The Prince of Wales and the Earthshot Prize

[iceflower]

Combined Arms of The Prince and Princess of Wales​

Welcome to The Prince of Wales and the Earthshot Prize thread

Commencing June 1st, 2021 ​

The thread about the 2022 Earthshot visit to Boston can be found here
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[iceflower]

The Duke of Cambridge announced the upcoming Earthshot Prize Awards in London, England.

The Earthshot Prize will hold its first-ever awards ceremony at Alexandra Palace on 17 October, featuring other famous landmarks across the UK’s capital city as part of the historic event. Founded by Prince William in 2020 and inspired by President Kennedy’s ‘Moonshot’, The Earthshot Prize is a global environmental prize which aims to discover and scale the best solutions to help repair our planet over the next 10 years. Every year from 2021 until 2030, The Earthshot Prize will find and reward inclusive solutions to five ‘Earthshot’ goals - Protect and restore nature; Clean our air; Revive our oceans; Build a waste-free world; and Fix our climate. Prize winners will each receive a £1 million prize fund and tailored support to scale their solutions. The finalists will be announced in July.

** gettyimages **

 

[iceflower]

The Duke of Cambridge will write the foreword for the Earthshot Prize book „How to Save Our Planet“ it was announced:


** earthshotprize.org book announcement **


** dm article: Prince William will write the foreword to a new book about his Earthshot prize which..**

 

[Heavs]

The Earthshot Prize has partnered up with the JFK Library Foundation:

The Duke of Cambridge’s landmark environmental prize has been hailed as a “great tribute” to the president it was named for, as John F Kennedy’s family gave their stamp of approval.

The Earthshot Prize, inspired by Kennedy’s “Moon Shot” speech, will work with the John F Kennedy Library Foundation as official partners, as they aim to find solutions to the world’s greatest climate challenges.

Ambassador Caroline Kennedy, the late president’s daughter, said it was a “great tribute” to his legacy that the Earthshot Prize was set up to “take on the most important challenge we face today – repairing the planet”.

The name refers to President Kennedy’s 1962 speech at Rice University, which launched the race to reach the moon before the end of the decade.

In July 1969, the Apollo 11 mission successfully landed the first two human beings on the Moon and then safely returned to Earth.

“Over the past 60 years I have watched each new generation find inspiration in my father’s decision to send a man to the moon – not just inspiration for mankind or for America, but for their own lives,” said Caroline Kennedy.

“It is a great tribute to President Kennedy that The Earthshot Prize has been inspired by his moonshot to take on the most important challenge we face today – repairing the planet.

“My family and the JFK Library Foundation look forward to partnering with Prince William and The Earthshot Prize on this exciting initiative.”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...ms-earthshot-prize-receives-high-praise-jfks/

 

[eya]

Duke of Cambridge:

"In my introduction to Earthshot: How to Save our Planet, the authoritative book of The @EarthshotPrize, I wanted to share the early conversations in 2018 that led to the Prize’s creation and the simple equation that captures my theory behind Earthshot: Urgency + Optimism = Action.

The book will be available from 30th September"

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT6d_ZVlmco/

 

[Heavs]

The 15 Earthshot Prize Finalists in 5 categories. Big and small groups, individuals and governments.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT7W3K1Fe91/

A lot of eyes are on the youngest finalist Vinisha Umashankar who at 14 invented the solar powered ironing cart.

The finalists are from 15 countries including 7 Commonwealth countries.

 

[yukari]

The 15 Earthshot Prize Finalists in 5 categories. Big and small groups, individuals and governments.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CT7W3K1Fe91/

A lot of eyes are on the youngest finalist Vinisha Umashankar who at 14 invented the solar powered ironing cart.

The finalists are from 15 countries including 7 Commonwealth countries.

Two are from India; Takachar and Vinisha Umashankar (both in the Clean Our Air category) so it's 14 countries, not 15.

I've never heard about Wota Box but have to chuckle because "wota" is what we call idol (fanatic) fans

 

[Heavs]

Trailer for the Earthshot Documentary with, among others, William and David Attenborough starting next Sunday.

 

[Heavs]

From The Telegraph:

Camera-shy Prince William channels his grandfather in TV hosting role to promote Earthshot Prize

As a future king, he hardly needs the work. But the Duke of Cambridge has turned his hand to a potential new career, as he scales a mountain, strolls down a beach, and climbs a wind turbine for his television hosting debut.

Following in the footsteps of his grandfather Prince Philip and Sir David Attenborough, his environmental mentor, the Duke is taking a star turn in front of the camera for a five-part series about his Earthshot Prize.

