Hello. Is that Gareth? 

 

Yeah. How are you doing?

 

I'm well, how are you?

 

Hi, David. I'm absolutely fine; a little bit weary after the last few weeks' efforts!

 

…Because you rode your bike all the way down to MIPIM as a ride captain for the Cycle to MIPIM with Club Peloton, didn't you?

 

I did. And I thoroughly enjoyed it - there's some great collective endeavours there to help raise some fantastic money for charity. 

And as a practice, you have undertaken some calculations about how much carbon was spent or saved in the process this year? Could you unpack some of the key findings that you made?

 

Yeah; I think the first thing to say is, I think Knight Frank, along with Club Peloton, were really keen to try and make the ride down to Cannes cleaner and greener. And the first point, I guess to do was a baseline study, a carbon study on what the current cost of carbon is to get down there. So we worked quite closely with them and our transport team at Civic Engineers to unpack what were the key aspects where we were spending carbon on the way down to Cannes. And fundamentally, they were, first of all, what was the fuel? The fuel to get us down - what was the fuel for the riders? As we know, all the riders eat food? 

 

Yeah. (laughs) 

 

(laughs) It's really important, and we eat a lot of it as well, along the way, when we're off the bike and when we're on the bike. So we looked at different diets. And there are some people on the ride who had quite staunch vegan diets; other people with more average, and then obviously, if you eat more meat, then your carbon footprint is higher. So, we did some studies into that. And actually, I think it worked out that if you had a meat-based diet, you were going to be spending four times more carbon than a vegan diet to power yourself on your bicycle to get to Cannes. 

Yeah. Was there any antipathy from meat-and-potatoes kind of guys and girls who look on the vegetarian diet as more difficult to get carbohydrates from? Was there anything in opposition like that?

 

No, certainly no one put up their opposition. And fundamentally, a lot of the food provided by Club Peloton at the lunch stops was vegan food. But you then had the option to top it up if you wanted to, with cheese, or with maybe some locally-sourced meat. So certainly, people weren't forced to have to eat a vegan diet. But that was the sort of baseline which was provided, which I thought was really good. And when we were eating dinners in the evenings, you know, there was always the option of vegan, vegetarian and meat. So that was always there. So I don't think anyone felt forced in any way to have to start taking a new diet. But because the option was there, maybe a few people tried it a bit more often.

 

And has it affected the way you look at the whole food 'circle' as it were?

 

Er... Yeah, I suppose I've been aware for a while and have tried vegan diets. I won't say I'm vegan now, but I aim to be as vegetarian as possible. And I certainly eat a lot less meat than I used to, and I don't think it affects performance on the bike.

But principally it was choice of travel. I mean, I'm somebody who's been taking the train down to Cannes for years, and I've been slightly amazed that people haven't realized that it's an option, and that it can make such a drastic change to the whole carbon footprint. Not least because you can have a nice lunch in Paris as you change over! But was the other main finding that actually getting the train back - or getting the train there for people who don't cycle down there – is the single biggest thing you can do to cut your carbon footprint from going down to MIPIM?

 

Without a doubt. Yeah, without a doubt. And you'll see from some of the graphs and imagery which we shared that, you know, getting the train down to Cannes is incredibly environmentally friendly. That said, because electricity generated across France is pretty green; it's either nuclear or from green sources, and doing so means that it's something like eight times more efficient and less carbon than the plane. [The train back creates 19kg/co2 compared to compare to 150kg/co2 for the air plane economy class (226kg/co2 business class)]

But yes, it's fundamentally a lot greener. And I enjoyed getting the train home. It might have taken a whole day, but actually, I spent it with a colleague; we spent time digesting our week, talking about who we had met and actually met a few other people who I hadn't seen in Cannes, so I got to spend some time with them on the platforms, and on the trains too.

 

Yeah, it's great, isn't it? And you can get work done, or you can watch films and it's just more pleasant, really. Anyway, so anything else from your calculations that surprised you?

 

Yes; in some ways the ride down to Cannes - we do have a lot of support vehicles. There are a lot of people which help us get down there. So cycling was a very efficient way to get down, but probably not quite as efficient as we thought. You know, we were still accompanied by some quite big support vehicles. One large bus, which needed to be there for reasons should we all not be able to get on the road because of treacherous weather conditions. As it happened, there were some treacherous weather conditions, but the majority of us braved them and got through them. Just for reference for the other Club Pelotonners reading this, day five, stage five has gone down in history (laughs) as the wettest monsoon situation, I think a ride to MIPIM has ever encountered 

Really. I can think of a few over the years. But yeah! (laughs)

 

Certainly, the freshest one always seems the worst, right? (laughs) But yeah, there's quite a few vehicles. And I think where we've sort of got to concluding in the study is: what do we do next? What does Club Peloton do next in terms of trying to make it greener for next year? And so certainly the engines of the support vehicles can be looked at – whether we can start some of them to more electric based vehicles and whether that can work. 

 

What's the bus? Is it a diesel?

 

Yes… 

 

Naughty, naughty. Okay. And can you get hybrid coaches of that sort, for example, or even electric?

 

I don't know to that one, I think we'd need to find out. But I think the issue with electric vehicles at the moment is distance and heavy vehicles and distance. So it's those sort of vehicles, which are the hardest type. I think it is the lighter vehicles which accompany the trip, which could probably be a little bit easier. We have a few motorbike outriders; could they turn electric? So they're the sort of key wins which we'll start looking at next time. The other one is continuing to encourage the cyclists to maybe have a different type of diet. And I think they're well on the way with that - we did a great job over recent years, and people didn't realize probably quite how much vegan diet they ate this year, too. So I think that's really, really good. And then the last one, I think, as you mentioned, is as part of the ticket when you buy your Club Peloton ride to MIPIM entry is you actually get your train ticket home built into the package. And therefore, you almost physically have to opt out to go and spend more carbon by getting the plane back to the UK. So they're the key next things to look at. Carbon calculations can always be very sophisticated, and you can delve into a lot more detail. And I'm sure that will begin to happen more as each year goes by and look at where the ride could be made cleaner and greener.