material has 253 00:13:33,722 --> 00:13:38,917 taken, we can then account for it and say, simplistically, therefore this 254 00:13:38,927 --> 00:13:41,237 product has taken this amount of carbon. 255 00:13:41,507 --> 00:13:45,147 So you can either do it on a product basis, so do it sort of per thing 256 00:13:45,147 --> 00:13:47,807 that comes out of your factory, or you can do it as an organisation 257 00:13:47,827 --> 00:13:51,537 basis and say, our organisation has a totality has that sort of footprint. 258 00:13:51,837 --> 00:13:55,027 Dallas Campbell: And so basically, so all these numbers get totted up over all 259 00:13:55,027 --> 00:13:58,497 these different areas and it spits out a number and do you get like a score? 260 00:13:58,497 --> 00:14:02,131 Is that, I mean, if I'm a big company, am I producing with my carbon accounting? 261 00:14:02,131 --> 00:14:04,725 Amy Peace: Yeah, this is where it gets more complicated because 262 00:14:04,945 --> 00:14:07,515 carbon accounting means different things to different people. 263 00:14:08,185 --> 00:14:11,475 So if you're kind of a government, maybe looking top down, you will 264 00:14:11,475 --> 00:14:14,755 might want to know where's all the carbon coming from in our economy. 265 00:14:15,175 --> 00:14:19,095 So where are hotspots that have the industries to target or the particular 266 00:14:19,095 --> 00:14:22,535 things to kind of know that makes up our whole sort of territorial emissions so 267 00:14:22,535 --> 00:14:27,810 that if we're making those big global obligations to various climate treaties, 268 00:14:28,050 --> 00:14:31,280 we've got a good sense of are we pulling the levers in the right place to know that 269 00:14:31,280 --> 00:14:32,659 we're going to reduce carbon emissions. 270 00:14:32,957 --> 00:14:36,777 But then if you're kind of one of these big multinational companies that 271 00:14:36,777 --> 00:14:40,147 wants to make environmental claims about its products, you want to think 272 00:14:40,187 --> 00:14:41,917 on a very different perspective. 273 00:14:42,357 --> 00:14:45,807 You actually do kind of almost like a bottom up calculation of exactly what's 274 00:14:45,807 --> 00:14:49,697 gone into this particular product and the decisions you've made along the way 275 00:14:50,167 --> 00:14:54,737 and you do those calculations in two different ways, which means again, you 276 00:14:54,737 --> 00:14:57,627 could end up with different numbers for your carbon accounting, because it's 277 00:14:57,627 --> 00:15:01,777 always this kind of proxy of how do you allocate the carbon emissions to 278 00:15:01,777 --> 00:15:03,217 the thing that you're talking about? 279 00:15:03,227 --> 00:15:07,059 So we would love it to be one simple number that meant the same to everybody, 280 00:15:07,190 --> 00:15:08,575 but it's not quite that simple. 281 00:15:08,927 --> 00:15:10,137 Dallas Campbell: And do these companies, are they doing it 282 00:15:10,177 --> 00:15:11,697 for some altruistic reasons? 283 00:15:12,258 --> 00:15:14,888 Russ Hall: So the companies will do it for all sorts of different reasons. 284 00:15:14,888 --> 00:15:16,048 It could be altruistic. 285 00:15:16,078 --> 00:15:19,508 So if you're a small business, there's no real legislation that means you have to 286 00:15:19,508 --> 00:15:20,798 do your carbon accounting at the moment. 287 00:15:20,818 --> 00:15:24,128 So they do it because, hey, it's the right thing to do and if I'm measuring it, it's 288 00:15:24,128 --> 00:15:27,248 something I can show off about perhaps, or it's something I can then show year on 289 00:15:27,248 --> 00:15:28,658 year, I'm actually reducing my emissions. 290 00:15:29,008 --> 00:15:30,488 Big companies have to do it, it's law. 291 00:15:30,900 --> 00:15:34,560 So there are things they have to report to where they, you know, they've got to show 292 00:15:34,560 --> 00:15:38,210 what their emissions are and they've gotta calculate them and for the big companies 293 00:15:38,820 --> 00:15:40,320 it is a really difficult problem. 294 00:15:40,320 --> 00:15:44,040 Like everything, Amy's description of it then was absolutely brilliant. 295 00:15:44,100 --> 00:15:48,060 What I'm gonna add to is just to show how complex it is, so let's say you 296 00:15:48,060 --> 00:15:50,940 were in the UK and you were to make an airframe for something really big. 297 00:15:51,350 --> 00:15:56,360 Well, something like a Boeing 787, 2.3 million components sourced from 298 00:15:56,360 --> 00:15:58,040 13 different regions of the world. 299 00:15:58,565 --> 00:16:00,805 Every bit of that world has got a different energy grid, a 300 00:16:00,805 --> 00:16:02,235 different way of making something. 301 00:16:02,705 --> 00:16:07,035 So you've got an incredibly complicated supply chain, and yet you have to account 302 00:16:07,045 --> 00:16:11,785 for, to a reasonable degree of accuracy, what the carbon is in that product when 303 00:16:11,795 --> 00:16:14,795 it leaves and it is very difficult. 