In the hosting seat, he is seen talking directly to camera and filming on location in Snowdonia, Orkney, a London waste barge and an off-shore wind farm.

The programme, which begins on Sunday night on BBC One, will broadcast at tea time, with the Cambridge children Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis able to stay up to watch it on television at home.

The Duchess of Cambridge was able to witness some of the filming while the royal couple were on a visit to Orkney, and is said to have enjoyed watching from behind the camera.

Prince William, who has tended to shy away from being personally in the limelight, is understood to have been persuaded in front of the cameras as part of a “team effort” to bring the Earthshot Prize to global attention.

Speaking to experts on the prize council, he has previously joked he was the “very boring coach looking for some very skillful players”.

'He's got a really important role to play'
Now, a source says: “He knows that he’s got a really important role to play in that, but he’s realised that to create the space to hear the voices you see in the series, he had to use his own voice.

“Using his voice gives others a platform. All the amazing projects you see on the show and the finalists for the Earthshot Prize, he is trying to give those projects a voice.”

https://archive.ph/ogyzD

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...william-channels-grandfather-tv-hosting-role/

 

[Osipi]

Other than probably being a bit nervous about being "on camera" hosting, I think William has found something that really would appeal to him and enjoy doing. The doing part mostly that will be shown on the screen. He does like to get involved in what he's doing on the physical side as well and being a spokesperson for those incentives.

 

[iceflower]

A nice new photo of the Duke of Cambridge has been released in connection with the upcoming Earthshot Prize:

Behind the scenes of #BBCNewscast, talking about the environment and The @EarthshotPrize
Earth globe asia-australia
Look out for more this Thursday

** Pic **

The TV and podcast interview with BBC Newscast will be shown on Thursday, October 14.

 

[muriel]

A nice new photo of the Duke of Cambridge has been released in connection with the upcoming Earthshot Prize:




** Pic **

The TV and podcast interview with BBC Newscast will be shown on Thursday, October 14.

Looking forward to the show.

 

[iceflower]

Here's a part of it:

 

[Osipi]

I always knew that William has his head screwed on right and his priorities in the right order but his remarks about blillionaires and their recent race to get civilians into space makes a whole lot of sense to me. So Captain Kirk (William Shatner) made it to space for 11 minutes and is now the oldest man to have gone into space, I can't help but think of all the good that could be done for not only the earth but the people of the earth if that money was put towards that purpose.

$250,000.00 price tag for a brief, blast into the international space zone is probably echoed by my daughter's remark once upon a time as we sat at Cape Canaveral for a space shuttle launch that was aborted 3 seconds to liftoff. "All this way for just a puff of smoke?!?". To me, that's the bottom line of that much money for such a short ride to space and back.

We need a healthy planet for future space explorations to leave from.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/14/business/prince-william-space-tourism-intl-scli/index.html

 

[TLLK]

YouGov UK had this up on their daily question.


https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politic...edium=daily_questions&utm_campaign=question_2

Which of the following, if either, should humanity focus on more?


Here were the options and the results with the responses of those polled
Space exploration 2%


Tackling the climate crisis 68%


Both equally 12%


Neither should be a focus 10%


Don't know 7%

 

[tausi]

I am so impressed with Prince William! I agree, billionaires need to focus on saving this planet and not looking for another planet that will we will end up possibly destroying as we have done here on earth.

 

[Osipi]

I am so impressed with Prince William! I agree, billionaires need to focus on saving this planet and not looking for another planet that will we will end up possibly destroying as we have done here on earth.

If the launches were to actually explore space or visit the space station, it would have had more purpose than these short forays into international space and then quickly return (Bezo's and Shatner's were around 11 minutes and Branson's was around 8 minutes). There was no real rhyme or reason for these flights other than to give a few humans the bragging rights of saying they've been in "space". To me, it served no real purpose.

Reminds me of the time when I was little and stationed at my grandfather's barber shop for a day and I pestered him to no end to stop at my cousin's house to see them on the way home. Grandpa gave in but not the way I wanted. We stopped, went into the house, said "hello" and turned around and left again pronto. Wasn't what I thought I was going to get.

With 7.7 billion people calling the third rock from the sun home, a joyride for a few just doesn't make sense at all.

 

[SLV]

It seems so senseless, true. But at the same time it does mean work and income for a lot of people all through the productionline. So it is not as pointless as it seems at first glance.
It would be nice though, if those bosses would put the same amount of money and energy in things concerning the planet itself.

