Our vision is a clean planet, free from pollution.

We take a big picture view of pollution to research, educate and collaborate on solutions for a cleaner planet today.

We think about the issue of human-caused pollution through a human ecology lens - which means we look at the issue of pollution in the context of how humans live their lives. This includes how pollution arises, how it relates to society, culture, health, and our built environment and - importantly - how it impacts the natural environment we’re all a part of.

What we do

We're an environmental charity working towards a cleaner planet. We put our big picture view into action by:

• Researching the current facts and figures relating to pollution, who’s already working towards solutions and how they’re doing it, and what’s having the biggest impact.

• Educating people, communities and organisations about pollution issues and empowering them with information and tools to make environmentally friendly changes in their own lives.

• Campaigning to help raise awareness and offer people easy ways to get involved in solutions.

• Running practical projects that directly deal with specific issues where we know we can make a difference right now.

Our big picture view is one thing that makes us different - and it also puts us in a position to collaborate and connect the pieces together. There are a lot of organisations who’ve been looking at aspects of pollution across the world for decades. Most of them are focused on a very specific pollution issue or have a specialised project. Through our work we want to start linking up with these organisations, and help them connect so we can share knowledge and work together.

We’re also constantly seeking action that can be taken and make a difference now. Although long-term thinking is crucial to having a pollutant-free planet, the problem is happening now.

You can help us. We need all the support we can get to build our knowledge, expand our reach, and put our ideas into action for a cleaner planet every day. Find out how you can get involved.

Why it matters

It’s no secret that pollution is a major problem. We’ve all been hearing about it for years, sometimes to the point where it feels like it’s just part of the wallpaper.

But it’s never been more important than now. We’re at a turning point where it comes to the future of our planet. Right now, this generation, we’re deciding on the kind of world that everyone will be living in not just in the next few hundred years, but the next decade.

Think about all the rubbish you create in just one day, food packaging, old items you throw away, the packaging that comes with replacements for those items (and maybe packaging for a few luxury things). For one day it might not seem like much, but it really adds up. In 2015 the photographer Gregg Segal ran a project documenting how much waste a family produces in a week. It’s a lot. 

A lot of us live in a world where we get what we need to live - and to work and play - from shops, which are part of a consumer system. ‘Consume’ is the right word because we don’t really put anything back, and we also create a lot of waste we can’t really get rid of. Natural resources are used to create products which are bought by consumers (formerly known as people), with the aim of selling new products as often as possible. Waste is created when we gather these resources, when we turn them into products, and when we then go and throw these resources away - and often this rubbish can’t be reintegrated into the consumer system or the ecosystem that, actually, this consumer one is a part of.

This means that all the ecosystems we’ve been relying on - and other species have been relying on - to provide us with food, shelter and the lives we’ve become accustomed to are starting to fall apart or at at risk.

We're facing changes to our climate at a rate the planet’s never experienced in its history. Our home is getting warmer, our oceans are rising as our ice melts, and the level of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is rising - and it’s happening faster than any patterns in our history. 97% of scientists agree that the change in climate we’re seeing is likely due to us. We’re polluting our home.

We have to decide we want a clean planet to live in, and we need to start doing things about it right now.