What does it mean to be a green professor?

This week in the Times Higher there is a feature on the carbon footprint of Universities.

A long way down that article there is an interview with David Sedley (professor of ancient philosophy in Cambridge) who makes some pertinent points about the pressures on academics to travel.

In order to achieve promotion, for instance, one needs to show that one has a significant international reputation and that one is in demand as a speaker all over the world, and even if you're not looking for promotion this is what gives you high status both in your own eyes (it's nice to feel people have noticed that your ideas are worth hearing, and that they want to have you come and speak) and in the eyes of others when they judge your achievements, assess your grant applications, consider who are the stars in your university, choose who to feature as exciting globetrotters in their newsletters about the university's research successes, and so on. Besides, meeting and talking to other academics is important for generating and sharing ideas, so this is how we derive our intellectual stimulation—and that's especially so if you're the only one working in a certain specialist area in your own place. And universities tend to make you use flights for your overseas visits rather than alternative methods of travel, by providing only a small annual research and travel allowance, and by approving expenses claims only for travel by what appears to be the cheapest means. Indeed, I wonder if it would be possible to get a conference funded by the research councils and other funding bodies if one asked for the costs of travel by train and ship? I doubt it.

I have expanded a little here on the points that made it into the article about David Sedley, who has a very commendable policy of taking no more than one return flight per year and using the train for any other travel he agrees to undertake.

Well, the point is well made and Sedley is probably right when he says that most academics are still living the unexamined life in this respect, and that they regard his conduct as a little eccentric. Still, when he says (early on in the reported interview) that he's aware of few other academics who are trying to alter their style of travel, I thought it would have been nice if he'd mentioned this blog, because there is at least one other (and he remembered that enough to send me a message on Thursday to say he was being featured that day...). In the competition for green credentials, I may not be doing quite as well (I ended up with two sets of return flights to Europe this calendar year) but I did manage to avoid travelling to the USA altogether for the whole of the Bush era.

Besides, you should also bear in mind that Sedley already comfortably has his position at the very top of the academic field that we work in, and in a university that has an unusually large number of others in his field. His need for travel to establish his credentials as a major player in the field is not so great as it is for those of us who are still pleased, and even flattered, to be included in distinguished research meetings.

And for those who are really just starting out on an academic career (not that this applies to me but I'm thinking of those at the junior end, still looking to make a name) there'll also be the difficulty of finding the money to take the train, if as yet they have no permanent job and no secure salary, and are trying to find money for a house and to support a young family.

So we need to change the rules a bit, not just by asking academics to take the train at some personal cost in their reputation and status, but by slowing the pressure of academic life (we need to be able to find the time to add two nights on the train each way; so international meetings can't be held during teaching terms for a start), by having fewer and longer academic meetings (so that the extra time travelling is not out of proportion to the time once you get there), by funding the whole cost of the travel taking environmental cost into account, by requesting funding council grants that cover proper travel not air fares, and by providing adequate travel grants and child-care grants to assist early career academics to make the proper choices about their time and travel.

Comments welcome from other academics who think they deserve a place in this competition for the Green Professor.

My guilty secrets

I came home from Papa Westray on the Northlink ferry from Kirkwall to Aberdeen (very comfortable, overnight with a spacious cabin). That bit was fine.

But before that, I did something terrible.

I took the plane from Papa Westray to Kirkwall (not the two minute flight to Westray that is in the Guinness book of records, but still a little flight, fifteen minutes of it).

Now this was a bad idea for more than one reason.

One was the environment (though of course the thing was flying anyway, and better full than half empty I suppose).

Second, it nearly didn't fly at all, because the pilot was being iffy about how low the cloud base was and had to be chivvied into agreeing to come and get us, which he eventually did, but only after we'd hung about in the shed at the air strip for an hour or so ringing him and trying to persuade him that it was "brightening" a bit. So we came pretty close to having to resort to plan B, or even plan C which would have been to stay longer (which would have been an attractive solution but I'd run out of clean clothes).

The third reason why it was a bad idea to take the plane was that plan B—which was to take the boat to Pierowall at 4 pm, and then the minibus or taxi across to the other end of Westray, and then the boat to Kirkwall at 6, getting there at 7.30, in time for the meal I'd booked at the Kirkwall hotel at 8 pm—was actually a great deal shorter and more efficient, as well as more immune to the bad weather. Well, more immune to the kind of bad weather we were having on that particular day.

