In 2012 three sustainability-related events will take place: the first “One Planet” Olympics will be held in London and coincides with the 20^th anniversary of the UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and the 25^th anniversary of the Brundtland Commission report “Our Common Future“, which began the global mainstreaming of the sustainability agenda.

These events prompted John Elkington with his company Volans to showcase London’s cluster of organisations working in sustainability-related areas such as climate change and carbon, water, human rights, biodiversity, development aid, renewable energy and other forms of clean-tech, social responsible investment, education and training programmes, etc. The venture’s name “One Planet London” (OPL), derives from the One Planet Living framework by BioRegional which helps individuals, businesses and government organisations to live and work within a fair share of the earth’s resources.

The project will help building a better collective sense of the nature and scale of the relevant organisations, initiatives, networks and clusters in London, in particular for the 9 million people expected to visit the city next year.

Michael Porter defines clusters as geographic concentrations of interconnected companies suppliers, and related institutions in a particular field. They affect competition by increasing the productivity of the companies in the cluster, by driving innovation, and by stimulating new businesses in the field.

One Planet London was started assuming that a London sustainability cluster with multiple sub-clusters does exist. It will be interesting to explore this assumption by looking at how these clusters developed to find out why there is a high concentration of talent and initiatives in London. Ultimately, it will be examined how the links within the London sustainability community can be enhanced.

So watch this space to find out more about London’s sustainability players and how they can be connected and mobilised to accelerate change towards sustainability.