Rural Community Carbon Network

I applied to Artist’s Project Earth (APE) last month for funding towards the training element to the network; to run a series of workshop sessions on Web 2.0 and how community groups can learn from each other using this technology and by maintaining their own web space (like Tracey Todhunter and Transition Town Stafford).

This is disappointing news as I believe that the online aspect of networking is under-valued - it would add huge value to the enormous amount of activity that is going on within so many community groups.

We will continue to apply to other organisations - thank you to the CarnegieUK Trust and Esmée Fairbairn Foundation for their continued support.

We also heard the other week that our second round application to NESTA’s Big Green Challenge did not make it through. We had the following feedback:

“Our Reviewers believe that your approach could support the adoption of wider behavioural/lifestyle change through sharing practice and building networks. Reviewers commended your strong links with individual communities, and the role these communities will have in taking a lead and having ownership of the approach. Our Reviewers feel that the strength in your approach is currently in the detailed promotion of existing carbon saving projects, rather than directly facilitating new action.  Our Reviewers advise that your growth plan could be clearer in terms of your steps and targets towards building the network developing and the numbers of organisations you will support.”

The Network is about community empowerment and knowledge transfer.  As such we could not easily demonstrate carbon savings as part of the project either - this was a priority for the BGC team.

Good luck to Ross Weddle from CoRE and Adam Kennerley from Light Foot - who were both selected to present their projects to a judging panel.

If you are interested in finding out more about the Rural Community Carbon Network, then come along to ruralnet|2008 ‘Live & Local’ in Skipton, North Yorkshire on 30 Sept to 1 Oct 2008.

I will be facilitating the ‘Local Energy’ workshop - looking at the opportunities and challenges to rural communities of local energy generation.  Take a look at the conference programme.

The conference will be examining local everything - local food, local transport, local ownership and local retail.  The line up of organisations at the event is impressive and includes The Soil Association, Land for People community land trust, The Plunkett Foundation and Pub is the Hub.  Guest speakers include Ian Brown, Vice Chair of Local Living and John Craven OBE, Broadcaster and presenter of BBC’s Countryfile.

I had an interesting discussion with Rod Yeoman recently - he is the Environmental Projects Manager with Impact Housing Association in Penrith.

Impact is working with National Energy Action (NEA) to establish Impact Affordable Energy; an Energy Services Company (ESCo) in Cumbria to tackle fuel poverty through a range of environmental methods.

They have successfully secured an Innovation and Good Practice grant (sponsored by the Housing Corporation), which will support their approach to tackling fuel poverty.

“By developing environmental responses to fuel poverty, Housing Associations could significantly impact on climate change within existing stock and beyond, whilst providing direct economic benefits to low-income communities.”
Impact Affordable Energy

The regional Energy Services Company (ESCo) for Cumbria will provide:

• Energy audits and advice for residents in fuel poverty
• A domestic energy management service
• Energy efficiency and renewable energy measures for individuals or clusters of dwellings
• Bulk buying and onward sale of carbon-abated fuel supplies from mainstream suppliers
• Community-based renewable energy production and distribution

Rod is also developing plans for 2 district biomass heating schemes in Lakeland villages.

Both these models are being undertaken as pilot schemes and will create a replicable approach for other villages around Cumbria and further afield, that wants to develop renewable energy project in this way.

Rod is keen to ensure as many people, groups, villages and housing associations know about this as possible - so please spread the word!

If you have any feedback or questions, please post a comment to this post.

Rod at Impact Housing Association can be contacted on:

07769 905284

The O2 Energy Saver Fund is a joint initiative between O2 and the Energy Saving Trust. It has been designed to help local communities of between 10-25 households to install energy saving measures in their home that will help in the fight against climate change.
If an application is successful a “hit squad” will be sent into individual’s homes to install priority insulation measures.

For more information on the initiative please see the CAfE website:

The Energy Saving Trust also runs the CAfE (Community action for Energy) programme. CAfE is a network of people who share a common interest in community energy projects and ideas. Membership of the network is free and by joining you can keep up to date with news on community-based energy initiatives, as well as hearing about funding opportunities, training sessions and other news from the network.

