Chemistry will play the underpinning role in addressing the key issues relating to energy, food, water and health in a sustainable way in the future. Crucially, the resourcing of materials, their processing, and waste management to support these areas, will place increasing demands on environmental monitoring, and the role of environmental science in contributing to solutions on a grand scale. Foremost amongst these will be how the world meets the challenge of climate change and the increasing provision of carbon-free energy sources.Of total world energy use for power, heating and transportation, around 80% of primary sources comprises fossil fuels, with a further 7% derived from nuclear. The remaining 13% from carbon-neutral or carbon-free renewables paints a deceptive picture because nearly all the biomass portion (10%) is agricultural waste or wood, rather than what we would recognise as bio-fuels, such as ethanol or bio-diesel. The higher-technology renewables, such as photo-voltaics, wind, tidal, hydro and geothermal constitute just 3% of world energy provision. All this is equivalent in energy terms to the use of over 11 billion tonnes of oil each year.The impact of that 80% can be addressed only through a combination of massive carbon dioxide sequestration and substitution of fossil fuels with a mix of renewables and nuclear, although the last of these raises important issues of radioactive management. Whatever the political or economic decisions made in the future, it is essential that we have the science available to implement the routes selected.Long-term sequestration has yet to be demonstrated. The future will also move to one likely to be increasingly dominated by electricity and hydrogen, with new ways of storage and transmission or transportation. Further into the future, some are asking whether it might not be possible to capture the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, and through a catalytic reaction with water (driven by sunlight), produce liquid fuels, such as methanol, to meet all global energy needs. There is sufficient solar energy and feedstock to do just that, but in this and the other areas, science still has a challenge. The efficiency in land use for different options will be a key issue, as will be full life-cycle analysis. Open debate and transparency of information will be essential. Too few people appreciate for example that, in terms of energy generated, bio-fuels require typically twenty times the land area of a photo-voltaic facility.It will be essential to have national and global leadership to bring about the changes needed in a self-consistent way. This will drive the regulatory and fiscal framework within which countries, companies and individuals will operate in the future. With the inertia of the various hydrocarbons industries, and conversely the need for innovators to have incentives, the biggest risk is that governments will shy away from difficult decisions and fail to provide a clear vision for the way ahead. If there is no material change in implemented policy within five years, alarm bells should be ringing. There is only so much that individuals, themselves, can do directly to reduce their carbon foot-print. Nor should we be lulled into thinking that the decline of fossil fuels will compel us to develop alternatives sooner rather than later. In reality, coal, oil and gas will provide reserves for hundreds of years at current consumption rates. This is the major contributor to the 0.6% per annum rise in the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere, now at about 380 parts per million (ppm).The consequences of limited action include changes in regional climates and local weather patterns, and their (largely adverse) impacts on flora and fauna, and ultimately human populations. Most tangible will be the continuing melting of ice and the flow of the melt-water from the polar land-masses into the oceans, leading to further rises in sea-level. All this is likely to have an enormous effect on the socio-economic fabric of our world. While we must be realistic about the future—and it may look daunting—we should see these challenges not as problems, but business and career opportunities. These will drive science to work more collaboratively and internationally, and engage political and financial decision-makers to work in a way not seen for over sixty years, since the Second World War. This cannot take place in isolation, however, and as a subject, energy and the environment needs to be integrated more effectively into the educational supply chain, from primary school to university, with appropriately trained teachers.This is the tenth anniversary of theJournal of Environmental Monitoring, and I wish all contributors, authors, referees, other members and staff, the very best in being in the forefront of a discipline that will play a major role in our future.Dr Richard Pike MA PhD CSci CEng FRSCChief Executive Officer, Royal Society of Chemi