304 00:16:15,065 --> 00:16:18,101 Dallas Campbell: It's almost as if you need some kind of standardisation 305 00:16:18,122 --> 00:16:19,812 to make it all come together. 306 00:16:20,222 --> 00:16:23,982 Let's talk about the carbon accounting projects and what that is and how 307 00:16:23,992 --> 00:16:27,522 that's aiming to try and, from what I understand, it's trying to simplify 308 00:16:27,532 --> 00:16:31,652 things, make things a bit easier, a bit more standarsised, I suppose. 309 00:16:31,722 --> 00:16:34,882 Russ Hall: Yeah, so the Carbon Accounting Programme has aimed to 310 00:16:35,212 --> 00:16:40,012 produce a standardised framework for UK manufacturers to use to do their carbon 311 00:16:40,012 --> 00:16:44,355 accounting by taking into account thing like, what sort of user type they are. 312 00:16:44,355 --> 00:16:48,105 So whether they are a big company, a small company, a high emitter, small emitter, 313 00:16:48,525 --> 00:16:52,645 what sorts of legislation they already had to report to and then it's sort of based 314 00:16:52,645 --> 00:16:55,200 on stuff that's already out there, things like the audience would have heard, I 315 00:16:55,200 --> 00:16:59,460 think, about the Greenhouse Gas Protocol and tries to take into account all of the 316 00:16:59,460 --> 00:17:00,850 legislation that's currently out there. 317 00:17:00,880 --> 00:17:04,850 It just, it tries to come out with a standardised way of producing a number 318 00:17:04,850 --> 00:17:06,630 you can then use for your reporting. 319 00:17:06,875 --> 00:17:09,195 Dallas Campbell: Can I just say this is the High Value Manufacturing Catapult. 320 00:17:09,235 --> 00:17:10,285 This is your catapult. 321 00:17:10,800 --> 00:17:13,480 Russ Hall: This is the High Value Manufacturing Casper in association 322 00:17:13,480 --> 00:17:18,085 with Satellite Applications Catapult, Energy Systems Catapult, Connected Places 323 00:17:18,085 --> 00:17:20,305 Catapult, and the Digital Catapult. 324 00:17:20,555 --> 00:17:22,905 So it's, we are, it's a true cross catapult project. 325 00:17:23,852 --> 00:17:25,802 Dallas Campbell: I suppose what I want to know is how's it going? 326 00:17:26,235 --> 00:17:27,125 are you succeeding? 327 00:17:27,438 --> 00:17:29,768 are you having kind of eureka moments where everything's going to 328 00:17:29,768 --> 00:17:32,248 be much easier and less complex and 329 00:17:32,373 --> 00:17:33,943 Russ Hall: Some days yes and some days, no. 330 00:17:33,943 --> 00:17:37,793 I think if I were to criticise myself, I would say that in my head, I oversimplify 331 00:17:37,793 --> 00:17:42,853 it and then I'm brought back to reality by the people who I work with, who are 332 00:17:42,923 --> 00:17:46,183 true technical experts in the space who point out to me that my wonderfully 333 00:17:46,183 --> 00:17:47,583 simplified ideas can't be happened. 334 00:17:47,823 --> 00:17:48,643 How is it going? 335 00:17:48,923 --> 00:17:52,743 I would say, I think personally pretty well, but I mean, Amy is 336 00:17:52,773 --> 00:17:56,523 from the sponsoring area, so she read better to comment, I don't... 337 00:17:56,608 --> 00:17:57,578 Dallas Campbell: How do companies like it? 338 00:17:57,628 --> 00:17:59,988 You know, you've got this project that's just meant to make things 339 00:17:59,988 --> 00:18:03,348 easier, companies like things when they're easy and less, less faff. 340 00:18:03,553 --> 00:18:05,863 Russ Hall: From the interactions with the companies that we've had and 341 00:18:05,863 --> 00:18:09,733 with people in our advisory board, they love the idea of it for sure. 342 00:18:10,233 --> 00:18:14,863 Are we going to, at the end of the project, be able to present the one 343 00:18:14,903 --> 00:18:16,493 answer that solves the whole problem? 344 00:18:16,663 --> 00:18:18,787 I don't believe that, but we will have gone a long way to showing to 345 00:18:18,787 --> 00:18:20,287 just where we could get to, I think. 346 00:18:20,872 --> 00:18:23,452 Dallas Campbell: Let's talk a little bit, cause this is a space podcast, let's talk 347 00:18:23,452 --> 00:18:29,950 a little bit about how satellite data and what we do in orbit can help companies 348 00:18:29,980 --> 00:18:31,980 with this and, your project in particular. 349 00:18:32,345 --> 00:18:35,095 Amy Peace: I think this has been quite an interesting one of just, I mean, 350 00:18:35,095 --> 00:18:38,645 with the whole project, it's been saying, where are the barriers in this? 351 00:18:38,675 --> 00:18:40,355 What's stopping it being simple? 352 00:18:40,635 --> 00:18:44,545 So for some kind of small businesses, some of the barriers might be we 353 00:18:44,545 --> 00:18:46,985 just, we don't even know about the topic, we don't really understand 354 00:18:46,985 --> 00:18:48,365 what this is, where do we start? 355 00:18:48,455 --> 00:18:51,055 And what's a kind of really simplistic way to get started? 