This evening I thought I was attending an event as a spectator and ended up as a speaker.The event was the launch of Climate Answers - an organisation set up by Stephen Tindale the ex-boss of Greenpeace and ex-advisor to ex-Environment Minister Michael Meacher and one of the (cynical but) good guys in the environment movement.
I stood in for Lord Smith, Chair of the Environment Agency - get well soon Chris.
The meeting was in the Friends Meeting House in Euston and I could see Stephen getting edgy as time moved on and it looked like the panellists might outnumber the audience - I've known those worrying moments at RSPB events but the audience almost always turns up and so they did tonight. It was a good evening with expert views and good input from the audience. I learned a lot.
A man who works in films said that his industry was making great strides at reducing its carbon emissions and was very convincing.
There were questions about which political party would do the best job on climate change that were difficult to answer until the party manifestos come out. I mentioned the Low Carbon Transition Strategy which came out of DECC this summer, and which I wrote about in this blog, as well as the bad signals that the government approval of a third Heathrow runway sent - and it seemed that many more of the audience knew of the latter than the former.
There were business people from renewable energy companies and not-so-renewable energy companies present.
Barbara Young, the ex Chief Executive of the RSPB took me on a route march around London after the event and we eventually found the pub which she had confidently predicted was in several other places!
But also, in the audience, was Prof David Mackay, whose book I have already praised in this blog, and who is very soon to be the Chief Scientist in DECC. I had a brief word with him and found that he has read this blog. It was good to put a face to a name. And, let's be honest - a bit of an ego-trip to find he has dipped into this blog.
It is a strangely connected world. As a scientist by training I tend to think that it's what you know that is important. And it is. But it is also who you know and who you can influence that makes a difference to the world around you. When David Mackay wrote his book I cannot really guess what he hoped to achieve. Maybe he wanted to influence the world; maybe he wanted to look clever; maybe he wanted to get a load of stuff off his chest! Who knows? But his book changed my thoughts on energy matters and I know that it has influenced the thinking of several RSPB staff and at least one of our Council members. And in promoting his book I really had no idea that he might end up as DECC's Chief Scientist, and then in expressing pleasure at that, I had no idea that I would meet him a few days later. The connectedness of the world is interesting in itself.