Ecoislands movement launches with signing of ten-point sustainable communities accord

More than 30 regional and island communities from around the world have signed up to a new ten-point accord to help drive the grassroots deployment of clean technologies and sustainable business models.

The Scottish Island Federation and communities from Hawaii and Bornholm, in Denmark, signed up to the Ecoisland Accord following an inaugural two-day summit on the UK’s Isle of Wight, the home of the Ecoisland ‘movement’.

There they committed to targets designed to make them renewable-energy self-sufficient by 2020 and fully ‘sustainable’ by 2030. The accord also commits the group to using standardised systems to measure progress, collaborate on deploying clean technologies and establish sustainability ‘showcases’.

Representatives from more than 100 businesses attended the summit, during which its corporate sponsors Cable&Wireless Worldwide and IBM demonstrated aspects of a £300m (€372m, $483m) Ecoisland plan for smart grids, renewable power generation and energy management systems on the Isle of Wight.

IBM showcased an ‘intelligent operations centre’, to measure and aggregate data from a range of sources on the island and present them in dashboard form as key performance indicators towards achieving sustainability.

Ecoisland CEO David Green said: “We are no longer voices in the wilderness. Our approach makes sense for everyone – politicians, corporations and individuals. The movement is not just visionary but also practical. We mean business in every sense of the word.”

The summit is to become an annual event, with the next due to be held in Bornholm, Denmark, next October.