356 00:18:52,220 --> 00:18:55,210 For some of the bigger companies, or even for some of the sort of 357 00:18:55,260 --> 00:18:57,980 government level, so like they've got quite different questions, like how 358 00:18:57,980 --> 00:18:59,460 do we trust the data that we've got? 359 00:18:59,480 --> 00:19:03,080 We've already got systems there, but we might not really have that 360 00:19:03,080 --> 00:19:05,040 assurance that we've covered everything. 361 00:19:05,275 --> 00:19:08,251 So this is where kind of Sat Apps comes in and it's sort of an interesting 362 00:19:08,251 --> 00:19:11,701 space because a lot of things sort of the new technologies on sort of 363 00:19:11,701 --> 00:19:16,811 visualisation and sort of looking for literal hot spots on the earth, can 364 00:19:16,821 --> 00:19:20,191 provide really interesting information about what's happening on the ground. 365 00:19:20,441 --> 00:19:24,001 So every now and again we get interesting news stories about we've detected 366 00:19:24,081 --> 00:19:28,611 massive methane plumes coming out of some gas pipeline somewhere and you 367 00:19:28,621 --> 00:19:30,981 know, they're the ones that kind of hit the news on, perhaps we should 368 00:19:31,061 --> 00:19:34,471 take note of that, you know, the oil and gas industry might have a slightly 369 00:19:34,471 --> 00:19:36,411 bigger footprint than we suspect. 370 00:19:37,131 --> 00:19:41,913 But also there's the, stuff from just general industry, you might have a sort 371 00:19:41,913 --> 00:19:46,140 of big, steel industry in one country and it might give you some data about 372 00:19:46,140 --> 00:19:47,900 how much they're operating and things. 373 00:19:47,980 --> 00:19:51,860 But actually, can you be sure that's actually true data? 374 00:19:51,910 --> 00:19:55,403 is the plant really off for sort of six months in the year or something? 375 00:19:55,403 --> 00:20:00,193 So, this is that interesting sort of balance of when are things operating? 376 00:20:00,213 --> 00:20:03,233 When is things particularly hot, particularly cold? 377 00:20:03,623 --> 00:20:05,353 All the things which you can see from space. 378 00:20:05,353 --> 00:20:05,633 Dallas Campbell: Yeah. 379 00:20:05,633 --> 00:20:08,363 I mean, is the idea, you know, obviously getting satellite data 380 00:20:08,363 --> 00:20:11,983 in real time, so you could real time, monitor your steel plant. 381 00:20:12,470 --> 00:20:14,931 Russ Hall: I mean, in principle, that s probably possible. 382 00:20:15,155 --> 00:20:18,035 It's a great way of verifying exactly what Amy's just said. 383 00:20:18,035 --> 00:20:24,845 So if somebody is buying 30, 000 tons of steel from a steel plant in Korea, and 384 00:20:24,955 --> 00:20:28,791 that plant in Korea makes a declaration to say, there's this much embodied carbon. 385 00:20:28,801 --> 00:20:32,051 Well, if you've monitored its emissions through a year, you will 386 00:20:32,051 --> 00:20:34,221 know what its emissions are and you could proportionate to it. 387 00:20:34,431 --> 00:20:35,241 Is it that simple? 388 00:20:35,701 --> 00:20:35,991 No. 389 00:20:36,421 --> 00:20:38,681 But in theory, you can do it. 390 00:20:38,755 --> 00:20:43,285 You have to understand the layout of, in the case of a steel plant, you'd 391 00:20:43,285 --> 00:20:45,955 have to understand the layout of the steel plant to understand what emissions 392 00:20:45,955 --> 00:20:47,456 were associated with which bits of it. 393 00:20:47,906 --> 00:20:51,606 But the principle of being able to look at those emissions from space to 394 00:20:51,606 --> 00:20:54,506 see where the energy is being used, where the emissions have come from, 395 00:20:54,506 --> 00:20:58,566 and then proportioning it out should be possible and it is a neat way of seeing 396 00:20:58,566 --> 00:20:59,576 whether people are telling the truth. 397 00:20:59,926 --> 00:21:01,576 Dallas Campbell: Yeah, well, presumably it's not just neat. 398 00:21:01,626 --> 00:21:06,126 Presumably it's absolutely vital because if you can't quantify emissions, if 399 00:21:06,126 --> 00:21:08,906 you can't actually quantify all this and actually understand it, then 400 00:21:08,906 --> 00:21:10,306 you're never going to get to net zero. 401 00:21:10,536 --> 00:21:13,396 Presumably the more information we have is the key to this. 402 00:21:13,851 --> 00:21:16,031 Amy Peace: Yeah, and it's that difference between, again, that top 403 00:21:16,031 --> 00:21:19,431 down understanding of where are all the emissions coming from, have we actually 404 00:21:19,431 --> 00:21:24,441 accounted for everything and the bottom up proactive declarers of information, kind 405 00:21:24,441 --> 00:21:26,051 of, that's coming from that product level. 406 00:21:26,431 --> 00:21:28,961 I mean, another example on the Sat Apps one is obviously for, like, land 407 00:21:28,971 --> 00:21:32,636 use change, where we've seen, sort of things, quite high publicity kind of 408 00:21:32,636 --> 00:21:37,166 on deforestation and you get some great sort of time sort of stamp series maps 409 00:21:37,166 --> 00:21:41,076 of looking at what's happened like the Amazon over the years and where again 410 00:21:41,076 --> 00:21:45,256 companies may have declared certain sort of operations but actually then looking 411 00:21:45,256 --> 00:21:47,626 at the realistic, well this is actually... 