Interview: Royal Academy of Engineering president Prof Sir Jim McDonald on engineering net zero

The clock is well and truly ticking. In less than 1500 weeks the UK - along with many other countries - hopes to have played a role in averting the worst impacts of climate change by bringing all greenhouse gas emissions to net zero (i.e. the point where we’re no longer adding to the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere).

It is, says Royal Academy of Engineering president Prof Sir Jim McDonald, “the existential challenge of the 21^st Century”.  And whilst policy makers, businesses, and consumers all have a role to play, it’s ultimately engineers who will develop and deliver the solutions. “This is not something we should be debating very much more,” McDonald told The Engineer. “We need to move to action.  And engineers bring in the rigor and the knowledge and expertise of what needs to be done to deliver and address; and how it’s done.”