info@greenerkirkcaldy.org.uk   8 East Fergus Place, Kirkcaldy, KY1 1XT   01592 858 458

Greener Kirkcaldy

Going Greener Together

climate action

Using Climate Fresk to understand the climate emergency

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In March 2022, Climate Action Fife delivered their first in-person training day combining the Climate Fresk approach with Fife Climate Knowhow modules. Read about how it went in this blog by Climate Action Fife. 

We developed the Fife Climate Knowhow course as part of the Climate Action Fife project. Our training provides everything the learner needs to know to confidently discuss the climate emergency, as well as take action to tackle it. At the end of the course, people have an understanding of the science, causes and impacts of climate change and the knowledge and motivation to reduce their personal, community and work based emissions. Participants also learn how to talk about climate change to their peers.

The course has been accredited by the Carbon Literacy Project as meeting their standard. This means those who complete the course can be certified as carbon literate.

Climate Fresk is a collaborative workshop that allows participants to collectively understand the implications of climate change and trigger action. Participants work together to create a collage using a set of 42 climate cards. Firstly, participants lay out the cards to tell the story of global warming, thinking about causes, effects and impacts. They then creatively link the cards by adding arrows and artwork to their collage. Finally, they reflect on their creation and give it a name. It is a collaborative and creative approach to understanding the science and impacts of climate change.

Sports Development Team Climate Fresk Training Day

We delivered Climate Fresk and Climate Knowhow with Fife Council Sports Development Team. The team leader had come across the Big Five for Fife on social media. He contacted us to find out how his entire team could become more knowledgeable on the climate emergency. The Big Five for Fife is our public campaign to encourage Fifers to tackle the climate emergency by pledging to one of five high impact actions.

In the morning, we looked at the science, causes and impacts through the interactive session, Climate Fresk.

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After lunch, we delivered the Adaptation and Action and Talking About Climate Change modules of our Climate Knowhow course. Participants took part in climate-friendly food and travel activities and we talked about what a climate friendly Fife might look like. We discussed individual and community climate action. The group also talked about how to make talking about climate change normal.

We set time aside in the programme to help the participants fill in a short assessment at the end of the day to gain Carbon Literate accreditation. All participants have since become accredited.

At the end of our Climate Fresk training day, the participants told us they felt:

“Educated and in control of how I can make a difference”

“Empowered”

“This workshop was done with colleagues and it was great to work together on getting a better understanding of Climate change and how we can tackle it.”

“[The facilitators] were great, answered any questions we had and the workshop was very interactive. Thoroughly enjoyed it and would recommend it to others. Definitely gave me a better understanding of Climate change”

“Fantastic training and a real eye opener”

Climate Knowhow

We have delivered Climate Knowhow to 121 Fifers to date, 49 of whom were certified as Carbon Literate. This includes project partners, community leaders, community councils, Fife Council employees and members of the public.

The post-course assessment requires learners to pledge to an individual and group climate-friendly action. We used these pledges to calculate that Climate Knowhow has saved 117 tCO2e annually, with a lifetime saving of 350 tCO2e.

If you would like to find our more about taking part in Climate Fresk or another of our climate literacy workshops, please email hello@climateactionfife.org.uk

Our Carbon Literate Organisation Journey

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Greener Kirkcaldy is a Gold Carbon Literate Organisation.
 
This accreditation recognises that we are improving carbon literacy in our community. That we are engaging our audience in developing and delivering low carbon behaviours. And that we are supporting the development of a Carbon Literate workforce. The certification is given by the Carbon Literacy Trust.

Our Carbon Literate Organisation Journey

As part of Climate Action Fife, we developed our Climate Knowhow training course to improve understanding of the climate emergency in Fife. Our course also builds community capacity to take action. The training has a Fife focus to make the learning relevant to local people. In our course, we discuss the impact of climate change in Fife, as well as sharing success stories of local people taking action.
 
We focus on the co-benefits of taking climate action. This inspires participants to pledge to take action themselves. A strong message of Climate Knowhow is that community leaders are the right people to drive climate action in their community. George Marshall from charity Climate Outreach explains that very well here.
You can have the greatest climate scientist in the world, telling people that climate change is a threat, but in the end people only respond when they hear from people around them. When you have this climate collective silence, it is by naming the silence that you get action. Try to have a conversation or interaction every day where you do that and don’t for one second underestimate how important those conversations are.

The impact

Greener Kirkcaldy is a local climate change organisation. As such, we were already taking climate action and encouraging other to do so too. We see ourselves as leaders on climate action in Fife and the Gold CLO status is a reflection of our knowledge and expertise.
 