412 00:21:47,741 --> 00:21:50,421 Dallas Campbell: That's, so if you make a claim, you have to back it up. 413 00:21:50,481 --> 00:21:51,161 You have to... 414 00:21:51,296 --> 00:21:54,336 Amy Peace: Yeah and I think this brings in sort of an interesting side on kind 415 00:21:54,336 --> 00:21:57,556 of that regulated point of view, because there are those sort of challenges, I 416 00:21:57,556 --> 00:22:01,166 think to this on, you know, how much would you expect individual companies 417 00:22:01,206 --> 00:22:05,206 to chase the supply chain and actually say, you told us this, and it's actually 418 00:22:05,206 --> 00:22:08,746 not that, versus should it be done by someone who's more independent? 419 00:22:09,001 --> 00:22:13,671 When you are actually doing that, looking at somebody else's 420 00:22:13,671 --> 00:22:18,351 operations, it does bring in some slight uncertainty on kind of how 421 00:22:18,361 --> 00:22:20,171 much could an individual company do. 422 00:22:20,411 --> 00:22:23,571 Dallas Campbell: Yeah, that's interesting, and is the idea once you've got all 423 00:22:23,571 --> 00:22:27,131 this data, once you've got all the satellite data, presumably then needs 424 00:22:27,131 --> 00:22:30,831 to be agreed upon, there needs to be kind of regulatory frameworks to 425 00:22:30,831 --> 00:22:34,731 make sure that it's used properly and understood properly and all that data 426 00:22:34,813 --> 00:22:36,723 really doing the job it's meant to do. 427 00:22:37,253 --> 00:22:40,073 Russ Hall: Yeah and that goes for the rest of carbon accounting as well. 428 00:22:40,073 --> 00:22:42,953 You need to make sure that it's used responsibly, that the 429 00:22:42,953 --> 00:22:44,633 information's used in the right way. 430 00:22:45,043 --> 00:22:48,943 One of the difficulties with, well not difficulties, but there is a data risk 431 00:22:48,943 --> 00:22:53,373 with anything to do with carbon accounting that if somebody has got the emissions 432 00:22:53,373 --> 00:22:56,973 that are embedded with a product and they've got the list of materials that 433 00:22:56,973 --> 00:23:01,483 go in the product and a data sheet, then a clever person could work backwards 434 00:23:01,483 --> 00:23:02,843 as to how that product was made. 435 00:23:03,253 --> 00:23:05,975 So, it's kind of, because it's embedded in everything and it unlocks 436 00:23:06,505 --> 00:23:09,115 everything, but it does present some challenges along the way. 437 00:23:09,205 --> 00:23:11,772 Dallas Campbell: Yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm interested in, you know, 438 00:23:11,782 --> 00:23:15,022 if you're a company and as we've established, it's very difficult and 439 00:23:15,022 --> 00:23:18,152 your job is to try and streamline everything, make it much, much easier. 440 00:23:18,332 --> 00:23:21,552 Is there a kind of rubber, like a kind of seal of approval that one would get 441 00:23:21,552 --> 00:23:23,182 a kind of Catapult seal of approval? 442 00:23:23,352 --> 00:23:26,765 Yes, this has been done right, that companies aim towards that would 443 00:23:26,765 --> 00:23:32,305 be standardised, so everyone has the same, you know, the same stamp. 444 00:23:32,755 --> 00:23:34,335 Russ Hall: No, it's not for us to do that. 445 00:23:34,525 --> 00:23:38,545 Our job is to provide the framework, the stamp of approval, I guess 446 00:23:38,565 --> 00:23:41,035 we could say, well, yes, you've used our framework, that's nice. 447 00:23:41,515 --> 00:23:44,845 But I don't think it's for us to give a stamp of approval of what that is. 448 00:23:44,845 --> 00:23:47,915 Our job is to look at the research, look at the data, find the streamlined way of 449 00:23:47,915 --> 00:23:51,679 doing it and show the most efficient way for a business to get to do their carbon 450 00:23:51,679 --> 00:23:55,905 accounting and to provide a way where we are comparing apples with apples. 451 00:23:55,915 --> 00:23:59,265 So at the moment people can do their carbon accounting in different ways. 452 00:23:59,745 --> 00:24:03,094 So if I'm comparing automotive company a, with automotive company 453 00:24:03,094 --> 00:24:07,012 B, do I know that I can compare the embodied emissions figures for 454 00:24:07,012 --> 00:24:09,121 on a per vehicle to vehicle basis? 455 00:24:09,121 --> 00:24:12,738 No, I don't know that at the moment and I've got firsthand 456 00:24:12,738 --> 00:24:15,751 evidence of that from automotive manufacturers admitting it to me. 457 00:24:16,111 --> 00:24:17,821 This is trying to solve that problem. 458 00:24:18,005 --> 00:24:21,455 She's trying to find a way that we know that we can compare this Apple 459 00:24:21,455 --> 00:24:22,795 with this Apple quite literally. 460 00:24:22,800 --> 00:24:25,393 Dallas Campbell: Yeah, let's talk about the carbon regulator. 