About Us
Climate Change, and the economic impact of possibly importing the majority of our energy in future, threatens us all. But we can all make a realistic contribution to reducing these threats.
We therefore formed this action group to promote Green Issues within our community. We recognise that by acting both individually and together as a community we can reduce our use of non-renewable energy, thereby reducing both the emissions of greenhouse gases and the import of fossil fuels.
At our initial meeting in May 2009 we decided to follow the methodology of The Greening Campaign (see below) which is very much about local people taking local action and (by late-2010) was being implemented in 200+ communities across England.
We successfully completed our Phase 1 campaign and in October 2010 launched our initial Phase 2 campaigns. Since then we have continued as an active organisation, running at least 4 major activities per year, and contributing a regular flow of articles to parish publications.
We run as a core committee of about 15 (which meets monthly). Anybody within Cold Ash Parish is welcome to join the Committee – just contact us.
Our Facebook page is here.
Organisationally we are a major Group within the Cold Ash Volunteer Groups (CAVG). CAVG is formally constituted and provides us with banking facilities.
We are enthusiastic supporters of the West Berkshire Green Exchange which links together all the Sustainability/Climate Change community groups in West Berkshire.
The Greening Campaign was set up in response to the threat of global warming. It was an innovative idea to help motivate people to reduce their energy consumption and therefore lower their personal and community carbon footprint. The campaign was the brain child of Terena Plowright, who is a resident of Petersfield and who wanted to make a difference. The campaign was so successful it was taken up by very many other local communities. It is now operating in communities across England..
The Greening Campaign is fun, structured, and makes fighting climate change visible in local communities.
The Greening Campaign joins individuals, groups, councils, schools and government together in a joint programme that is simple and very effective. We cannot do this in isolation – walk the talk!!
The Greening Campaign is a structured programme with Three Phases which, briefly, are
Engaging the community
Running energy saving projects within the community
Adapting the community for climate change
The central Greening Campaign has now run its course with Terena Plowright moving onto new opportunities after many hectic years. But (as for other similar groups) we have not depended on support from The Greening Campaign for some time now and are able to continue running a full set of activities.