Our staff have completed the Fife Climate Knowhow course. This was a fantastic morale boost and refreshed our commitment to our work. The training improved our knowledge and increased our confidence to talk about climate change. It highlighted how all our projects and activities contribute to a future where everyone can live better and tread more lightly on our planet.
It also reminded us of the urgent need to reach new audiences and empowered us to lead by example. Greener Kirkcaldy staff and volunteers are climate champions in their own families and communities.

Our Carbon Literate Organisation future

We worked with Climate Action Fife partners to develop our climate literacy course. All the partners, Fife College, FCCAN and Fife Council are committed to completing the training and also hope to apply for CLO status. We will continue to deliver training to our partners and will support them to deliver it to their own communities.
 
It is important to continue to build capacity in communities across Fife to talk about the climate emergency – our job isn’t done! We will keep the course up to date and include more local stories. We will deliver both to groups, organisations and individuals and offer a mix of online and face to face training.
 
Our Climate Toolkit provides further resource to promote climate literacy. It contains resources, event guides and success stories to download that will get climate conversations going across Fife. We will offer workshops on climate action to support this. We will cover themes including transport, energy, growing, cooking and waste reduction. Alongside our training, this will support a wave of climate action across the county.
 
CLO status is a tool that we can use to further engage our community. Gaining gold accreditation is an important milestone for our organisation and the Climate Action Fife partnership. It provides us with greater authority and influence to make Fife a greener and fairer place to live.

It’s Food Waste Action Week

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Here at Greener Kirkcaldy it is Food Waste Action Week  every week, but this week there is extra focus on how we save food from the bin by changing the way we buy, store, and use it.

What’s the problem?

The Love Food Hate Waste campaign tells us that the average UK family wastes eight meals every week. Food waste in UK households produces nearly 25 million tonnes of CO2 every year and cost families a lot of money.

This year the spotlight is on the unsung heroes that live in most British kitchens – Fridges, freezers, microwaves; they can all help us to reduce food waste in our homes – helping to save the planet and saving you money too!

Two handy guides to help us become freezer heroes

The campaign has produced two handy guides to help us all become freezer heroes and guide us on how to freeze and defrost meat and poultry safely. Freezing the food you haven’t had time to eat acts like a pause button, giving you more time to eat the food you’ve bought.

Scotland’s Food Waste Reduction Champion

There is also a great competition for those community chefs and food projects out there. You can compete to be Scotland’s Food Waste Reduction Champion. All you have to do is to share your food waste-busting recipes before the deadline of 1st September. Find out more here.

Take action every week

Remember you can take action of food waste all year round by getting involved in Food Pantries, Food Hubs and Community Fridges across Fife.

At Greener Kirkcaldy we run the Lang Toun Larder (currently on waiting list) and our Community fridge is open to all on Thursday afternoons and Fridays. We are also looking for Community Food Volunteers to join us.

Community Food Volunteers help out in The Lang Spoon Community Kitchen. The kitchen run a range of exciting food and cooking activities, including courses and workshops, Community Meals, The Lang Toun Larder – a community pantry, and a community fridge.

Greener Kirkcaldy Annual Report 2020 – 2021

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2020 – 2021 was an eventful period for Greener Kirkcaldy, learning to adapt and change like many organisations had to in 2020. We also opened our community bike shop Lang Toun Cycles and launched the Climate Action Fife partnership project. We were able to provide Emergency food and energy support for vulnerable people during lockdown. Our Community Meals became the Community Meals To Go – a weekly takeaway meal that served over 10,000 meals in one year. The Cosy Kingdom team went out on 356 handy service visits, installing measures like thermal curtains and LED bulbs.

We were still able to hold events, with 800 people taking part in 70 events both in-person and online. We also welcomed almost 1,000 new people to our social media community. This was a key place for us to keep in touch with people when we were closed during lockdown.

Read our highlights in our 2020 – 2021 Annual Report 

The results are in! Reflecting on The UN Climate Conference in Glasgow – Cop26

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The climate summit made some positive steps but it was also disappointing. The final agreement is not as strong as we wanted it to be. But it does commit each country to revisit and strengthen their emissions targets in 2022.  The science tells us that we need to limit the rise in global average temperatures to 1.5 degrees. That aim is still within reach, if only just.

What did the countries agree in Glasgow?