461 00:24:25,893 --> 00:24:28,710 Russ, do you want to tell us a little bit about the carbon regulator? 462 00:24:29,400 --> 00:24:32,973 What it is and who created it and why it exists? 463 00:24:33,013 --> 00:24:34,968 Russ Hall: It doesn't exist, that's the thing. 464 00:24:34,998 --> 00:24:38,858 So it doesn't exist now and the people, the catapult that's done the bulk of the 465 00:24:38,858 --> 00:24:42,648 work to look at what a carbon regulator is, it's the Energy Systems Catapult and 466 00:24:42,648 --> 00:24:46,948 they've done some great work to point out the need for, what has been termed 467 00:24:46,948 --> 00:24:50,458 a carbon regulator, which would be an independent body sat within UK government 468 00:24:50,468 --> 00:24:55,218 ideally, that was responsible for the monitoring, reporting and verification 469 00:24:55,538 --> 00:24:57,408 of businesses carbon accounting. 470 00:24:57,738 --> 00:25:01,870 So they would be sort of the arbiters of what people have reported to say 471 00:25:01,870 --> 00:25:05,350 whether it's accurate or not and also the provider of the basis data. 472 00:25:05,896 --> 00:25:10,976 So a carbon regulator would be, I guess, much like a financial regulator 473 00:25:11,016 --> 00:25:14,226 in that it provides a structure and framework for other people to follow 474 00:25:14,576 --> 00:25:17,276 and then an audit, it is an audit trail. 475 00:25:17,900 --> 00:25:21,250 Is there a rubber stamp at the end for everybody, every year? 476 00:25:21,713 --> 00:25:25,543 No, cause it's, it would be quite akin to doing your financial accounting. 477 00:25:25,783 --> 00:25:29,213 So you do it in the right way, so it is then approved, it's done through 478 00:25:29,213 --> 00:25:32,066 an approved process and there would, I don't know, we would have to look 479 00:25:32,076 --> 00:25:35,116 at what the future would hold, but you would then probably have things like 480 00:25:35,116 --> 00:25:38,076 spot checks to make sure people have done it right, of different sectors 481 00:25:38,076 --> 00:25:40,636 at different times, it's probably the route you would go down in the future. 482 00:25:41,196 --> 00:25:43,946 That we haven't got to, what we've done is we've outlined what the 483 00:25:43,946 --> 00:25:47,326 carbon regulator would do and how it could come into existence versus 484 00:25:47,396 --> 00:25:49,076 other regulators that already exist. 485 00:25:49,176 --> 00:25:51,366 Dallas Campbell: And so where are you with this at the moment? 486 00:25:51,366 --> 00:25:53,593 What kind of timeframe are we in? 487 00:25:53,893 --> 00:25:55,073 How's it coming along? 488 00:25:55,073 --> 00:25:56,093 Is it ready to rock? 489 00:25:56,215 --> 00:25:58,495 Russ Hall: So the proposal is there, the reports are written. 490 00:25:58,495 --> 00:26:02,798 they are there to be adopted and we are talking with both Defra and the 491 00:26:02,798 --> 00:26:07,208 department for Energy Security Net Zero about how they could be adopted. 492 00:26:07,538 --> 00:26:10,208 But ultimately, the decision isn't ours, the decision is theirs. 493 00:26:10,228 --> 00:26:10,578 Dallas Campbell: Right. 494 00:26:10,708 --> 00:26:12,028 Amy, are you involved in this as well? 495 00:26:12,028 --> 00:26:12,858 Do you get, are you... 496 00:26:12,888 --> 00:26:16,473 Amy Peace: Well, just the oversight thing, but I think the interesting case here is 497 00:26:16,703 --> 00:26:22,043 just how it would work when you kind of consider the UK is not in isolation in 498 00:26:22,263 --> 00:26:26,773 space and prior to joining Innovate, I was working on a lot of EU programs and sort 499 00:26:26,773 --> 00:26:31,563 of knowing what's going on there of the biggest sort of international, Markets on 500 00:26:31,563 --> 00:26:33,733 things like, carbon border tax adjustment. 501 00:26:34,093 --> 00:26:37,163 So as it's, you know, working out if something were to enter the country, 502 00:26:37,163 --> 00:26:40,143 you're not being undermined if you're going to extra efforts to do low 503 00:26:40,143 --> 00:26:43,813 carbon manufacturing here and then somebody just uses coal power and make 504 00:26:43,813 --> 00:26:45,373 something really cheaply elsewhere. 505 00:26:45,423 --> 00:26:48,173 You, kind of, essentially importing carbon into your country. 506 00:26:48,183 --> 00:26:53,233 So how would you use a regulator as part of that, has to be something 507 00:26:53,243 --> 00:26:56,573 that works internationally and not just be for the UK. 508 00:26:56,663 --> 00:27:00,353 So it's been quite interesting just sort of checking that sort of engagement's 509 00:27:00,403 --> 00:27:04,263 happening and it's been good to see kind of, there's a whole extra report on how 510 00:27:04,493 --> 00:27:06,193 into that sort of international space. 511 00:27:06,570 --> 00:27:08,530 Russ Hall: If we were to put a carbon regulator in place, the 512 00:27:08,530 --> 00:27:10,090 UK would be the first to do it. 513 00:27:10,750 --> 00:27:12,100 Dallas Campbell: Has no, there's no other countries. 