About Rose

Rose moved to Bristol in May 2008 from Oxfordshire County Council where she worked on sustainability and carbon management.  Before that she completed a BA (Hons) in Human Sciences at St Hilda’s College Oxford, and an MSc in Environment and International Development at the University of East Anglia, where she conducted research into media representation and public understanding of climate change. Rose has also worked in natural resource management in the USA and Sri Lanka.

Rose is passionate about sustainability and climate change, leading to her decision to undertake a PhD exploring the low carbon futures for the Bristol region. A summary of her PhD can be found below, and further information and a selection of publications - including international conference presentations and peer reviewed journal papers - can be found on her research page. Rose's news stories can be found on the AQMRC blog.

Alongside her PhD research, Rose has undertaken several other projects, including completing a detailed carbon emissions assessment, toolkit and report for UWE, as part of the university's commitment to sustainability; running carbon management training sessions for NHS South West professionals, and for an EU transport project; and producing carbon management CPD teaching materials, and lecturing. Rose has also supplied consultancy services to GWE Business West, providing a carbon assessment of Bristol in 2050, for the book "2050 - High in Hope". Rose was also the carbon lead for a UWE team contracted to produce a sustainability framework and carbon emissions assessment for a new 'Aerotropolis' development in South Africa.

Having now submitted her thesis for examination, Rose is currently working on a variety of carbon emission and sustainability research projects for AQMRC and ISHE.

Rose loves travelling and being active outdoors, and is a keen cyclist, runner, surfer and kitesurfer. She was previously a rower for many years, representing Oxford, UEA and UWE at a number of national regattas, and competed for UWE lightweight women with the GB University team at the European University Rowing Champions in Kruszwica, Poland in 2009.

Research Summary

Cities are increasingly recognised as important for achieving climate change commitments, due to their large environmental demands and the concentration of people and activities within them. However, the all-encompassing nature of decarbonisation necessitates cooperation and commitment to act across all sectors and institutions, and the temporal scale of carbon reduction targets (80% by 2050) poses a significant challenge for policy makers. This research aims to help close the gap between ‘where we are now’ and ‘where we need to be’ by exploring through participative scenarios the low carbon futures for the Bristol city region, and aims to assess the suitability of such an approach for improving long-timescale carbon management.

Using an innovative hybrid Delphi-backcasting methodology with key local stakeholders, a three-stage iterative consultation process resulted in two broadly consensual narrative ‘visions’ for the Bristol city region in 2050. Pathways of key actions and drivers of the scenarios were identified in a backcasting workshop. The two resulting scenarios for the region in 2050, named ‘X’ and ‘Y’, broadly emphasised ‘global connectivity, economic growth, and technology’, and ‘relocalisation, self-sufficiency, and resilience’ respectively. However, the results also identified the presence of entrenched worldviews and preferences within sectors, and found that the process of imagining an alternative preferable future is challenging for participants.

The research concludes that the method is a successful approach for engaging a range of cross-sector stakeholders, challenging their worldviews and integrating their priorities. It also finds that achieving an 80% reduction in CO₂ by 2050 is a significant challenge, requiring considerable economic, social, technological and political change, and that the approach currently being pursued nationally is not considered either preferable at the local level, or likely to achieve the long term targets due to a lack of faith in technological development. The anticipated impact of resource constraints and “shocks” in the 2030s will by necessity bring about the more ‘preferable’ future of increased localisation and resilience through disruptive adaptation, therefore the Bristol region needs to improve its resilience to such shocks so that the preferable future is achieved proactively rather than reactively.