"Data Centres, SMRs and the challenge for Plaid" - Jack Wilkinson-Dix

Jack Wilkinson-Dix, Trustee of Sustainable Wales, has written an article for the IWA asking how Wales’ new government should respond to a rapidly growing – and increasingly contested – industry…

Data Centres, SMRs and the challenge for Plaid

The unrestrained expansion of data centres could jeopardise Welsh and UK climate goals, as their operation increases our energy demand and puts strain on the environment.

https://www.iwa.wales/agenda/2026/09/data-centres-smrs-and-the-challenge-for-plaid/

Glacier Melt

Glacier Melt

Experts say a massive glacier collapse is responsible for the catastrophic flash-flood across the Nepal-Tibet border. It buried a city in mud and killed hundreds.

This morning, a colossal mass of ice, snow, and rock collapsed high in the Himalayan mountains, temporarily damming the Lende River. The natural barrier rapidly ruptured, sending a violent, sediment-heavy wall of water, mud, and boulders downstream into Nepal’s Rasuwa and Nuwakot districts.

Striking with virtually no warning, the deluge obliterated critical infrastructure, sweeping away homes, roads, bridges, and local hydropower projects.

The disaster was preceded by a magnitude 4.4 earthquake in Tibet just minutes earlier, which researchers believe destabilized the already fragile glacier, triggering the cascading failure.

This tragedy highlights the extreme vulnerability of the rapidly warming Hindu Kush Himalaya region, where glacier ice-loss rates have doubled since 2000.

Climate scientists warn that as rising global temperatures weaken natural ice dams, the risk of sudden, destructive floods—often referred to as 'inland tsunamis'—will continue to escalate, threatening millions of lives downstream.

source: New Scientist. (2026). A glacier collapse is most likely cause of the Nepal disaster. New Scientist.

Robert Minhinnick

Wales Book of the Year poetry prize - Laura wainwright

How delighted we are that Laura Wainwright has won the poetry prize for ‘Wales Book of the Year’ 2026, for ‘The Storm’s Flora’ (Seren).

Laura is a good friend of the charity, and we feature several episodes of her ‘A Newport Journal’ on this site, some of which are the basis of poems in her Seren book. Laura was also a familiar performer when our Green Room was running. 

She has also taken part in our ongoing campaign to prevent damage to the Gwent Levels by extension of the M4.

Llongyfarchiadau enfawr i Laura! And look out for her in future events with us.

Laura Wainwright reading at the Green Room Porthcawl 2022

Glamorgan Heritage Coast - Green Room Celebration

Green Room Poster June 2026

As the heatwave of late June faded, Porthcawl’s Green Room staged an evening celebration of the coast as its last event before the charity Sustainable Wales moves to new premises.

Kristian Evans read from his new book Duneland: A Year in Kenfig (Seren Books).

Porthcawl’s resident writer and poet Robert Minhinnick read an extract from his award winning collection of essays ‘Watching the Fire Eater’ as a celebration of 50 years of the Glamorgan Heritage Coast, which runs between Newton Point and Aberthaw.

Back in the 1980’s Robert was a manager of a Community Programme scheme at Dunraven Park, Southerndown. His essay ‘The Scheme of Things’ introduces a disparate group of characters brought together under the aegis of the Government’s bid to relieve chronic unemployment. Come rain and shine the group’s work proceeded intermittently on footpaths and walls as participants came and went.

A question and answer session followed the two readers and there was some reminiscing on the Dunraven Estate and in particular the missing castle. Among the audience local resident Chris Fray said that he stayed at the castle in 1960 when he was 11 years old. His parents were keen visitors to properties run as guest houses by the Workers Travel Association (WTA).

View fullsize

Dunraven Castle

For a few brief years Dunraven Castle was leased to the WTA but its condition deteriorated and it was later demolished by the landowners. On his arrival at Dunraven, Chris recalled the warning to all children not to access the beach unaccompanied by the zigzag path. Of course this was a challenge met with relish by a group of intrepid children arriving at the beach at high tide as the waves hammered against the rocks. This visceral experience was beyond his suburban life in South London and the occasional visit to the genteel South Coast. Its memory still lingers and Chris returned to South Wales as a student in 1967 and persuaded a friend to drive him to Southerndown to explore the coast. At that time the Dunraven Estate had fallen into disrepair with the trees salt burned to a ghostly white and the castle reduced to rubble.

Further visits ensued over the years and in 1974 Chris was appointed as a planning officer with the Vale of Glamorgan Council.

View fullsize

© Copyright Stephen McKay

Among the projects he contributed to was the preparation of a management plan for the Glamorgan Heritage Coast, one of three pilot projects trialled by the then Countryside Commission. Although the Dunraven Estate was in the adjoining Ogwr Council area a joint working party of officers identified a boundary for the pilot project and carried out public consultation across South and Mid Glamorgan, and the respective local authorities adopted the management plan some 50 years ago. Key to the work was the the enthusiastic Heritage Coast Officer, John Howden, and John Sienkiewicz a charismatic civil servant whose challenge was to improve access, remove eyesores and provide information on the natural attractions of three coastal areas: Suffolk, Purbeck (Dorset) and Glamorgan. Cooperation and teamwork were the order of the day which provided a basis for conflict resolution and positive intervention in the countryside. Heritage Coasts were subsequently rolled out across England and Wales. The work to conserve the natural undeveloped character of the coastal scenery and protect and enhance its natural resources continues to this day. 

The Friends of Glamorgan Heritage Coast is a non-profit charity which helps to conserve the coastline through fundraising and volunteering. A small grants programme has been launched by the Friends and offers grants  of £500-£3000 to support practical projects that protect, maintain and enhance the unique character of the Glamorgan Heritage Coast. Apply for details at email below.

Why not become a member of the Friends of Glamorgan Heritage Coast : contact@foghc.org.uk

The AGM of the organisation takes place on Saturday 25 July 11am at the Heritage Coast Centre, Dunraven Park CF32 0RP 

Friends of Glamorgan Heritage coast logo

---

Duneland: a year in Kenfig by Kristian Evans is available from SUSSED Porthcawl

Farewell to the Green Room at James Street

by Robert Minhinnick

Farewell the Sustainable Wales/Cymru Gynaliadwy Green Room

Our final event before SUSSED’s relocation took place June 26, 2026. It was the end of a scorching week, weather-wise, and proved a real celebration.

Fitting that we highlighted Kristian Evans’s ‘Dunelands: A Year in Kenfig’, (Seren) and 50 years of the Glamorgan Heritage Coast.

Kristian was once employed by us, and it’s satisfying to see his literary career taking off. For the Heritage Coast, Robert Minhinnick read his essay ‘The Scheme of Things’, from ‘Watching the Fire-Eater’. (Seren). Also poems and translations about the coast. New music and film were provided by M3, (Peter Morgan, Richard Thomas and David McCormack).

The Green Room always celebrated the human imagination and creativity. This surely is a vital feature of ‘sustainability’ itself.

In a world increasingly dominated by ‘data’ harvesting and artificial intelligence, what the Green Room promoted can be seen as increasingly necessary.

While regretting our change of premises, Sustainable Wales/Cymru Gynaliadwy

pledges itself to continue arts events and maintain our commitment to such.

This event, along with events from as far back as 2014, can be heard on the Green Room Podcast.