uZero is a platform that maps and predicts fuel poverty by integrating cross-sector datasets with anonymised real-time smart meter data. It provides local authorities, housing associations, energy providers, and social care providers with a method for targeting solutions that will enhance wellbeing of occupants while saving energy and reducing emissions. To help these organisations identify the areas most at risk of fuel poverty, the platform provides both satellite maps and street views of local data along with probability results displayed via heatmaps. The platform is easy to navigate and utilises custom layers and filters which can also be exported as APIs for integration with third-party systems.����

Using AI and machine learning, uZero can predict the carbon saving potential along with the cost of remediation in targeted areas. Organisations which provide targeted support can be more efficient and act sooner using the insights provided by uZero to identify the most at-risk households, including “hidden pockets” which may otherwise escape detection as at risk of fuel poverty such as more rural homes, elderly residents, and householders who do not speak English as their first language. This ensures a higher return on investment for energy-efficiency campaigns and other support services. uZero can also provide ‘before and after’ comparisons to help organisations better understand the success of the programmes they run.��

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Building with Nature (BwN)’s mission is to make high quality green infrastructure integral to placemaking in the UK, maximising benefits for both people and the natural world. The BwN Standards define what good green infrastructure looks like at each stage of the development process. This framework contains 12 individual standards built around the themes of Core, Wellbeing, Water, and Wildlife. The framework itself is also easy-to-use and is free to download. A Building with Nature approach is one that through the provision of good green infrastructure:

• Optimises multifunctionality and connectivity
• Positively responds to the climate emergency and maximises environmental net gains
• Champions a context driven approach and creates distinctive places
• Supports equitable and inclusive places and secures effective place-keeping
• Brings nature and water closer to people
• Delivers climate resilient water management
• Delivers wildlife enhancements and underpins nature’s recovery

Planning authorities use the standards to develop and test new planning policy with planners benefitting from a clear picture of what good looks like, a shared framework of principles, and the ability to draw on supporting specialist knowledge they may not have in-house. Professional experts – ecologists, landscape architects, and planning consultants – use the standards to engage with clients and improve physical development of green infrastructure. Many go through training to become Approved Assessors, so they can help their schemes achieve BwN certification. The Standards were developed to support cross-disciplinary decision making and inform better design and delivery of green infrastructure.

Effectiveness of the solution is determined through the assessment and third-party audit of development proposals and/or policy documents. Applicants and their projects/policy that meet the Standards are granted, by way of a certificate, a BwN Nature Award with all awarded projects/policies listed on the Building with Nature website.

The cost of appointing a BwN Approved Assessor will vary depending on the appointment and project scope. The accreditation cost also varies from £1,300 to £8,000 + VAT and depends on the size of the development. The accreditation cost for a policy document is currently £2,625 + VAT.

WeCanMake have developed a framework for addressing these problems which can build social infrastructure and community wealth all the while providing homes where they are needed. The framework was developed on a neighbourhood test-space in Knowle West, Bristol, a 100-year-old council-built estate. WeCanMake is a community land trust (CLT) which has developed a community-led and innovative approach to build affordable homes in micro-sites. Landowners can opt-in to provide micro-sites to be used for new homes. These sites could be between existing buildings or in large back gardens. WeCanMake’s strategy is focused on what they call ‘gentle densification’ which involves utilising the capacity of the existing urban fabric instead of building in greenfield areas or with high-rise housing complexes.

Ownership of the micro-sites is transferred from the Council to the CLT to be held by the Trust in perpetuity giving low density neighbourhoods the power to densify on their own terms. Through the CLT, the community also establishes a Community Design Code to ensure that any new homes add to the neighbourhood’s character and are high-quality. Their Our Living Rent policy also ensures that rent for the new homes is no higher than one-third the average neighbourhood household income. WeCanMake also utilises Modern Methods of Construction to realise a number of benefits. This approach allows for the homes to be locally produced in a community microfactory, ensuring that the community can retain more value by locally developing skills, creating jobs, and providing tech infrastructure.

WeCanMake’s framework was also developed to function without requiring any new policy or regulation. It can function as a prototype for similar communities across the UK. With many similar neighbourhoods in other cities, the approach WeCanMake has developed can be scaled, replicated, and adapted elsewhere. To facilitate this, they have published their Playbook to explain their methods and share insights into how it could be applied in other communities. Over 1.1 million council-built interwar homes like those found in Knowle West can be found across England. With only a 3% increase in densification, 33,000 affordable homes could be built where they are needed most.