 

[Claire]

Hmm - I have no problem with space exploration and in fact I think that we have to do it. And if billionaires are happy to fund it - all the merrier. Space Exploration is one of those industries that positively affects all other industries, we made giant leaps in medicine, technology, food production and engineering due to the space race. Not a single person on this planet has not been positively affected by the space race.
Space Tourism - however has not purpose but to provide photographs.

There is also another very important aspect about space research that we need. Regardless of how in sync and green everyone on the planet becomes - humans as a species have a limit time on this rock. Lets be clear that when people talk about saving the planet - they are actually talking about extending human occupation on the planet. The planet will survive in one form or another until it is destroyed. But humankind will not - that is part of the process. Many species have come and gone and in the broad scheme of things we are really not that important or significant as we like to think we are. Life will continue - it has before. But it will continue without us.
Regardless of how many trees we plant, if we all have no children or eat plants and algae for the rest of our species life spans, we cannot stop the natural progression of our planet and our sun. Eventually the Earth will moved into another stage of its life - and we will need to understand how to live in that stage and the only way we can do that is space exploration and space science.

 

[victor1319]

I am so impressed with Prince William! I agree, billionaires need to focus on saving this planet and not looking for another planet that will we will end up possibly destroying as we have done here on earth.

Well, the Earth is somewhat limited: There is no alternative to space exploration! Except forced birth control...

And these little trips into space are surely just the beginning! More technologically advanced space liners will travel further, that is for sure!

Prince William here might be a bit short sighted...

 

[Heavs]

Well, the Earth is somewhat limited: There is no alternative to space exploration! Except forced birth control...

And these little trips into space are surely just the beginning! More technologically advanced space liners will travel further, that is for sure!

Prince William here might be a bit short sighted...

But he wasn't saying space exploration was wrong, just that the ego stroking space *tourism* race a handful of men are on could theoretically be put to better use. They're like the modern day version of the publicity stunts Branson used to do in the 90s. Although I think Amazon is actually involved in Earthshot too.

Also space tourism comes with a lot of "space litter" which he didn't talk about but is a potentially big concern.

But it was one question out of many and has been extremely overblown by the media, he certainly didn't "slam" anyone but even non tabloid outlets used that phrase.

He named the prize after "Moonshot" I don't think he believes scientific discovery is wrong, quite the opposite. There's room for both but IMO it should be done carefully.

 

[tausi]

Well, the Earth is somewhat limited: There is no alternative to space exploration! Except forced birth control...

And these little trips into space are surely just the beginning! More technologically advanced space liners will travel further, that is for sure!

Prince William here might be a bit short sighted...

You totally misunderstood Prince William. His issue is prioritization. Climate change is more pressing matter than Space tourism. We need to solve for climate now before it is too late otherwise, earth goes burst! and they will be no space tourism or anything else left. No future for the next generation.

 

[Osipi]

Although it may seem to many people (me included at first) that this billionaire "race to space" seems trivial and frankly, a huge waste of money that could do so much good elsewhere, one little factor about these three billionaires (Musk, Branson and Bezos) has been overlooked. All *three* of these billionaires are also very actively involved in projects very similar to William's Earthshot prize scheme.

Jeff Bezos is committed to spending 1 billion of his own money a year to fight climate change. His is called the Bezos Earth Fund.

Richard Branson has created a $25 million prize for the first person to come up with a way of removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere called the Virgin Earth Challenge prize.

Elon Musk is responsible for the creation of a $25 million prize for the first person to come up with a way of removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. XPRIZE Carbon Removal is aimed at tackling the biggest threat facing humanity - fighting climate change and rebalancing Earth’s carbon cycle. Funded by Elon Musk and the Musk Foundation, this $100M competition is the largest incentive prize in history, an extraordinary milestone.‎

So, after actually looking into things here, I have to amend my thoughts on what William has said about prioritizing our earth first before space to state that the reality actually is that William, with his Earthshot prize, has gone where three billionaires have already gone before him.

Just the facts, ma'am. ?

 

[yukari]

Although it may seem to many people (me included at first) that this billionaire "race to space" seems trivial and frankly, a huge waste of money that could do so much good elsewhere, one little factor about these three billionaires (Musk, Branson and Bezos) has been overlooked. All *three* of these billionaires are also very actively involved in projects very similar to William's Earthshot prize scheme.

Jeff Bezos is committed to spending 1 billion of his own money a year to fight climate change. His is called the Bezos Earth Fund.

Richard Branson has created a $25 million prize for the first person to come up with a way of removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere called the Virgin Earth Challenge prize.

