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A Year of Community Climate Action: Reflections Report 2024

What a year it’s been – from moss mapping to repair cafes, from planting vegetables to making homes warmer… and that’s only the beginning!

As you probably know, our journey began with our Community Assemblies on the Climate in 2022-2023, where residents across our five areas in Gwynedd came together to envision a greener future. Following this, GwyrddNi was delighted to receive further funding from the National Lottery Community Fund, enabling us to start turning our community’s inspiring ideas – which are captured in our Action Plans – into real, tangible projects.

This marked the start of the “Community Action Period” – a time for bringing ideas to life!

Since then, the energy and passion of our communities have been inspiring. Some groups have been working tirelessly since the Assemblies, taking the initiative to secure their own funding. Others have worked alongside GwyrddNi’s Community Facilitators, receiving support and seed funding to get their projects off the ground.

We have created this report to share a taste of the incredible work happening, how our communities feel about GwyrddNi’s support so far, and to share some of the lessons we’ve learnt together:

GwyrddNi: Reflections on 2024 – Read the report as a flipbook or as a static PDF.

But this is not the end of the story – it’s just the beginning! The Action Plans are packed with brilliant ideas that need your support, and seed funding is still available to kick-start new initiatives or support existing ones. Whether you’re full of ideas or keen to lend a hand, we would love to hear from you: contact us or fill in this short form to tell us how you’d like to be involved.

Over the next three years, our aim is to kick-start, nurture and support a wide range of projects, enabling our communities to take ownership of them in the long term – creating a ripple effect of inspiration and positive change throughout Gwynedd and beyond!

If you want to be part of co-creating greener, more sustainable and resilient communities – get in touch.

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Dyffryn Peris Climate Cafe

Caffi Caban in Brynrefail is part of a centre that was founded with sustainability values at its core. It was wonderful to be there on the 4th of February for GwyrddNi’s 3rd Dyffryn Peris Climate Cafe. The first was held in November at the Lone Tree Cafe and the second online at the beginning of December for COVID safety reasons.

Climate Cafes take place all over the world. They’re informal events. An opportunity to share opinions, listen to others and make new connections.

It was wonderful to see some returning visitors as well as new faces.

Over the two hours, with some coming and going as is the nature of these events, I enjoyed the company of Moira, Rhian, Gareth, Eve, Lindsey, Kerry, Ruth and Trystan. Some had seen the Facebook advertisement and others by word of mouth.

Here’s a summary of the inspiring conversation topics that we flowed through and ideas shared;

  • Utopias Bach
  • Local primary schools doing great work
  • RSPB/NRW Nature Recovery Project (Natur am Byth) that Eve works with
  • Cwm y Glo old primary school building becoming Menter Fachwen HQ
  • Locavores (where can we buy locally grown food?)
  • Gareth & Menter Fachwen ‘What if…..?’ guided walks envisioning alternative landscapes (which inspired a group activity)
  • Could there be District Heating initiative for Brynrefail?
  • Trystan’s energy sufficiency assessment and modeling 
  • Profiad Ni – peer-to-peer house visits to showcase domestic sustainability endeavours 
  • Sewing Club @ Caban every Tue AM
  • Community Councillor Cari Jones’ great work in community building
  • New builds, retrofitting and internal vs external wall insulation and novel materials
  • 3km wide insect networks
  • Early access expression of interest to take part in Climate Assemblies

Following on from Gareth’s tales of the ‘What if?’ walks where walkers were invited to envision the landscape if conditions were different, I invited everyone there to come up with their own ‘What if? Question in response to climate change.

These are the questions that were posed. Would you care to respond to any of these?

Before heading home, I got to visit Brynrefail’s allotments with Angharad Owen. Another excellent example of a community pulling together with a sustainability initiative.

I’m extremely grateful to everyone who attended for taking a chance on an event with little information, run by a relative stranger! I sincerely hope that they found as much enjoyment and hope there as I did.

The next Climate Cafe will be on the 4.3.22 at 10am at the Coffee Pot (Arts and Craft Centre) Llanberis