514 00:27:12,160 --> 00:27:15,140 I'm amazed that no other countries kind of have it or have done. 515 00:27:15,340 --> 00:27:17,540 There must, be other countries who are doing similar things. 516 00:27:18,680 --> 00:27:20,755 Russ Hall: We can't be alone in thinking about this, that's for sure. 517 00:27:20,755 --> 00:27:23,775 The EU has done an awful lot of work towards streamlining emissions, 518 00:27:23,775 --> 00:27:27,765 reporting this as the US, but the idea of an independent body looking at 519 00:27:27,765 --> 00:27:31,555 this, as far as we can tell from, as far as the guys at energy systems can 520 00:27:31,555 --> 00:27:33,599 tell, It just hasn't been done yet. 521 00:27:33,619 --> 00:27:35,069 It doesn't mean it's not going to be. 522 00:27:35,274 --> 00:27:37,314 Amy Peace: There is emissions trading schemes. 523 00:27:37,334 --> 00:27:40,594 So those are the ones where there is a lot of sort of regulation on that. 524 00:27:40,604 --> 00:27:44,414 So I think it's the Environment Agency deals with that within the UK and then 525 00:27:44,414 --> 00:27:46,494 there's sort of EU platforms for that. 526 00:27:46,494 --> 00:27:50,874 So that's where big industry does have to report its carbon emissions and 527 00:27:50,934 --> 00:27:56,049 that is a level of sort of verifying that on an annual basis, just to check 528 00:27:56,079 --> 00:27:59,729 that what they're emitting actually matches up to the truth, because that's 529 00:27:59,729 --> 00:28:04,489 where you can say, well, if I decide to sort of turn off a plant or turn down 530 00:28:04,489 --> 00:28:08,609 operations, I can actually trade that sort of carbon benefit with someone else. 531 00:28:08,609 --> 00:28:12,649 So that's kind of where it is happening, but that's that where we go back to 532 00:28:12,649 --> 00:28:16,149 those kind of scope one emissions, that stuff that's happening on your 533 00:28:16,149 --> 00:28:18,739 sites, that element has got that. 534 00:28:19,259 --> 00:28:21,949 What we're talking about is more that scope three, the supply 535 00:28:21,969 --> 00:28:23,629 chain, the stuff that's coming in. 536 00:28:23,884 --> 00:28:26,754 Dallas Campbell: And presumably there is a big role for space data as well 537 00:28:26,774 --> 00:28:28,786 in the carbon regulator as a thing. 538 00:28:29,446 --> 00:28:33,302 Amy Peace: Well, potentially, and again, I don't necessarily see this as being kind 539 00:28:33,302 --> 00:28:38,152 of every company would need to engage with satellite data and every sort of little 540 00:28:38,152 --> 00:28:41,055 bit of data you're coming through and go, well, let's check that with Sat Apps. 541 00:28:41,735 --> 00:28:44,745 I think it's interesting to see what granularity you 542 00:28:44,745 --> 00:28:46,625 can actually get on a site. 543 00:28:46,625 --> 00:28:50,525 So is it just basically saying roughly, Oh, well, they said that plant was 544 00:28:50,525 --> 00:28:54,625 operating and it wasn't, and you know, those sorts of sort of binary answers, 545 00:28:55,065 --> 00:28:58,345 or like, oh, we thought that pipeline was switched off and, but there's a 546 00:28:58,445 --> 00:29:02,955 big methane plume there and in that sort of situation, it might be more 547 00:29:02,955 --> 00:29:07,085 for just doing those sort of high level assessments of, have we missed 548 00:29:07,085 --> 00:29:11,605 something, or is there a big hotspot we're not aware of, or is this particular 549 00:29:11,615 --> 00:29:14,865 actor, you know, doing what they said they're going to do because enough 550 00:29:14,865 --> 00:29:16,375 people have raised concern about them. 551 00:29:16,979 --> 00:29:19,982 Russ Hall: What it is, I think at a high level, it gives you a way of looking at 552 00:29:20,712 --> 00:29:24,072 for the bulk material flows around the world where people are making claims 553 00:29:24,072 --> 00:29:27,932 that their emissions at a regional or national level are being decreased here 554 00:29:27,932 --> 00:29:29,682 as a way of potentially checking that. 555 00:29:30,122 --> 00:29:33,752 I'm not saying that is politically easy, it politically could lead to, 556 00:29:33,762 --> 00:29:37,652 of course, a lot of difficulty, I imagine, but here is a way of doing it. 557 00:29:37,792 --> 00:29:38,212 Dallas Campbell: Yeah. 558 00:29:38,542 --> 00:29:39,872 Give us just a sort of round off. 559 00:29:39,872 --> 00:29:42,932 I'm interested in, well, you know, in the work that you're doing 560 00:29:42,982 --> 00:29:48,202 and how important space as an industry now is for what you do. 561 00:29:48,342 --> 00:29:52,052 Like, could you do what you do without satellite data anymore? 562 00:29:52,772 --> 00:29:56,539 I'm just trying to get a sense of kind of how important it is in all of this. 563 00:29:56,979 --> 00:30:00,214 Amy Peace: It's difficult to say really because, you know, the day to day 564 00:30:00,464 --> 00:30:05,574 individual companies can essentially do carbon accounting for their factory 565 00:30:05,574 --> 00:30:09,524 boundaries without having to worry about having a satellite looking at their 566 00:30:09,524 --> 00:30:11,484 plant and verifying what they're doing. 