Elon Musk is responsible for the creation of a $25 million prize for the first person to come up with a way of removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. XPRIZE Carbon Removal is aimed at tackling the biggest threat facing humanity - fighting climate change and rebalancing Earth’s carbon cycle. Funded by Elon Musk and the Musk Foundation, this $100M competition is the largest incentive prize in history, an extraordinary milestone.‎

So, after actually looking into things here, I have to amend my thoughts on what William has said about prioritizing our earth first before space to state that the reality actually is that William, with his Earthshot prize, has gone where three billionaires have already gone before him.

Just the facts, ma'am. ?

Or maybe it was just the press stirring the pot as usual because .... guess what:

(from Earthshot website)

The Global Alliance Founding Partners are a group of leading global organisations and philanthropists which act as strategic funding partners to the Prize, including Aga Khan Development Network, Bezos Earth Fund, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Breakthrough Energy Foundation, Coleman Family Ventures, DP World in partnership with Dubai EXPO 2020, Holch Povlsen Foundation, Jack Ma Foundation, Marc and Lynne Benioff, Paul G. Allen Family Foundation and Rob & Melani Walton Foundation.

https://earthshotprize.org/about-us/partners/

 

[Curryong]

Jeff Bezos began his own initiative first, though. And another partner in Earth Shot, Jack Ma, is rather controversial isn’t he, or rather his company was?

 

[yukari]

TBF, he didn't name anyone nor, IMO, "blast" space travel. But it's just my opinion and I'm not a native English speaker so maybe I misinterpret his comment.

I can't find the link to the full interview anymore, but this is the longest one:

The conversation about space travel start around minute 3 where he explains that Earthshot is inspired by Moonshot and then his opinion that rather than giving up Earth and looking for a "new home", he thinks it's better to try fixing the "current home" first before looking for new home.
Again, that's just my interpretation. And I have to say I agree with him. For one, in a Wall-E sort of future, it's impossible to relocate the whole Earth population to the new planet. Furthermore, even in that movie, they end up returning and rebuilding Earth, right?

Tweet by Rebecca English (of DM) before all of those headlines emerged:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1448542925034512393

In today’s #DailyMail Prince William says we should focus on saving the planet we have, rather than discover new ones (his comments were made before yesterday’s space tourism extravaganza, but will inevitably be seen that context). In earlier editions we cover his

@EarthshotPrize

Jeff Bezos began his own initiative first, though. And another partner in Earth Shot, Jack Ma, is rather controversial isn’t he, or rather his company was?

Sadly, it's impossible to find donor who's perfectly "clean". They are owned and operated by human after all. For one, even most if not all of the big environmental NGOs get money from oil companies or big corporations with an employee welfare issue.

 

[Osipi]

One thing we've discovered though through this conversation is that, on our planet, there are multiple incentives and organizations that not only are working to save our planet and preserve it for the future, but they're *also* looking at the final frontier for solutions we may come to need.

It's a win/win situation if you ask me. Now we all just have to do *our* part.

 

[camelot23ca]

One thing we've discovered though through this conversation is that, on our planet, there are multiple incentives and organizations that not only are working to save our planet and preserve it for the future, but they're *also* looking at the final frontier for solutions we may come to need.

It's a win/win situation if you ask me. Now we all just have to do *our* part.

Exactly, it’s not an either/or situation, and I don’t think that’s what William was suggesting.

I think research and missions directed by organizations like NASA are just as worthy, for lack of a better word, as research and development surrounding climate change. Leaving the actual space exploration aside, the advances in science and technology that come from building a better telescope or Mars rover or whatever are immense, and can benefit society in many different ways that aren’t directly related to space. I also think exploration is what humans do, full stop. I’m sure there was a strong argument to be made many thousands of years ago in favour of optimizing your current cave instead of needlessly taking your life into your hands to see what the cave over the hill had to offer, but aren’t we happy that at least some cavemen and women didn’t listen?

 

[iceflower]

A lovely message by the Prince of Wales has been released:


** princeofwales: A message from HRH The Prince of Wales ahead of the inaugural Earthshot Prize Awards Ceremony, London 2021 **


And by now the guests are arriving for the Earthshot Prize Awards Ceremony this evening, October 17:


** rex gallery ** gettyimages gallery **

 

[eya]

Short videos from tonight

https://twitter.com/x/status/1449767342766968832

https://twitter.com/x/status/1449768734239899656

https://twitter.com/x/status/1449771669074161666

Article

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/...ds-stars-arriving-Earthshot-green-carpet.html