On the 30th of January 2024, Sustainable Futures hosted a keynote presentation from Professor Mark Miodownik, from University College London.
Held at No.1 Circle Square, a Bruntwood SciTech venue, the event invited both internals and externals to The University of Manchester to come along and hear Professor Miodownik's presentation 'The End of Consumerism'.
The event was the first in a newly created annual guest lecture by Sustainable Futures, The Albatross Lecture, showcasing cutting-edge sustainability research. Watch the video below to find out the story behind The Albatross Lecture:
Around midday, Professor Mike Shaver, Director of Sustainable Futures and Chair of this event, welcomed delegates by introducing the Sustainable Futures platform and Professor Mark Miodownik himself.
-
With a healthy turnout from the crowd, Prof. Miodownik proceeded with his talk. For more than twenty years, Prof. Miodownik has championed materials science research that links to the arts and humanities, medicine, and society. This culminated in the establishment of the UCL Institute of Making, where he is a director and runs the research programme. Mark also recently set up the Plastic Waste Innovation Hub to carry out research into solving the environmental catastrophe of plastic waste dealing with topics such as biodegradable plastics and product reuse and repairability.
-
'The End of Consumerism' concerns many of these research areas. Read below for Prof. Miodownik's own abstract for his talk:
"To deal with issues such as plastic pollution and climate change all materials and products in future will need to be part of a circular economy – they need to be designed primarily for repair and reuse, with recycling as the last resort. But how far away is that future? Almost all current products and materials in our homes and cities fail this circularity test. Thus, the task is enormous and means that we will need to redesign practically everything - and do it fast.
In this talk I address the challenges of this paradigm shift and show that one of the striking implications is that consumerism as an economic model is incompatible with climate and biodiversity goals. I give examples from my research group where we have been working with manufacturing companies to tackle plastic waste, reduce carbon dioxide emissions and increase repairability. In each case the importance of taking a systems approach emerges and brings with it the added complications of working across disciplines, from psychology to economics. One of our conclusions is that the word ‘consumer’ is no longer a useful way to describe the role of people in a sustainable economy.
Prof. Mark Miodownik's insightful and ambitious talk proved a success, after which the event broke for a lunch and networking session. During this period, attendees were able to discuss the topics of the day with each other over provided food and drink.
Delegates then returned to the room for the Q&A session. Featuring Prof. Mark Miodownik and chaired by Prof. Mike Shaver, the session invited three UoM academics in the field of sustainability to join in the discussion. They were:
Maria is Professor in Energy and Sustainability at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research in the School of Engineering, University of Manchester. She is a Co-Director at Policy@Manchester, the University's sector-leading policy engagement platform. She served as Senior Academic Advisor with the Government Office for Science and Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS), working on the Net Zero Foresight project in 2021-2023.
Carly is Director of Manchester’s Tyndall Centre and is Associate Director of the ESRC Centre for Climate Change and Social Transformation. Both centres are interdisciplinary and have stakeholder engagement and policy relevance at their core. Her current research primarily focuses on city level decarbonisation, co-producing a carbon and co-benefits toolkit for local authorities. She chairs Greater Manchester’s 5 Year Environment Plan Implementation Forum. She was part of the team that produced a Super-low carbon live music road map - commissioned by Massive Attack and endorsed by the UN Race to Zero programme. Carly is also the Academic Lead for Carbon for the University of Manchester.
Helen is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the Sustainable Consumption Institute, University of Manchester. Her work explores consumption and diverse forms of economy, including circular economy. Helen has worked on multiple interdisciplinary projects, the latest of which is the UKRI funded study ‘One Bin to Rule Them All’, exploring the barriers and challenges to household plastic recycling. Her most recent book ‘The Materiality of Nothing’ (Routledge, 2023) draws together Helen’s research expertise on the social practices of consumption, waste and disposal and their relevance for environmental sustainability. Helen is Deputy Director of the University of Manchester’s Sustainable Futures Platform.
Taking questions from the audience, the Q&A proved to be a spirited and engaging affair, inviting many members of the audience to ask questions to the panel.
The end of the Q&A panel signalled the conclusion of the event as a whole. Prof. Mike Shaver was invited to the stage once again to provide some closing thoughts and wrap up the first annual Albatross Lecture.
If you missed the event, you can watch it back here:
Connect with Sustainable Futures
- Register to our upcoming Sustainable Futures Seminar Series events
- Register to receive regular updates on upcoming Sustainable Futures events and activities
- Connect with Sustainable Futures via Twitter
- Connect with Sustainable Futures via LinkedIn
For more information, visit our website here.