D&G is a turn key vertical farm packaged inside a 40ft shipping container. It combines powerful aeroponic technology with advanced farm management software, allowing growers of all abilities and backgrounds access to the freshest produce for communities. With aeroponics, plant roots are irrigated with nutrient rich mist, allowing roots greater access to oxygen and nutrients, leading to faster growing times and healthier plant stock. Communities are able to localise their food system, reduce food miles to metres whilst producing healthy and nutritious food with far less impact on our planet.

D&G container farms can be used as a stand alone system, or integrated with other farming methods to create a more holistic system of urban farming. Vertical container farms are best used to grow fresh herbs, nutritious leafy vegetables and microgreens, and can grow 20-200% faster than crops grown using hydroponics, enabling growers to supply fresh, sustainable produce to more of the local areas. Growing in a controlled environment means that growers use no pesticides, herbicides and can grow and harvest 365 days a year, so growers have a reliable and sustainable source of crops throughout the seasons.

D&G’s Life Cycle Assessment demonstrates that with a grid renewable supply of energy, it has the potential to offset ~4,300 kg/CO2 every month if directly replacing imported crops. It can be incorporated into any urban environment in spaces otherwise unsuitable for growing food. Basements, car parks, rooftops – these spaces then have the ability to be productive and grow fresh food from whom surrounding businesses and individuals can benefit. Providing a space to reconnect people with where their food comes from and freeing up more precious land suitable for schemes that enhance natural capital and focus on biodiversity. Urban neighbourhoods and communities that are disconnected from the food system instantly have access to a working farm, providing fresh healthy food which has been grown and harvested on their doorstep. It also creates new and exciting employment possibilities in the agri-tech industry.

Drop & Grow (D&G) can be used in a variety of scenarios to deliver a range of impacts and benefits to the community it serves. This can range from the provision of fresh healthy produce to creating employment opportunities in a new and exciting agtech sector. LettUs Grow has a comprehensive farm economic model that can be used to build and test viable operation models for D&G in a range of scenarios.

D&G starts at £100�� plus VAT. As a stand alone project LettUS Grow aims to model operational scenarios that offer a return on investment of less than 3 years.

To see how the Green Roof Project works in just 4 minutes watch !

The Green Roof Project is, in effect, a takeover of rooftops for people and nature by creating green spaces to support community cohesion, raise awareness and demonstrate the benefits of green roofing.

The Green Roof Project combines both product (green roof, roof garden and growing spaces) and service (installation, training and outreach) to pioneer the retrofit potential of green and blue roofs in towns and cities. In a time of climate emergency and biodiversity loss, it is essential that towns and cities look at green infrastructure opportunities to mitigate the effects of climate change. These are opportunities that can recreate lost wildlife habitats and improve the natural environment.

By retrofitting green roofs it can result in multiple indirect benefits including reduced heating costs, extending the life span of the roof, health and wellbeing, food growing opportunities and biodiversity net gain, plus building internal capability for long-term stewardship of the roof. The Green Roof Project has been tested and proved that can be translated to any appropriate roof, any size, anywhere.

EM|Path is a not-for-profit social enterprise that uses a range of people-centred co-production and engagement techniques to support sustainable community development and environmental protection. EM|Path works across Europe with organisations and groups to help them develop sustainable and inclusive projects, design outputs, conflict resolution and team building.

EM|Path works with cities to prepare the ground for meaningful co-production. At the heart of delivering this are the fundamental principles of slow research, creative thinking, and contextual understanding that are key for enabling stakeholders to express and connect the tangible and intangible factors that matter and that build the requisite trust and shared vision. Delivering the EM|Path approach requires time and ongoing commitment by all stakeholders to build lasting, sustainable and just transitions across the multitude of challenges facing us.

The EM|Path Approach is a co-creative, arts-based engagement process developed within the Connecting Nature project to support cities in the design, delivery and stewardship of nature-based solutions. The EM|Path Approach uses several methods – memory work, immersion in nature, embodied reflection, eco-therapy, and body mapping – to help capture lived experiences and build our stories in and with nature. It works with communities and stakeholders to co-create meaniful connections through emotional mapping, empathetic connections, embodied reflections, embedding shared learning and knowledge and empowering communities.

EM|Path tailors its offer to the specific context and needs of each project, to provide the essential foundations for spatial, institutional, and local development transformations that respect social and environmental justice.