567 00:30:12,169 --> 00:30:15,829 But it's that challenge of getting to net zero where this becomes interesting, 568 00:30:15,839 --> 00:30:19,439 because if you're just asking each individual company what they do and 569 00:30:19,449 --> 00:30:24,189 what they're aware of and what they can see, you'll get a piece of the picture. 570 00:30:24,349 --> 00:30:26,809 But it's that way of saying, when you look top down, you're always going 571 00:30:26,809 --> 00:30:31,551 to miss some bits of stuff that's not reported or incorrectly reported 572 00:30:32,081 --> 00:30:37,421 and because net zero is that absolute kind of, we've got to get to zero and 573 00:30:37,471 --> 00:30:39,681 beyond to take other emissions away. 574 00:30:39,931 --> 00:30:45,550 We can't just say that 20, 30, 40, however many percent of the emissions, we're just 575 00:30:45,550 --> 00:30:48,600 going to assume someone has taken care of and we're not going to worry about. 576 00:30:48,730 --> 00:30:52,290 We need to look well everywhere and check. 577 00:30:52,880 --> 00:30:56,120 So yeah, it's interesting how we miss some really big things. 578 00:30:56,785 --> 00:30:59,175 Russ Hall: The verification part, I completely agree. 579 00:30:59,175 --> 00:31:01,645 I think in the future it's going to become more and more important. 580 00:31:01,645 --> 00:31:05,205 We're going to have to look and see what's really happening as opposed 581 00:31:05,205 --> 00:31:06,455 to trusting what's being said. 582 00:31:06,945 --> 00:31:10,138 Dallas Campbell: Yeah, that seems to be the message I, as people who work in 583 00:31:10,138 --> 00:31:14,018 the sector, I sensed at the beginning when we started, you're optimistic. 584 00:31:14,258 --> 00:31:15,048 Is that fair? 585 00:31:15,071 --> 00:31:16,111 Amy's pulling a face. 586 00:31:16,411 --> 00:31:16,871 Amy Peace: Yeah. 587 00:31:17,811 --> 00:31:19,321 Dallas Campbell: Is there more that we could be doing? 588 00:31:19,321 --> 00:31:19,631 Is there more... 589 00:31:19,631 --> 00:31:21,226 Amy Peace: I really want to be optimistic. 590 00:31:21,306 --> 00:31:25,266 I mean, it's one of those ones where, you know, when you look at the kind of 591 00:31:25,276 --> 00:31:29,226 the rates of some uptakes of technologies and ideas, you know, and you see those 592 00:31:29,246 --> 00:31:33,046 curves for like, say, solar panel technology and every year they get the 593 00:31:33,046 --> 00:31:37,506 estimates wrong of how much more solar we could possibly do and it just keeps 594 00:31:37,506 --> 00:31:40,356 going up at that ridiculous exponential curve and everyone keeps saying 595 00:31:40,366 --> 00:31:41,496 it's going to flatten off this year. 596 00:31:41,556 --> 00:31:42,916 No, maybe this year it'll flatten off. 597 00:31:43,296 --> 00:31:44,546 Dallas Campbell: It never seems to flatten off. 598 00:31:44,546 --> 00:31:47,076 It may get less steep, but we're still going in the wrong direction. 599 00:31:47,206 --> 00:31:47,936 Amy Peace: Yeah, yeah. 600 00:31:48,016 --> 00:31:53,096 So, I think there are some technologies and some ideas that just get such momentum 601 00:31:53,726 --> 00:31:58,346 that it just becomes the normal thing to do and it actually just, and once it 602 00:31:58,346 --> 00:32:03,336 kind of makes financial sense to do it, either because you have to, to operate. 603 00:32:03,336 --> 00:32:05,596 Dallas Campbell: We have to make it work with the way humans work, 604 00:32:05,956 --> 00:32:08,806 otherwise it won't work and humans work by, with money and stuff. 605 00:32:08,821 --> 00:32:11,431 Russ Hall: And when you, if you come back to, you know, what I said 606 00:32:11,471 --> 00:32:17,078 earlier about meeting people where they are, if we go to a, as, HVMC or 607 00:32:17,078 --> 00:32:21,523 WMG, if we go to a business and say, we can help make you more sustainable. 608 00:32:21,533 --> 00:32:23,963 Typically that won't open the door, but if we go to a business and 609 00:32:23,973 --> 00:32:27,596 say, we can help you save money, that usually will open the door. 610 00:32:27,606 --> 00:32:30,796 Now, what is nice is that typically the two go hand in hand. 611 00:32:31,296 --> 00:32:34,966 So if we're saving a business money, we're speeding up its productivity. 612 00:32:35,166 --> 00:32:36,236 We're saving energy. 613 00:32:36,463 --> 00:32:37,883 then we're reducing its emissions. 614 00:32:38,213 --> 00:32:41,643 So the two things are the same, the message is there and that's what I mean 615 00:32:41,653 --> 00:32:46,133 about sustainability being a lever for UK manufacturing to make it more than it is. 616 00:32:46,413 --> 00:32:49,363 That's the thing that unlocks it, regardless of what the industry is. 617 00:32:49,743 --> 00:32:52,643 Sustainability is actually the key to making a better manufacturing 618 00:32:52,643 --> 00:32:55,723 sector in every sense, it has to be. 619 00:32:56,178 --> 00:32:59,538 Dallas Campbell: I'm quite optimistic because you two are involved and 620 00:32:59,538 --> 00:33:00,538 I think you're both brilliant. 