TODAY The Scotsman continues its countdown of the top 50 green pioneers in Scotland, with a list that includes engineers, academics, activists and writers.
Numbers 21-30 on the list, compiled by the Scottish Sustainable Development Forum, show that, in terms of environmental thinking, Scotland often leads the world. Our list includes Allan Thomson, who helped to establish the world's first commercial wave farm on Islay, and Barry Sinclair, who worked on the first island wind farm on Fair Isle.
The first Scottish Green List features Bill Ritchie and Alastair McIntosh, two major players in Scottish land reform.
The countdown continues tomorrow, working towards Scotland's top ten green heroes, who will be honoured at a ceremony in The Scotsman building tomorrow night and listed in Thursday's paper. One of the judging panel, Professor James Curran, chairman of the SSDF, said those on the Scottish Green List should be "thanked, celebrated, encouraged and supported for not just talking the talk, but walking the walk".
• Yesterday, we used the wrong image for Mike Robinson, chair of Stop Climate Chaos Scotland.
30 John Ferguson As he stood on the platform of an oilrig watching 15 flares burn over the North Sea, John Ferguson realised things had to change – and hestarted applying for environmental jobs.
He got "hooked on waste" and helped to draw up Scotland's waste management plan, working to increase recycling and joining the government's Zero Waste think tank. He is now masterminding an eco-innovation park in Perthshire.
29 Barry SinclairIf you live somewhere as remote as Fair Isle, you have to be resourceful – and the islanders proved so when, inspired by the Seventies' oil crisis, they set up the world's first community-run, standalone, wind-turbine project. Engineer Barry Sinclair, chairman of the Fair Isle Electricity Council, was also the man responsible for keeping the engines running when it opened in 1982. Electricity charges went down from 13p to 4p per kilowatt hour.
28 Clare Symonds Clare Symonds is an independent planning consultant on the brink of setting up a new group, Planning Democracy. Her mission is to challenge planning procedures, showing how communities can be railroaded into accepting unpopular developments. She says guidelines do not allow enough consultation. She says plans for a new Forth road bridge and coal-fired power station in Ayrshire are examples of inadequate consultation.
27 Dave du Feu The computing officer for Edinburgh University Medical School is also a very prominent cycling campaigner. With the campaigning group Spokes, he has successfully lobbied governments and councils to do more to support cyclists and maintain cycle networks. He has edited more than 90 newsletters and conducts a survey every year into how much is being spent on cycle projects across Scotland.
26 Tessa Tennant Tessa Tennant is the chair of the ICE Organisation – a carbon management and loyalty programme. A pioneer of sustainable development, she co-founded the UK's first equitable investment fund for sustainable development and was chair and co-founder of the UK Social Investment Forum and of the Carbon Disclosure Project. Since 1997 she has concentrated on encouraging socially responsible investment in Asia.
25 Bill RitchieWhen he was made an MBE in 2007, Bill Ritchie joked it would mean "a severe dent in my reputation as a revolutionary". The Oxford-educated crofter has been involved in two community buy-outs which revolutionised the political and economic landscape of Scotland. He was secretary of the Assynt Crofters' Trust in its buy-out of the 21,000-acre North Assynt Estate in 1993, and then played a major role in the purchase of the 44,000-acre Drumrunie and Glencanisp estates by the Assynt Foundation.
24 Richard DixonTrained as an astrophysicist, the director of WWF Scotland has become a leading campaigner on climate change. WWF Scotland helped to gather 20,000 signatures in support of a climate change bill which would reduce carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2011. Dr Dixon, who also worked for Friends of the Earth Scotland, is a major supporter of renewable energy and an opponent of nuclear power plants. He caused controversy recently by saying a failure to be energy-efficient should be treated as a crime.
23 Allan ThomsonThe marine energy expert who, in 2005, created Aquamarine, the world's first commercial wave-power energy plant on Islay.
In 2007, the company he founded merged with Renewable Energies Ltd to create a new company dedicated to developing commercial wave-power technologies.
The company is currently testing the Aquamarine Oyster, the "big floating hinge", which it hopes will become available commercially in 2014.
22 Alastair McIntoshWriter, activist and campaigner Alastair McIntosh was once described as "Naomi Klein in a Fair Isle jumper". But despite his homespun style, this Scottish maverick academic has quite a following.
Thom Yorke of Radiohead is such a fan of his book Son and Soil that he has taken to waving it over his head at concerts, urging his fans to buy a copy. McIntosh campaigned in support of the community buy-out of Eigg and against the superquarry on Harris and is a director of the Galgael Trust.
Writer in love with landscape
21 Kathleen Jamie The work of Kathleen Jamie is, said the critic Richard Mabey, "as close as writing gets to a conversation with the natural world". The Fife writer has been chosennot for environmental activism – but for the way she helps us look afresh at our surroundings.
One of her most recent projects has been to write a collection of pieces about Jura for Spirit of Jura, about the writers' retreat on the island.
Mark Lambert, director of the Scottish Book Trust, said: "We chose Kathleen because she is without rival as a poet and an observer of the natural environment. She very simply but very powerfully gives a sense of how incredible Scotland's landscape is, without being at all strident.
"She does what all great writers do, which is show and not tell."
David Robinson, The Scotsman's books editor, said: "Kathleen Jamie writes nature poetry with the same attention to detail as a great landscape photographer. She is precise, illuminating, and above all clearly focused."
YESTERDAY: 50 - 31The full article contains 1039 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