The investment will depend on the time, goals, context, number of stakeholders, degree/depth of consultation, and could be in the range of 15%-20% of budget.

To see how The Connecting Nature Framework works in under 7 minutes watch !

In response to the above uncertainty, Connecting Nature has developed a process tool to help organisations and individuals navigate the path towards the large-scale implementation of NBS. The Connecting Nature Framework places NBS at the core of an interactive process. The process runs through three distinct phases of development for a NBS: 1) Planning 2) Delivery 3) Stewardship.

Throughout each phase there are seven separate elements that need to be considered to shape individual NBS:

1. Technical solutions
2. Governance
3. Financing and business models
4. Nature-based enterprises
5. Co-production
6. Impact assessment
7. Reflexive monitoring

The tool is free to use being made available as an open access resource following its development in the European Commission co-funded project Connecting Nature. In order to mainstream NBS processes, it is likely that significant governance and investment changes will be required. The Framework provides guidance in relation to how this can be developed and achieved.

Tiny Forest is an innovative tree planting initiative that establishes accessible, nature-rich green spaces in our towns and cities, where they are needed most by people and wildlife. The disproportionate power of a Tiny Forest is delivered through three positive impacts:

1. Physical: dense, fast-growing native woodlands, bringing a range of environmental benefits and consisting of around 600 trees planted in a tennis-court sized plot of 200m2, and using no chemicals.
2. Social: local communities, schools and businesses directly engaged in planting, maintaining and monitoring of the forests
3. Scientific: public and citizen science activities that support data collection on the environmental and social benefits of Tiny Forest, uploaded to Earthwatch’s open-access digital data platform.

Tiny Forest’s approach is about planting ‘the right trees in the right places’. It works with local authorities to identify locations that will maximise value by planting in areas of high deprivation, creating green corridors and greening schools.��In addition to the physical creation of the forests, Tiny Forest also empowers local communities to care for and maintain the forests, as well as partaking in scientific research at every forest planted, to assess the impacts they have over time and between forests.��Tiny Forest provides outdoor space for people to enjoy nature, as well as educational and volunteering opportunities, resulting in a multitude of benefits for the community.

The total cost for the 2-year Tiny Forest programme is £40,000 +VAT which includes site selection, landscaping, materials, preparation and construction, community engagement, research, education and sundries.

Although return on investment has yet to be determined, early assessments already indicate high potential for positive impact including improved soil quality and species diversity as well as 100% of participants rating their experience as positive.��Further study is already planned, but initial results suggest that Tiny Forest represent a cost-effective alternative to traditional tree-planting and urban landscaping options, when the combined environmental and social benefits are taken into consideration.

Watch to learn about the Model in under 3 minutes!

The Model is Demsoc’s response to gaps they are witnessing in pan-European efforts to democratise climate action. Technocratic, transactional solutions are favoured by governments and industry but are not the answer for strengthened climate resilience. Demsoc assert that durable change requires democratic, relational approaches, putting diverse community voices and knowledge systems, and deeply-rooted collaboration at the heart of how governments, civil society and communities act for our collective futures.

The Model is a compass, not a map. It makes us think about and commit to steps we can take towards climate resilience, democratically. In the context of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), it provides language and tools for cities and regions to explore this question at a local level, to show, assess and celebrate progress, and reveal possibilities for changes in direction. It uses the analogy of tree canopies symbolising protection and durability for the climate resilience of where we live, work and play. Through practice, it draws us towards the social, as well as physical, resilience NBS provide.

The democratic, relational approaches fostered by use of the Model are important in all stages of the NBS lifecycle. The Model includes four tools for practical application:

1. Canopy for Climate Democracy: To assess and see the big picture of a city or region’s climate resilience based on four segments for climate democracy derived from Demsoc’s work in the climate field: diversity of actors and knowledge, participatory culture, resourcing, and competencies. Shows how to map foundational conditions, emerging shifts, and future possibilities for change. The Actor Types & Interactions and Competencies tools feed into this tool for a ‘big picture’ view.
2. Actor Types & Interactions: Deep democratic support for climate action requires collaboration between diverse actors. This tool helps to identify different types of actors present in action for climate resilience, reveal who is missing, and build inclusive and diverse engagement strategies. Feeds into the Canopy for Climate Democracy tool.
3. Competencies for Climate Democracy: Taking action for climate resilience requires a spectrum of individual and group skills and capabilities. This tool provides reflection on competencies present in work programmes for climate action, and helps build team profiles and recruitment strategies. Feeds into the Canopy for Climate Democracy tool.
4. Landscape Analysis: Addressing structural barriers to change means being able to identify what’s preventing transition to low-carbon alternatives while simultaneously weakening democracy. This tool uses lenses of democratisation, decarbonisation, and community and climate resilience to identify and map structural barriers within a qualitative framework. It is designed to expand thinking about a project or issue, helping teams progressively identify areas for change, build compelling stories about the impacts of making these changes, and celebrate progress made as programmes advance. It helps determine where teams could or should be focusing their efforts, and provides a way of continuously realigning priorities.