621 00:33:00,538 --> 00:33:05,605 I think, I think both of you speak so, so, so eloquently you're so 622 00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:07,620 clued into actually what's going on. 623 00:33:07,620 --> 00:33:08,220 I think it's good. 624 00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:10,745 Russ Hall: You can't work in sustainability every day, like Amy 625 00:33:10,745 --> 00:33:13,755 and I do, if you're not optimistic and you don't have hope because 626 00:33:13,755 --> 00:33:16,735 otherwise you just go in such a dark place, you'd never leave it, you know? 627 00:33:17,275 --> 00:33:18,165 Amy Peace: You have to be. 628 00:33:18,285 --> 00:33:20,795 Russ Hall: Yeah and I don't know about Amy, but I'm going to, I'm 629 00:33:20,795 --> 00:33:22,585 not gonna speak on your behalf, but hopefully you'll agree. 630 00:33:22,585 --> 00:33:25,245 I, believe in human beings that we will ultimately do the right thing. 631 00:33:25,865 --> 00:33:27,405 So we will get there, we will get there. 632 00:33:27,947 --> 00:33:30,768 But we have to, just, as you've just said, we have to make it work for them. 633 00:33:31,008 --> 00:33:34,078 Amy Peace: Yeah, and I think it's interesting, some of the sort of 634 00:33:34,078 --> 00:33:38,428 periphery organisations to business, things like insurance and risk, they're 635 00:33:38,428 --> 00:33:42,458 the ones which actually seem to be ahead of the game on this because, you 636 00:33:42,458 --> 00:33:46,438 know, it's the bread and butter risk and climate, carbon, it's all part of that. 637 00:33:46,438 --> 00:33:50,413 So whether you see climate has been a risk because of adaptation, you might 638 00:33:50,423 --> 00:33:54,363 have some sort of sea level based plants that are getting flooded a lot more 639 00:33:54,363 --> 00:33:58,273 or similar, or whether you're actually saying, well, we're going to be regulated 640 00:33:58,273 --> 00:34:02,333 out of operation because carbon is going to have a price to it in a lot more 641 00:34:02,393 --> 00:34:04,723 sort of places or crossing borders. 642 00:34:05,603 --> 00:34:08,440 You then realise that if you don't take this seriously, then that 643 00:34:08,440 --> 00:34:09,893 is a major risk to your business. 644 00:34:09,903 --> 00:34:15,298 So I think that element of doing business, insurance, is probably the 645 00:34:15,298 --> 00:34:19,028 one that's going to be, for those who aren't proactively doing this, 646 00:34:19,068 --> 00:34:22,218 the enthusiasts, it's probably going to be the biggest stick to actually 647 00:34:22,218 --> 00:34:26,458 make the others take note and that's my optimism, that insurers will... 648 00:34:26,468 --> 00:34:29,968 Russ Hall: I, I had a, did a really interesting talk to NatWest senior 649 00:34:29,968 --> 00:34:34,348 leadership team, in February and the message that I took was, sustainability 650 00:34:34,348 --> 00:34:38,758 is great for business because if we are helping businesses to be more 651 00:34:38,758 --> 00:34:41,488 productive in a more sustainable way, odds are they'll have more 652 00:34:41,848 --> 00:34:43,318 operating money floating around. 653 00:34:43,673 --> 00:34:46,383 They've got more operating money floating around, that means that you 654 00:34:46,383 --> 00:34:49,573 can give them bigger loans and all of a sudden everything clicks and you 655 00:34:49,573 --> 00:34:52,836 start to see how it all comes together and the insurers, the banks, as Amy's 656 00:34:52,836 --> 00:34:56,286 just said, they are ahead of this, they know where it is because they 657 00:34:56,286 --> 00:34:57,806 see the risks and they're worried. 658 00:34:58,536 --> 00:35:00,583 So let's just provide the answers. 659 00:35:00,673 --> 00:35:03,713 Let's provide the ways of measuring what we've done, sharing the 660 00:35:03,713 --> 00:35:05,153 solutions that will all come together. 661 00:35:05,328 --> 00:35:08,078 Dallas Campbell: And then the ball will start rolling and we'll all be fine. 662 00:35:08,078 --> 00:35:11,568 Maybe. 663 00:35:11,568 --> 00:35:13,718 Thank you so much, Amy and Russ. 664 00:35:13,718 --> 00:35:14,998 It's been an absolute pleasure talking to you. 665 00:35:14,998 --> 00:35:15,468 Thank you. 666 00:35:15,808 --> 00:35:16,328 Amy Peace: Thanks, Dallas! 667 00:35:16,633 --> 00:35:16,843 Russ Hall: Thank you. 668 00:35:17,701 --> 00:35:20,731 Dallas Campbell: To hear future episodes of In-Orbit, don't forget to be sure to 669 00:35:20,731 --> 00:35:23,641 subscribe on your favourite podcast app. 670 00:35:23,991 --> 00:35:28,101 And to find out more about how space is empowering industries in between episodes, 671 00:35:28,571 --> 00:35:33,341 you can of course visit the Catapult website or join them on social media.