Shared Energy: working together for a sustainable future

bassac believes that climate change will disproportionately affect people already living in poverty.

bassac has worked with the Community Development Foundation, Groundwork UK, the Community Sector Coalition and the new economics foundation (nef ) on the ‘Shared Energy’ project. Nine community organisations across England were supported to carry out environmental assessments and to work together using scenario planning to see how they could become more sustainable.

Because they are rooted in their communities and work with a diverse range of people, multi-purpose community organisations are ideally placed to lead the response locally to climate change. Many bassac members are working on the sustainability of their own organisations but importantly they are also working to improve sustainability with local people in their community.

From this project we've produced the Shared Energy Toolkit to help community organisations to raise awareness of climate change and plan for different possible future scenarios. This is a great way to raise awareness with staff, volunteers and service users and a way to influence other organisations and policy makers. The toolkit includes easy to use exercises and original ideas for imagining different futures and planning for these. It also explores the links between climate change and the mission and vision of multi-purpose community organisations.

To get a free printed copy of the Shared Energy toolkit or for advice about making your organisation more sustainable please contact Eleanor Pryde

We'd like to hear how you used the toolkit, what worked well and what didn't work so well and your views on the advice and support you'd like to receive from us in the future. Please contact Joanna Shardlow