ESG Radio Newsletter 141217
Key words: ESG issues New premises Transport Issues Renewable Energy Progress Town & Heritage Acts Pace of Development on the Rock
Looking ahead to 2018 the ESG will continue pursuing its aims for a safer and healthier Gibraltar by focusing on all its core objectives set out and available for anyone interested to access on our website, that’s esg-gib.net. Our target areas include: climate change and local actions to address this, pollution from all sources, energy generation, particularly renewable energy, traffic and transport issues, cross border impacts, sewage treatment and infrastructure, development and sustainable planning, port impacts, waste treatment-recycling and litter, tourism and beaches, conservation and the updating of the Environmental Action and Management Plan.
Yes, it’s a lot of issues but then, the environment includes everything and we are all affected by these too. We believe that our promotion of these issues over the years has raised a lot of awareness among the community as can be increasingly seen during our many recent talks and presentations and by the quality of debates and discussions generally out there.
Our new home at Wellington Front is starting to take shape and we are confident of developing some exciting ideas in the first quarter of 2018 to engage interested parties in a number of environmental projects. We have faced quite a lot of costs in the move and appeal now for donations, big or small, all welcomed – please get in touch if you would like to help us out with this – email esg@gibtelecom.net. Thanks to those of you who have already stepped forward to help with this.
The ESG met with the Minister for Transport very recently to raise concerns which are mostly contained within the Sustainable Traffic and Transport Plan. This is a key issue for many people and we invite you to go to our news section on our website for more details on that meeting.
A lengthy meeting also took place with the Minister for the Environment to review key issues on sewage, shipping pollution, development, progress on the new power station and a lot more. The ESG will continue to table these issues to ensure they remain high on the agenda for change. It was very positive to hear about legislative changes to allow individuals to feed back excess energy from renewable sources to the grid. This, along with a move to wider use nationally of renewable energy, has been an important objective for us and we must congratulate the Minister for getting this done. We now want to see protocols, information, guidelines and recommendations provided so the public can take the next step. We also hope that financial assistance packages and incentives will be expanded to incentivise people further.
There have been a number of positive announcements recently that will help our environment. We hope to see many more including the publication of the new Town and Heritage Acts particularly when planning and development is scheduled to come under immense pressure from the multiple construction projects announced. The ESG has its own views about the rate and pace of development and the need to complete so many projects at the same time. We shall continue to express and communicate these going forward into the new year hoping that necessary regard will be given to important vistas, open spaces, light and need for greenery between so much concrete development.
On that note, the last 2017 DPC meeting take place tomorrow morning at the John Mackintosh Hall and it promises to be interesting one if you have the chance to attend. Mtg starts at 9.30am.
So Happy Christmas ! Be mindful of the environment during the coming weeks and also spare a thought for those less fortunate.
Congratulations also to GBC for another successful Open Day event too.
See you in 2018!
