Future proofing our community
How Ambition Lawrence Weston has changed by being involved with the Community Climate Action Project
In this blog post, Donna Sealey, Community Development and Engagement Worker at Ambition Lawrence Weston, shares the impact of the Community Climate Action Project on the organisation and community. She also shares some tips for other community organisations considering taking climate action.
My name is Donna Sealey and I am the Community Development and Engagement Worker at Ambition Lawrence Weston. My role is in improving community life and addressing social issues by working with individuals, families, and groups to identify needs, develop strategies, and implement projects. I act as a bridge between our community and other organisations, promoting collaboration and ensuring local voices are heard.
Developing our community climate action plan
Ambition Lawrence Weston joined the Community Climate Action Project at the beginning as one of the cohort one partners back in 2020 just at a time when the Covid pandemic hit. We are a small organisation with just three employees but with big aspirations. Ambition Lawrence Weston was set up in 2012 to take action after a decline in services and closure of local facilities. Before joining the Community Climate Action Project coordinated by Bristol Climate & Nature Partnership, we had already written a community plan, a neighbourhood development plan as well as an economic sustainability plan – so why not a climate action plan?
Previously we have worked with Bristol Energy Network and had undertaken small energy advice workshops, ran an energy internship and assisted in Bristol Energy Co-operative building a solar farm here in Lawrence Weston, but we had just submitted a planning application to build the biggest community owned onshore wind turbine in the UK, but a community climate action plan would be much more encompassing.
In the initial phase of the project, we had to buff up our own knowledge and skill level. What did three people in Lawrence Weston know about ‘reaching net zero by 2030’ or ‘the implications of temperatures rising by 0.5C’? Our combined knowledge was pretty rudimentary, so the workshops we attended as part of the project were vital in growing our understanding.
During our community research phase of the project, and using our neighbourhood level carbon footprint that had been developed by the Centre for Sustainable Energy, residents identified potential solutions to reducing our neighbourhood carbon emissions and solutions to the climate and ecological crisis locally. Some of the solutions and recommendations were grassroot initiatives, but some were more future proofing and blue sky thinking.
Wider impact
The plan was refined and launch in January 2021. However, we knew that as a local organisation we needed to practice what we preach, and looked at how we could change to become a greener, cleaner organisation. We looked at our own policies and introduced a new environmental and sustainability policy and a new staff travel to work policy. To help with this we were successful in receiving funding from Travelwest to buy staff electric bikes as well as a cargo bike to reduce our carbon emissions from car journeys.
Over the next couple of years, we were planning the building of a community hub here in Lawrence Weston. With us and residents now being more aware of the climate and ecological crisis, we adapted our original plans. We looked at how we could reduce our energy consumption by ensuring the building took a “fabric first” approach and adding in solar panels, underfloor heating, air source heat pumps and a mechanical ventilation and heat recovery system, installed cycle racks and an electric car charging point. We have adapted our catering policy, introduced recycling in our community centre and food composting. We also updated our landscaping and worked with our horticulturist and ecologist to better design biodiversity gain and nature.
One of our next main projects is developing an Energy Learning Zone which will sit underneath our community-owned wind turbine. The Energy Learning Zone will be a physical space, a sister site to our Green Skills Academy which will run from Ambition House Community Centre in Lawrence Weston. It will become a nexus point for learning and teaching, ranging from school and youth visits to practical accredited courses for adults and students of all ages.
Advice to others
The climate and ecological crisis are deeply interwoven with community issues, impacting livelihoods, health, and overall health and wellbeing. Extreme weather events, pollution, and biodiversity loss disproportionately affect vulnerable populations, exacerbating existing inequalities and leading to displacement, food insecurity, and health crises. Addressing these crises requires a holistic approach that considers social, economic, and environmental dimensions, and prioritises community-based solutions. That is why our community plan is now our community climate action plan.
Our advice to other similar communities considering delivering a climate action plan, is to ensure you concentrate on resident’s immediate needs and priorities and then introduce climate action alongside these, but always ensuring the residents own priorities and needs are met first and foremost.
Resources
We have released a series of resources over the last few weeks to share learnings from the Community Climate and Nature project. You can find them here.
The Community Climate Action Project is coordinated by Bristol Climate & Nature Partnership and funded by the National Lottery’s Climate Action Fund.
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