Culture File Debate: Three Books to Save the Planet Mary Robinson, Sadhbh O’Neill and John Gibbons in conversation with Paddy Woodworth
Three leading climate activists – Mary Robinson, Sadhbh O’Neill and John Gibbons – will discuss the book on climate change (excepting their own!) which they believe is most effective in informing the public about the climate crisis, and in proposing practicable solutions that offer hope. There is a glut of climate books on the market, and we hope that this debate, which writer Paddy Woodworth will chair, will provide helpful selective guidance for our audience.
Mary Robinson is a co-founder of Project Dandelion, which is a women-led global campaign for climate justice, Adjunct Professor for Climate Justice at Trinity College Dublin, and a member of The Elders. She served as President of Ireland from 1990-1997 and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997-2002. She is a member of the Club of Madrid and the recipient of numerous honours and awards including the Presidential Medal of Freedom from the President of the United States Barack Obama. Between 2013 and 2016, Mary served as the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy in three roles; first for the Great Lakes region of Africa, then on Climate Change leading up to the Paris Agreement and in 2016 as his Special Envoy on El Niño and Climate. Her Foundation, the Mary Robinson Foundation – Climate Justice, established in 2010, came to a planned end in April 2019.
Based in Dublin, John Gibbons has been writing and campaigning on environmental and climate issues for the last two decades, two years as a weekly environmental columnist with the Irish Times. He is founder of the website Climatechange.ie and has a long-running blog at ThinkOrSwim.ie. He regularly appears on national media outlets. He has been a weekly environmental columnist on The Last Word on Today FM for the last five years and contributes to the Irish Examiner, Business Post, Irish Times, TheJournal.ie, and DeSmog UK. His first book, The Lie of the Land: A game plan for Ireland in the climate crisis, was published by Penguin in 2025. The book was Shortlisted for non-fiction Book of the Year in the Irish Book Awards 2025. He is also co-author of the Routledge Handbook of Environmental Journalism (2020).
Sadhbh O’Neill has over thirty years working in environmental advocacy, policy research and engagement. With a background in academic research and teaching in environmental politics, climate change policy and climate law, she has combined roles in advocacy, litigation and policy research for universities and environmental organisations over the years. For the past four years she has taught climate, environment and energy law modules at TU Dublin. Her “claim to fame” is that she was (at the time) the youngest elected member of Dublin City Council, having been elected in absentia in 1991 while on a J1 student visa. Building upon her long-standing work in advocacy and communications, Sadhbh was also the a candidate for the Waterford constituency in the last General Election and stood in the TCD Seanad election in 2025. She is currently the project manager for a PEACEPLUS cross-border project of the Irish Environmental Network and the Northern Ireland Environment Link, alongside being a regular contributor to the Irish Times Opinion page on climate and environmental topics.
Paddy Woodworth is an author, journalist, lecturer and tour guide. He contributes regularly to The Irish Times and presents The Naturalist’s Bookshelf series on RTE lyric fm’s Culture File, on which he talks about nature books he loves. He has published two acclaimed books on the Basque Country. In 2013, he published a study of ecological restoration projects worldwide, and in Ireland, Our Once and Future Planet: Restoring the World in the Climate Change Century (U of Chicago Press). A BioScience reviewer wrote: “Highly readable. This book will bring the concept and application of ecological restoration to a broader audience and will help inspire a new generation of restoration practitioners and researchers”. He is a Research Associate at Missouri Botanical Garden, and an Adjunct Senior Lecturer at University College Dublin. He partners Muhammad Achour on Sanctuary in Nature & Heritage, a project that introduces asylum seekers, refugees and migrants to Irish natural and cultural heritage sites, and offer them opportunities to discuss their own heritages with Irish people.
This event is part of Science Week 2026 supported by Taighde Éireann – Research Ireland.
The Culture File Debates are presented by RTÉ lyric fm’s Culture File.
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