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Incoming CIBSE president calls for industry climate change “leadership”

Adrian Catchpole outlines the importance of building engineering expertise to reduce carbon emissions and unveils plans to launch a STEM Ambassador scheme to help build up workforce skills

CIBSE’s new president Adrian Catchpole has called for the industry to take a strong leadership role in the fight against climate change. Mr Catchpole made the comments during his inaugural address at the organisation’s Annual General Meeting that took place earlier this month at the Royal Society in London.

During the address, Mr Catchpole said building engineering experts had a vital role to deliver on national and local decarbonisation targets.

He said: "Our leadership is needed now if we are going to have the impact required. This spans both our individual responsibilities and those of whole organisations.”

“As engineers, we must help move the built environment from being a significant contributor to global emissions, to an exemplar of how to reduce them. Each one of us needs to step out of our comfort zone, step forward with solutions; and commit to 'taking a lead'".

Mr Catchpole said that the scale of change required to address climate change would be significant, but that there was still sufficient time to make the required progress.

He added: "I know there are engineers (many of them in our own CIBSE family) with the knowledge and expertise to deliver the further step changes we need. Building Services Engineers now need to be prepared to lead those changes.”

CIBSE’s new president said he would use his time in the role to spearhead the launch of a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) Ambassador scheme, in partnership with the educational consultancy STEM Learning.

The new scheme will aim to help CIBSE volunteers attract new entrants in all CIBSE regions, including the UK, Ireland, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and the UAE.

Mr Catchpole said: "We have never before needed more engineers, more urgently, to provide creative solutions to the challenges we face.”

Mr Catchpole challenged all CIBSE regions "to have 10 registered, and active STEM Ambassadors by the end of May next year”.

Mr Catchpole's address also referred to the Building Safety Act, which he described as "a hugely significant piece of legislation". He said that CIBSE would be bringing forward guidance to support implementation of the act, together with details of a new CIBSE Chartered Organisation Programme, that will facilitate the demonstration of competence.

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