Project Summary: Describe your contribution in one sentence

Accelerating UK local action and a community-powered response in particular, across different groups and generations, to tackle the climate and biodiversity crises.

What are the additional countries or territories of impact?

North America (biggest following outside UK)

Challenge Focus: What topic does your project most directly relate to?

Website URL(s) or social media handles

www.carboncopy.eco https://twitter.com/carboncopy_eco https://linkedin.com/company/carboncopy https://facebook.com/carboncopy.eco https://instagram.com/carboncopy.eco

The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve?

We simply have to admit it. Despite the fact that the climate and biodiversity crises are perceived as a grave concern, we have largely failed to touch the hearts of people at large. The role that the climate and nature play in our lives has failed to become a driving force behind individual and global action for most people, in most parts of the world.

One reason for this failure has been our tendency to communicate the crises as environmental problems, instead of talking about humans and solutions. At Carbon Copy, we engage communities by communicating a different narrative based on the diverse, direct benefits of working together locally, not limited to reducing emissions or halting biodiversity loss.

However, to reach a social tipping point we also need to connect with different audiences. Our next big programme will focus on older Britons whose priorities have shifted away from full-time paid work. This older segment of society is marginalized, left out of the youth-driven narrative on climate action and too often shunned as part of the problem not the solution. And yet, many older people have invaluable experience, influence within their communities and are seeking to do something active and purposeful.

We have less than a decade to decisively turn things around, which is why we need everyone to join in – young and old, of all ethnicities and from all sectors of society.

Your connection and commitment: How close are you to the problem and/or the community impacted?

The climate and biodiversity crises require change at all levels. The level of action that is often overlooked is local - where the forces of communities, local government and local institutions meet.

People locally are closest to the problems and hence closest to the solutions. There are 200+ local Climate Action Plans across the UK, developed collectively, with county-wide net zero and nature-positive targets. We know; we have helped to shape such plans, where we live. Across the UK, hundreds of thousands of people are unaware of these blueprints or the part they could play in turning these plans into reality.

And there are thousands of climate action initiatives that are under-powered because people do not feel confident enough to join in; live projects from inner cities to rural locations all around the country that make local communities stronger and fairer. We see this need for more people power, in our respective local counties.

As members of our own communities working with our local councils, the founders of Carbon Copy have experienced first-hand the difficulties of connecting people across different organisations and generations, to implement these Plans and to speed up change.

We did not have a wealth of real-world learning or different role models from other local areas to inspire our own community-led action. So we founded a non-profit organisation to bridge the gap.

Your approach: How are you enabling other people to identify as green changemakers? How are you influencing them to get involved in your initiative or care about the issue you are addressing?

Carbon Copy now manages a unique national collection of over 1000 climate action stories, told by the people who are leading change in their communities. We actively maintain this hub and publicise this invaluable resource through social media, local press and broadcast platforms, to as wide an audience as we can. People who don’t already know about us and want to start a new sustainability or social justice project in their community typically look online for ideas to copy. We make sure Carbon Copy appears close to the top of their search.

Whichever way they find us, we present local changemakers with a huge range of ideas to try, learning from previous projects, and contact information for advice. We make it easy and give them the confidence to get started, with the best chance of making an impact right away, using the communal well of shared wisdom and enthusiasm.

One of our key insights is that community power to tackle climate change doesn’t necessarily need a starting goal of tackling climate change. Instead, community action is often driven by a motivation to improve places and the quality of life within them, implicitly linked to a better local environment. There is further evidence that people who are civically engaged are more likely to be concerned about climate change. There is a compelling argument that community work is climate work, since the strengthening of community bonds almost inevitably leads to shared action towards sustainability and resilience.

With these broader motivations in mind, we encourage people on the cusp of taking local action to join in, through a mixture of inspiration and positive peer pressure by those who are already involved in local projects. In a similar way, we now want to mobilize the marginalized older generation.

Community involvement: How is your approach involving community participation, especially the historically marginalized groups?