The Model and its tools are for use by anyone working in cities or regions on climate action or policy, including:

• Civil society organisations working with local authorities on large-scale, complex climate programmes, to build competency in democratic climate action and mindsets and methods for change;
• Public servants working in climate innovation programmes at the local, regional or national level;
• Funders of climate innovation programmes, to consider ‘conditions’ for long term, scalable and durable change, and which suppliers and sites are best suited to make this happen;
• Researchers and students examining ‘climate democracy’ and/or working in climate or democracy fields;
• Grassroots groups progressing change from the ground-up.

The Model has been used to date by local authorities to understand the underlying conditions for climate resilience in a city, which efforts and resources should be explored, and where there is a need to readjust activities for better impact.

The Model is an open-access prototype. Demsoc estimate that each NBS solution would benefit from an indicative range of 15-20% of project value to allow for the needed local project capacity to implement the Climate Democracy Model, assess progress and recalibrate efforts. This estimate does not reflect the costs required to develop new tools, implement engagement methods, institutions or forms of governance that might be a result of the implementation of the Climate Democracy Model.

The Model relies on the capacity of project holders to explore the question of climate resilience at a local level. The Model can be used at the project level, city-wide work or as a way to understand NBS impact on regional efforts towards climate resilience. The Model is not a blueprint but requires adaptation to local contexts and settings.

Collecteco partners with companies across the UK to donate furniture, equipment and materials to charities, schools, NHS Trusts and other not for profit organisations. Donations of kit means that good causes get to spend their funding on helping people and communities. In return, clients get a report detailing the social value, carbon and CE benefits of their donations. Collecteco can also facilitate introductions to good causes supported to yield future social value opportunities through corporate volunteering, mentoring, etc.

Collecteco make the donation of surplus furniture, equipment and materials (‘kit’) quick and easy. It is a managed process so that Collecteco can ensure that kit is cleared from site on time, within HS requirements and on budget.

Collecteco usually work with clients on a partnership agreement, which means they are ready at the end of phone or email when surplus kit becomes available from across the UK. Impact is greatest, and carbon and costs lowest, when Collecteco can get at the forefront of projects and work with clients to achieve this and anticipate when surplus kit might be available. But they also realise that time is a luxury on some projects, so have a national network of labour, transport and storage partners that means they can get kit off site quickly at short notice.

Once Collecteco have instruction from a client they will identify any of their preferred good causes then we will allocate kit to their waiting list of thousands of not for profit good causes actively searching for donations of kit. If kit is a little out of the ordinary, then Collecteco will “market” it to their good cause network and through this achieve some great uses for kit that wouldn’t normally have been thought of as reusable.

Collecteco report back on carbon avoided by enabling the reuse of surplus kit, the tonnage diverted being broken-up for recycling, energy recovery or landfill and also the social value generated by the donation and the potential legacy. They provide a “paper trail” that details duty of care info and transfer liability from client to Collecteco and then from Collecteco to the good cause recipient. Liability is a major perceived barrier to the donation of kit, but Collecteco state they have never had a problem in this area and good causes are overwhelmingly grateful for donations.

Collecteco usually work with clients on a partnership agreement to understand the their operation and anticipate better when surplus kit becomes available. Usually, so that both sides can get acquainted, Collecteco will do “trial-runs” before entering into a partnership agreement.

When Collecteco can get in front of donation projects, their partnership agreement is based on the weight of the kit donated (actual and average weights). They believe charging by weight is a good way to set expectations and can be more easily compared with the costs for putting kit in skips. The more a client uses Collecteco, the cheaper their rates become.

If a project has a tighter timeframe, or Collecteco need to provide labour, transport and storage, then this is priced on project by project basis. Collecteco will work with existing resource on site wherever possible to keep costs down to make reuse feasible.

Costs are comparable with traditional methods to clear kit with the added benefit of the social value, carbon and CE benefit report.