Earthshot winners are ‘great example to COP29 leaders’
The winners in Prince William’s 2024 Earthshot Prize should encourage the world leaders meeting for COP29 this week, says Midlands green energy expert Ron Fox.
“They are from every corner of the globe, from different backgrounds and cultures and yet they all came together for one common goal to fight climate change,” said Ron, of Noreus Ltd on the University of Keele Science Innovation Park. “What an example they are setting to those nations meeting at the moment in the UN Conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, until Friday (November 22).”
He said with global temperatures hitting record highs, and extreme weather events affecting people around the globe, he hopes COP29 will use this opportunity to accelerate action to tackle our environmental problems.
Those were also the sentiments of the Prince of Wales who said at the Earthshot awards ceremony last week in Cape Town, South Africa, that he wants this environmental prize to ‘change the world for good’ over the next decade. Prince William called on people around the world to join this ‘movement for change.’
The fourth edition of the Prince’s annual Earthshot Prize award were hosted by Emmy-winning actor Billy Porter and TV presenter Bonang Matheba while models Heidi Klum and Winnie Harlow, actor Nina Dobrev and artist Tobe Nwigwe announced the £1m ($1.2m) prize winners from each category. Fifteen finalists were competing for their category’s prize after being whittled down from 2,500 applicants.
The five winners were:
- Protect and Restore Nature: Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative, a project that has saved the critically endangered Saiga antelope from extinction in Kazakhstan.
- Clean Our Air: Green Africa Youth Organisation who use behavioural change to help communities clean up waste and build circular waste management infrastructure across Africa.
- Revive Our Oceans: High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, an alliance of at least 119 countries with the ambitious goal to protect 30 per cent of land and oceans by 2030.
- Build a Waste-free World: Keep IT Cool, a Kenyan-based company using solar powered refrigeration to help cut harvest waste for farmers.
- Fix Our Climate: Advanced Thermovoltaic Systems, an American company that converts excess heat, produced during the making of steel or cement, into electricity
All 2,000 attendees to the ceremony were asked to wear sustainable clothes – either made from recycled materials or a previously worn outfit – and a host of global stars made their way down the ‘green carpet’ instead of a traditional red one.
Appropriately, William dressed in a second-hand double-breasted Prince of Wales check jacket and white plastic-free fully biodegradable shoes.
Organisers of the Earthshot Prize, which was first awarded in 2021 and was attended by the then Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, say they were inspired by former US president John F Kennedy’s Moonshot mission, which set scientists the challenge of getting astronauts to the moon and back safely.
The Earthshot Prize was created by Prince William and The Royal Foundation and aims to find innovative solutions to the earth’s environmental challenges.
The annual event has a global panel of 59 scientific and academic experts who select the 15 finalists from nominations from all over the world.
All the finalists receive mentorship, resources and technical support from The Earthshot Prize Fellowship Programme to help accelerate the growth of their ground-breaking solutions.
In his closing remarks, the prince said that the aim of the Earthshot Awards was to ‘find solutions to repair our planet and provide real hope for the future.’
For more advice on green energy call Ron on 0845 474 6641 or go to www.noreus.co.uk
Caption: The Earthshot logo.