  • For the first time at a COP conference, there was an explicit plan to reduce use of coal. Coal is responsible for 40% of annual CO2 emissions. But countries only agreed a weaker commitment to “phase down” rather than “phase out” coal after a last minute change.
  • World leaders agreed to phase-out subsidies that artificially lower the price of coal, oil, or natural gas. But no firm dates have been set.
  • Leaders from more than 100 countries signed the Glasgow leaders’ declaration on forests and land use and promised to stop deforestation by 2030.
  • A scheme to cut 30% of methane emissions by 2030 was agreed. Methane is currently responsible for a third of human-generated warming.
  • More than 400 financial institutions agreed to provide more money for green technology. It means that many major pension providers will consider investing in more environmentally friendly sectors.

Other important agreements

The UN Climate conference also acted as a backdrop to the Glasgow Food and Climate Declaration  which was officially presented by 100 local governments at Glasgow City Chambers. The declaration is a commitment by subnational governments to tackle the climate emergency through integrated food policies. It was initiated by Nourish Scotland with Glasgow City Council and others.

And there was a glimmer of hope in relation to oil and gas. The Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance (BOGA) was formed at cop26. The Alliance is led by Costa Rica and Denmark and has another six full members: France, Greenland, Ireland, Quebec, Sweden and Wales. Each member will commit to ending new licensing rounds for oil and gas exploration and production. They must also set an end date for oil and gas production. The alliance of governments is the first of its kind committed to phasing out the production of oil and gas.

Greener Kirkcaldy’s response

Here at Greener Kirkcaldy, the outcome of the summit has made us more determined. We will continue to work locally to raise awareness, build capacity, and support our community to take action on climate change.

There are community groups all over the world working towards a more sustainable future. The stories from Glasgow in this blog post are inspiring. In Fife, a network of community groups including Greener Kirkcaldy is working with Fife Council and Fife College on the Climate Action Fife project. In September, 900 Fifers took part in Line in the Sand events to show their support for urgent action. We believe that community groups have a key role to play in building the movement for change.

If you agree, we would love you to join us by becoming a member of Greener Kirkcaldy.

Blue Sky Thinking: Fresh ideas to encourage us to fly less

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Flying less is a quick way to significantly reduce your carbon footprint, but it seems that giving up our regular flight for some overseas sunshine is a difficult ask for many of us – even getting the conversation going is a challenge!

At this event, we will hear from two speakers who have been attempting to do just that, and who are trying to empower individuals and businesses to change the way we holiday and help us overcome our collective addiction to flying. We will hear about their campaigns, find out how to get involved and learn from their experiences of encouraging others to reduce their air-travel.

Anna Hughes, Director of Flight Free UK, will be sharing her experiences of encouraging individuals to stay grounded for a year by signing their flight free pledge. The organisation began life in February 2019 inspired by the Swedish Flygfritt (flight free) movement, which asks people to stay grounded for a year in order to reduce their carbon footprint, re-discover the joys of overland travel, and begin to shift the social norm away from aviation.

Our second speaker, Emma Kemp, is Campaigns Manager for Possible, who work across the UK supporting people and groups to do bold, beautiful things to tackle climate change. She will be sharing the story of their Climate Perks initiative, which supports climate-conscious employers to offer paid ‘journey days’ to staff who travel on holiday by train, coach or boat instead of flying – empowering them to act on their values.

We will finish with a group discussion on flight reduction, how to encourage behaviour change and will consider what will happen as Covid-19 travel restrictions are lifted. You will also have a chance to put your questions to our speakers.

Booking Information

The event is free but booking is required as places are limited.

The event will take place online, via Zoom. We’ll send out a joining link the day before the event.

If you have any problems booking or any questions, please phone 01592 858458 or email craig@greenerkirkcaldy.org.uk

About our speakers

Anna Hughes is Director of Flight Free UK. Anna has worked in the sustainable transport sector since 2008, mainly focusing on increasing cycling levels with children and families. A lifelong environmentalist, she made the decision to stop flying ten years ago and hopes the #FlightFree2021 campaign will inspire others to do the same.

 

 

Emma Kemp is Campaigns Manager at Possible, climate change charity focusing on positive, practical action. She has 7+ years experience in the sector, in 2019 was selected as one of the British Science Association’s ‘New Voices’, and has previously appeared on Channel 4 News and Sky News. She currently heads up Possible’s Climate Perks initiative, featured in publications including Harper’s Bazaar, the Guardian, and the Financial Times. There are a growing number of Climate Perks certified employers based in sectors ranging from food to finance to digital.

 

Main Image: Flower photo created by jannoon028 – www.freepik.com