So why did I succumb to booking a flight in the first place?

Well, partly because it seemed at the time that the flight was likely to be a safer bet than the boat, since the boats had been cancelled in the storms a week before. And it's no good waiting to see, because there are only 8 seats on the plane and you won't get on at the last minute if the boats aren't sailing. So to be on the safe side I rang for a plane ticket a few days before I knew whether the weather would be bad. It was a remedy for ignorance, not a preference for flying.

So the real problem is humanity's desperate lack of foreknowledge. How easy it would be if we knew what was going to work best before we had to take the decisions and make the plans!

My guilty secrets

I confess...

This weekend we're flying to Naples for a wedding...

My guilty secrets

I've just used something like 500 kg of CO2 as a passenger on an aeroplane to Athens and back. Oops.
Just back from a trip that combined professional work and a holiday, in Greece. The travel was organised by a travel agent in Greece. You sort of think that when the place is four hours away by air, you need to fly because the train travel would be too long and complicated. But I think that's not really true. We were put to shame by one of the participants on the course we were teaching on (a summer school for classics teachers) who had travelled out by train.
Well, at least we managed the work and the holiday on just one set of return flights. But still, none would be better than one.
Now I've discovered the most wonderful web site which tells you how to get to anywhere without using a flight, and how to book trains and ferries instead. It's at The man in seat 61 (I'll add the link to my list of links on this blog).
Perhaps I should think again about my trip to Toronto in the autumn?

Recent railway adventures

Here is how I went to Switzerland for a conference last weekend.

1. First I rode my bicycle to Cambridge Station.
   
2. Then I took a First Capital Connect train from Cambridge to King's Cross.
3. Then I took two underground trains to get from Kings Cross to Waterloo.

1. Then I took the Eurostar to Paris Gare du Nord.
2. Then I walked from Gare du Nord to Gare de l'Est. Gare de l'Est is currently under reconstruction, but there was a waiting room.
3. Then I boarded the night train heading for Zurich and Chur. The coach I was booked on didn't exist but they had reassigned me to an alternative one. It was, as requested, an all women couchette compartment.
4. Next morning at 0450 I got off the train in Basle and crossed the border into Switzerland.
5. At 5 a.m. the coffee shops opened so I had some breakfast.
6. Then I caught a train to Luzern.
   
7. At Luzern I was met by a representative of mine hosts and driven by road to Vitznau. This was a disappointment as I had hoped to complete the journey by way of the paddle steamer across the lake (but I think my hosts didn't appreciate that one might prefer to use the public transport method. Certainly I would have needed to wait perhaps an hour or two for the first boat I suspect).

On the way back I did the same thing in reverse. Total number of legs to the journey there and back, eighteen. Total journey time about 15 hours each way. But because most of it was at night, I actually got two complete extra days at my destination and lost very little usable time.

I suspect that a journey by air would have taken about 7 hours each way and cost about half as much. My original plan had been to cross the channel by sea rather than by Eurostar but by the time I came to book the travel agent claimed (somewhat implausibly, I thought) that there were no trains from Paris to Calais with available seats on the day I wanted to return. Next time I will make an effort to get it right. I don't much like the way the Eurostar tries to pretend it is an airline, creating just the very ambience one is trying to escape.

Eurostar (they tell me) is "ten times less polluting than flying". I suppose that means it emits about 10% as much CO2. They're trying to save further on the per passenger CO2 footprint now: well they could start by letting us wait in a normal building or on the platform instead of a horrible cramped air conditioned "departure lounge" with no windows and no natural light and most of the space taken up with silly airport shops and duty free outlets.

Yuk. Just let us travel in good old railway style: that would appeal much more to those of us who want to break free of the consumer society.

My guilty secrets

There are some things I still do which I guess I shouldn't do. Here in no particular order are some of them.

(1) We still do a small amount of shopping at Tescos.

(2) I rather like drinking sparkling water at breakfast and after dinner, especially when I'm in a no-coffee phase. The water comes in plastic bottles.

(3) I occasionally go somewhere by plane, even when it's possible to go there by train.

(4) I sometimes drive to Wales and back just for fun.

(5) I have a bit of penchant for lychees (I bought some yesterday).

Probably there are others. I'll let you know when I have qualms about something else.

Now the question is, shall I try to justify and rationalise these weaknesses, so as to be able to live with them? Or shall I "offset them"? Or shall I try to get rid of them?