All of our work at Carbon Copy is about enabling co-creation among communities. We give activists in UK communities access to inspiring stories about local leaders and the innovative work they are doing in different communities. Without exception, these stories emphasize the importance of co-operation and collaborative working for success.

We deliberately seed success stories from and about marginalized groups. Often these are not mainly about carbon and biodiversity, but focus on the ‘co-benefits’ of social justice and alleviating poverty around health (green spaces, air quality), energy (community green energy), or food (reducing food waste, community fridges).

But it’s not only about involving overlooked communities. It’s also about involving a different cohort in our society that historically has been dismissed and overlooked: older people, from all backgrounds. One way to effectively reach this cohort is through the network of approx. 12,000 parish councils throughout the UK.

Parish councils are perfectly placed to be catalysts for more climate action within their local areas. The majority are made up of experienced, older people keen to ‘get things done’. In the words of one parish councillor, “we need help to become greener as well as practical projects that local residents and retirees will get behind.”

Your Innovation: What is different about your initiative compared to other solutions already out there? How is your approach original and innovative? We are particularly interested in solutions that use regenerative approaches.

The power of big-thinking local climate action lies in connectedness. Carbon Copy exists to motivate, inform and give confidence to the biggest possible number of potential green changemakers in every community across the UK, to get started quickly with the best chance of making a real difference.

Carbon Copy amplifies the voices of many different people and shines a light on a uniquely diverse range of projects, so that there is something for everyone. We engage people through the social benefits of community action (versus the carbon consequences) and through the evident enjoyment of joining in.

We also break through to more people through innovative events that serve as ‘entry points’ in communicating about local climate action to a mass audience. For example, we generated tremendous community engagement through the Running Out of Time world-record relay in 2022, over 7,700km from Glasgow to Sharm-el-Sheikh.

The inspiring stories shared via Carbon Copy cover a uniquely wide scope of climate action, from biodiversity and nature to the built environment, circular economy, energy, finance, land use, transport, food and agriculture. There are many examples across these action areas of communities taking regenerative action, from slow fashion to pre-loved school uniform schemes, repair shops to tool libraries, active travel to car sharing, and the zero-waste circular economy strategies of numerous councils.

Much of the visible push for sustainability solutions across the globe has been led by the young, courageously making their voices heard everywhere from the streets to the UN climate summits. But we need everyone, so Carbon Copy’s next programme will focus on galvanising a potentially very powerful group, whose impact could be huge: the over-55’s.

Founding Story: Share a story about the "Aha!" moment that led the founder(s) to get started or the story of how you saw the potential for this to succeed.

One of our founders wrote a book in 2019 about local action and how small change becomes massive, titled Civic Revolution – A Citizen’s Guide. In the book, the answer to an unsustainable economy and unstable environment is having the courage to act. In the real world, the story of our time is about finding this courage.

In November 2018, Bristol City Council became the first local authority in the UK with the courage to declare a climate emergency, knowing they would have to change dramatically. Elsewhere, the founders worked to pressure their own councils to also declare climate emergencies.

What began as a trickle of declarations in 2019 turned into a torrent in 2020. Over 80% of all councils have now declared (320 councils), with the majority targeting 2030 to achieve net-zero emissions locally – 20 years ahead of the UK 2050 target! www.carboncopy.eco/local-climate-action

Carbon Copy was founded in 2020 in response to these declarations, believing in the power of local, and anticipating the need to move from declarations to plans to action, everywhere! The power of proliferation and connection between community initiatives is two-fold: when they succeed, the solutions are quickly copied; when they fail, they fail on a manageable scale with backups already in place.

Local leadership on the climate and biodiversity crises is emergent, and our model can be copied outside the UK.

Impact: How has your project made a difference so far? How is it contributing to a zero-carbon world- where every person thrives, and nobody gets left behind?

Carbon Copy is now one of the largest searchable collections of climate action success stories in the UK – with over 1000 different initiatives shared by project leaders across a wide range of areas and backgrounds. Our publishing platform is free to access, non-commercial and non-partisan; over 54,000 connections were made in 2022.

