Take the JUMP is a simple, clear and effective way of limiting individuals’ carbon emissions and community group Oxshott Net Zero has been putting it into practice. Based on research from the University of Leeds, Arup and C40 Cities, it quantifies the impact of individual actions and shows the most impactful changes individuals can make to live in balance with the Earth's resources. By 2030, we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from consumption by 66% to stay within the internationally agreed limit of 1.5 degrees warming. 27% of this required reduction is primarily down to individual behaviour with the other 73% being down to governments and businesses. 

“This decade is crucial to stay within that limit”, says Diana Thornton, Co-Founder of Oxshott Net Zero. “Big businesses and governments are not as agile as individuals in changing their behaviour and their systems. The impact of individual behaviour can be immediate and is therefore particularly important in these few years until 2030 after which some of the bigger infrastructure changes will start to filter through.”

Diana Thornton, Co-Founder of Oxshott Net Zero, explains: “Take the JUMP is a brilliant initiative to get involved with as an individual. But it has really come into its own for us as a way for Oxshott Net Zero to structure our approach and to focus our energies as a group in the village.

“There is so much information out there promoting different environmental approaches from apps to websites to daily emails. It can be a bit overwhelming trying to sift through and work out what to prioritise.  As a fairly new enterprise, we spent a while going down rabbit holes and exploring dead-ends before we found Take the JUMP.

“The beauty of TTJ is that the messaging is clear and simple but the impact is profound and it is founded on research so it feels 100% reliable. There are loads of resources on the website which you can use and there is free training to be an ambassador if you would like to take things further.

“Here in Oxshott we started with a couple of coffee mornings, inviting local community leaders -- from the church, schools, cubs, brownies and more -- to come along. From this we agreed one exciting project. The setting up of a repair café, which we’re launching in January 2024. We have several other talks, workshops, school assemblies and events on the horizon. We’ll keep following these leads until they run dry and then we’ll probably start again with some more coffee mornings to see where else we could take things. We’ve run stalls and talks and workshops at local events and even given a talk in a local church.

“That’s how we’re doing it, but the beauty of TTJ is that you have the materials and then you do whatever you think might work in your area with it. The staff at Take the JUMP are brilliant at supporting you and I know that the cohort I trained with as an ambassador are all doing different things to promote the initiative.

“Give it go and Take the JUMP as a local group. It’s the best thing we’ve done.”

What Take the JUMP has quantified is that individual behaviour is important and that if enough people who can afford to, do make these changes, then the impact is significant.

Sign up at the Take the JUMP website to try the challenges for 1, 3, or 6 months.