COP26 is the 26^th United Nations Conference on Climate Change and is currently being held in Glasgow. The University of Exeter will be in attendance, ‘helping to address the urgent issue of climate change by engaging with an ecosystem of disciplines, voices and solutions’. The University is a world-leader in environmental sustainability and climate change research and is helping to identify how the UK’s 2050 net zero climate change goal can be achieved. Exeposé reached out to Tim Lenton, Director of the Global Systems Institute at Exeter University for a comment. Lenton has stated that “it’s great to see a big group from the University of Exeter at COP26” and “there’s been huge interest in our work on climate tipping points and on the positive social tipping points that can accelerate climate action”. Lenton hosted a talk on climate tipping points earlier on in the week and has cautioned that the earth is a “system losing resilience, losing its ability to recover from perturbations, before it loses stability altogether”. 

Lilly Margaroli, President of the Students Guild will also be in attendance along with six other Exeter students. Margaroli has been documenting her experience of COP26 on her Instagram stories @exepresident in which she has announced her excitement “to meet lots of other people who are passionate about taking action against climate change!” and that “there are lots of networking events for young people” and that she is “hoping to learn a lot from these and bring back some of the initiatives …to Exeter”. The university of Exeter has granted a selection of students with Blue Zone passes which provides access to all the talks, events and exhibition areas as well as access to the Scottish Events Campus which is where the COP26 negotiations will take place.