We keep an interactive map updated with the latest Climate Action Plans, from every local authority area in the UK (380 in total), together with local data of greenhouse gases emitted and sample live projects. By connecting the dots, people are encouraged to have more ownership of their local Climate Action Plan – which is a collective starting point for working together in the majority of local areas. During an average month, different people access these pages approximately 5,000 times to discover what’s happening locally.

We have also organised high-profile, mass participation events. For example, in 2022 Carbon Copy was a principal partner of the world’s biggest ever climate relay, Running Out of Time, along a 7,700km route designed to highlight hundreds of local climate action projects.

Over 825,000 people signed our climate action petition urging more support to help people tackle the climate crisis locally where they live. Our UK media reach during the climate relay was over 17 million.

What’s Next: What are your ideas for taking your project to the next level?

In Q4 2023, we plan to launch an ambitious new climate action programme to recruit and mobilize older Britons (aged 55+, from all backgrounds) who have moved away from full-time paid work. This marginalized age segment within the climate movement has a vital role to play in our collective behaviour change.

There is a huge opportunity to engage this cohort by giving them the support and materials they need to play a more active and joyous leadership role, by working with others on local climate action. Through bespoke online resources, facilitated conversations in workshops and peer-to-peer success stories, we want to deepen their interest; build confidence; and increase participation levels.

This new programme builds on Carbon Copy’s core offering, by focusing on a community-powered response, building new connections between different people (across a wide range of possible actions and between generations), and celebrating and normalising taking part.

This idea is unlike anything else in the UK. At its core, it inspires individual participation through community-led action; creates greater ownership of local area Climate Action Plans as the blueprint for collective change; and provides tangible project opportunities for older Britons who can help make a difference by joining in.

Your team: What is the current composition of your team (types of roles, qualifications, full-time vs. part-time, board members, etc.), and how do you plan to evolve the team’s composition as the project grows?

We are a small, agile team that works in collaboration with a host of partner organisations. Our internal team consists of three complementary groups: staffers, trustees and board advisors.

Our two full-time staffers are comms experts: Isabelle Sparrow is our Chief Storyteller with experience in the charity and public sectors; Yasmin Redfern is an accomplished digital content specialist.

The charity was founded by three, hands-on trustees: Riccardo Casale, entrepreneur and author of Civic Revolution; Andy Knott, co-founder of Hedron, the pioneering change management consultancy; Heather Allen, former EVP of Reckitt plc, the top-ranked most sustainable company in UK (#7 globally). Claudia Jaksch is the fourth trustee and CEO of think tank Policy Connect.

Our advisors are Sonya Bedford (MBE for services to community energy), Professor Ian Thomson (Director of the Centre for Responsible Business) and Zarina Ahmad (advocate for climate justice and race equality).

Operational Sustainability Plan: What is this solution’s plan to ensure operational sustainability.

We will carry forward our existing broad action areas into our new Q4 programme. For each action area, Carbon Copy will align with a delivery partner(s) to signpost people who need further project implementation support from subject matter experts. For example, CoMoUK – the national charity for shared transport including community car sharing and bike share – would advise on local set-ups with our older target audience in mind.

Leveraging our national collection of climate action stories and 380 local area pages, we will create a bespoke hub on Carbon Copy for specific comms and relevant tools for this new audience and use the new space as a platform to organise relevant (online and in-person) workshops.

We are in discussion with a potential channel partner, to reach our intended audience more efficiently and effectively, matching their need for more useful content with our aim of collaborating. Potential partners include the national parish council network, The Women’s Institute, u3a.

Rolling out different elements of this programme would be a major focus in 2024, and existing core staff members and trustees would invest significant time in implementation.

If successful in our GCC application, the added advice and team support would make a major difference to our ambitious new programme and its rollout.