Finally public sector and not for profit organisations can apply for funding through the Low Carbon Building Programme Phase 2 (managed by the Building Research Establishment (BRE) which offers funding for micro generation technology.

As I mentioned earlier, the RCCN has made it through to Stage 2 of the NESTA Big Green Challenge. We are very happy about this as we feel that joining people, ideas and innovation up is really important in inspiring and supporting action; we are pleased that NESTA recognised this. Now, after an informative workshop session in Birmingham and 4 hours spent chatting through our initiative with our lovely adviser, plus many many hours spent writing the detailed project plan - the final application has gone to NESTA. Fingers crossed now.

Some Challengers will get an opportunity to pitch their idea to the NESTA team and judging panel in July (I am imaging something like Dragons Den, but hopefully less scary) - with successful finalists (there will be 10) being announced thereafter.

Good luck to all the Big Green Challengers!

In its tenth year now, the New Statesman New Media Awards highlight the positive impact of new media technology on public life - and the Community Carbon Network has been nominated within the ‘Innovation’ category - which “recognises social technologies, people or organisations that make an impact and improve our society through the use of new media technology.”

The nomination is here and you can leave a comment or star rating too.

communitycarbon.net is an initiative developed by ruralnet|uk, the rural regeneration charity.  ruralnet|uk (and other collaborators) were also nominated for a New Media Award last year, for the Open Innovation Exchange.

Or are you thinking about starting one?

There are many groups and villages out there doing great stuff to collectively reduce emissions but at present these groups cannot network effectively with one another.  We can support communities to do this and can provide free training, web space and the support service ‘Experts Online‘ to those that want to be at the heart of collective community action.

If you are thinking about starting a project, you will be well aware of how important the right support is and how valuable it is to be in contact with other villages that are doing the similar things.

If this is the case, please comment on this post or call me (Sam) on 0845 1300 411.

Before Christmas I entered the Rural Community Carbon Network in to NESTA’s Big Green Challenge.

From over 350 initial applicant, I am really pleased to tell you that we have been selected to go forward as one of 100 projects that have made it to Stage 2 of the competition

This means that we are a little bit closer to winning - but we can also benefit from accessing NESTA’s team of advisers and attending some workshops.

We will know if we have made it to Stage 3 in October 2008.

Take a look at the other projects and groups who have made it to Stage 2 here.

Following on from my last post about the successful Collaborate|2008 convention, you can now watch Simon and Paul talk about the online Community Carbon Network over here at the Collaborate site (just scroll down to Simon). Thanks to David Wilcox and Paul Webster, the many highlights of the day have been captured using a live stream from David’s mobile phone- very clever stuff!

Take a look at some of the pictures of the day over here at flickr. Or follow the Collaborate Tweets from Twitter.

Yesterday, I was at Collaborate|2008 in Dunchurch near Rugby - this is the ruralnet|uk convention which was jam-packed full of people wanting to be inspired, learn more about collaborative tools and take away a new idea or contact. If you could not make it, check out the video streaming that happened live, straight to the website.

The IT team at ruralnet|uk have been working flat-out over the last few weeks to unveil the ‘Community Carbon Network‘ - which is the foundation for the online community of climate change groups. It pulls all the useful information which is ‘out there’ and being created by communities and organisations in isolation - and brings it all together in one place, for the benefit of the community. To underpin this and help ensure that all the good stuff people are doing is accessible, we will provide a free weblog to communities that want to share what they are doing with others.

The next step is to organise a one-day training session with a group of communities that want to get online - or enhance their online presence. The benefits to being able to openly share knowledge and experience throughout a networked community are enormous; it will help new groups to contact people who have ‘been there and done that’- as well provide the opportunity for more established groups to share with others what they have learnt in a much more efficient and collaborative way.

Please do contact me (Sam) on 0845 1300 411 if you are a community interested in benefiting from a network of other like-minded communities.