VIDEO: Please share the link to a 1-minute YouTube video that answers the following “I identify as a Green Changemaker because...”. Ensure that your video does not exceed 60 seconds

https://drive.google.com/file/d/117ItZqgTHxIaSpwJSs1VGyBriCNVPjd6/view?usp=drive_link

Impact Model: While reviewing applications, we identified a need to better understand the impact models for the innovations that applied. How would you describe the activities you engage in and what outcomes and long-term impact do they lead to?

Our next big idea is an ambitious new climate action programme to recruit and mobilize older Britons (aged 55+, from all backgrounds) who have moved away from full-time paid work. This marginalized group within the climate movement has a vital role to play in stimulating collective behaviour change, everywhere.

The main activities of this Carbon Copy programme are:

1/ Develop and maintain an action-oriented website with bespoke newsletter.

Tie into the existing CC online hub, with local projects shared by 1000+ different organisations and pioneers, across 380 local areas in UK. Support with CC media to drive 50,000 page views so our target audience learns more about local action.

2/ Produce a podcast series by and for this audience.

Give this audience a voice and encourage participation through the inspiring project experiences of pioneers (of similar life stage). Leverage the success of first CC podcast series. Target a similar top 25% of all podcast downloads per episode, within 7 days of each release. This popular communication channel will promote the participation of this marginalized audience in local climate action.

3/ Run workshops.

Build confidence with this audience to join in climate action locally. Local workshops are a future element of the programme designed to boost the number of participants who join existing projects (identified by CC or partners; led by local pioneers) and who start new projects. Key impact metric of 75% participants joining or starting a climate action project.
 

Carbon Copy’s overall approach is to address problems that are interconnected with the climate and biodiversity crises, e.g. fuel and/or food poverty; poor health; social injustice. We see greater engagement and participation through this multi problem-solving perspective.

Audience: Who are you most directly impacting through your work? Who is the target beneficiary? Please specify if the population you are reaching is underserved due to any of the following characteristics?

If you chose the "Other" option, please specify

 

How are you activating green changemakers?

If you chose the "Other" option, please specify

 

Organization Type: Which organization type best describes how your work or initiative has been organized or registered?

Nonprofit/NGO

Tell us briefly about how you have and/ or would like to engage partners or other changemakers to enhance your approach:

Carbon Copy will roll-out its community-based workshops geographically, with an initial focus on 15 local areas in North-East England. This region is varied with a mix of prosperous places and areas of high deprivation, mostly in former mining communities and in parts of the bigger cities.

We are in early-stage discussions with Yorkshire & Humberside Climate Commission, an independent cross-sector organisation that supports ambitious climate actions and a just and inclusive transition, across this NE region. One of the Commission’s aims is to enable community engagement and encourage more hands-on participation, and by working in partnership, Carbon Copy could help in achieving this goal.

In addition, the Carbon Copy website, newsletter and podcast will all signpost people to other changemakers for more information and specific details about joining local projects that address climate change or protect nature.

Carbon Copy is a member of The Climate Coalition, together with some of the biggest non-profits and public sector organisations in the UK. Our organisation represents the voice of local communities and community action, and we will use this platform to engage with our audience and to highlight further the work of local changemakers.

Annual budget: Hint: What is the cost for your current operations every year (or most recent year)? This is expenditure for your project or organization. The reference currency is the U.S. dollar.

$100k - $250k

Winning Impact Potential: How would winning the Green Changemakers Challenge impact and leverage your work?

• The prize money would help bring other funders on board (who require seeing another funder before they will also commit).
   
• It would enable us to staff up the programme for wider and faster reach, because time is of the essence in tackling the climate and biodiversity crises. Specifically, we would be able to bring in more regions sooner, and manage a larger number at one time of all the programme elements we have described.
   
• Endorsement would raise the profile and credibility of our programme with additional partners, thereby also increasing our reach to new stakeholders and influencers.
   
• Visibility as winners in the Green Changemakers Challenge network would encourage other changemakers (in other countries) to copy what we’re doing; we believe in scaling our impact through others who copy what works!

Skills Matching: If you win, you may have the opportunity to be matched with HSBC employees for skill-based mentorship. If matched, which of the following skills would you be most interested in receiving?

Program Design