Category: GwyrddNi

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A Year of Community Climate Action with GwyrddNi

GwyrddNi is a community-based, community-led climate action movement, which brings people together in five areas in Gwynedd to discuss, learn and act locally on climate change. GwyrddNi is delivered by DEG, Partneriaeth Ogwen , Cyd Ynni, Yr Orsaf, Cwmni Bro Ffestiniog and Ynni Llŷn and funded by the National Lottery Community Fund. See more on the GwyrddNi website: www.gwyrddni.cymru

Here’s an update from the team:

Well, what a year – from mapping moss to repair cafes, from planting vegetables to making homes warmer… and that’s just the beginning!

As you probably know, our journey started with our Community Climate Assemblies in 2022-2023, where residents across our five areas in Gwynedd came together to imagine a greener future. Following this, GwyrddNi was delighted to receive further funding from the National Lottery Community Fund, enabling us to start bringing the inspiring ideas of our communities – captured in our Community Action Plans – to life.

This marked the start of the “Community Action Phase” – the time for putting plans into action.

Since then, the energy and passion of our communities has been inspiring to see. 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 some seed funding to get their projects off the ground – or a mix of all of the above.

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

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

Here are some highlights from last year:

  • In Dyffryn Nantlle, the Pickling Shed is being built and several meetings and workshops have already been held on preserving and pickling food.
  • In Dyffryn Ogwen, the Moss Mapping team have held several moss walks and are in the process of creating their moss map.
  • So far this year GwyrddNi has worked with 17 schools, with a total of 957 engagements. We are still working with several schools on bringing the children’s ideas to life, with several local artists joining us soon on the Creative Schools project.
  • The number of children who said they would be very confident explaining to someone else what climate change was jumped from 17% before our sessions to 84% after our sessions. We also helped one school win an Eco Schools Gold Award!
  • Our facilitator in Dyffryn Peris has helped organise people and funding to establish the new Partnertiaeth Dyffryn Peris (Partnership), which included renting office space and running an ongoing project to look at local housing needs and the possibility of establishing a community land trust
  • The Bro Ffestiniog school uniform exchange saw up to 300kg of school uniforms being donated and rehomed, with similar projects taking place across the other areas.
  • Hwb Beics was established in Pen Llŷn, with over 40 people so far having had a very positive experience of borrowing an electric bike and using it to go to work.
  • In May, at least 60 people attended the Climate Festival in Dyffryn Ogwen – there were nature walks, workshops, lectures and much more.
  • A Decarbonisation Network was formed, bringing together members from each of the 5 communities. The group has visited a few buildings that have been retrofitted, and more visits are planned soon.
  • Ynni Lleu has just been re-established as a community benefit company, with community members at the helm. A mapping study on the potential for clean energy production in Dyffryn Nantlle may soon be underway.
  • Gardens such as Gerddi Maes-y-Plas (Blaenau Ffestiniog), Manod garden, Yr Orsaf’s gardens in Penygroes and Gardd Nant, created by a member of the Assemblies, and also Llys Dafydd and Gardd Ffrancon in Dyffryn Ogwen have all been busy growing food.
  • We want to give a big shout to the 6 members pf Pen Llŷn’s Community Assemblies who joined Ynni Llŷn’s board of directors, who in early 2024 managed to attract funding from ARFOR 2 to start helping local residents to make their homes more energy efficient through the Retrofit for All project. Ynni Llŷn has already partnered on Cartrefi Clyd, Prosiect Sero Net Gwynedd and others, and four local jobs for Welsh speakers were created over the year.
  • Afallen is working together with GwyrddNi on Monitoring and Evaluation – in other words, to help us measure the effect GwyrddNi is having in our communities
Siôn, Dyffryn Nantlle Facilitator, with the children of Rhosgadfan School in yr Ardd Wyllt (the Wild Garden)

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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GwyrddNi

GwyrddNi

GwyrddNi is a community-based, community-led climate action movement established by the following six social enterprises in Gwynedd: Partneriaeth Ogwen in Dyffryn Ogwen, Cyd Ynni in Dyffryn Peris, Siop Griffiths in Dyffryn Nantlle, Cwmni Bro in Bro Ffestiniog, Ynni Llŷn in Pen Llŷn and DEG – Datblygiadau Egni Gwledig. 

GwyrddNi’s aim is to bring people together in the five areas mentioned above to learn, share, discuss and act locally on climate change. 

Soon we will be hosting Community Assemblies on the Climate in these  five areas, which is a way of bringing people together to discuss, learn and share information and ideas, before deciding together what they would like to do locally to take action on climate change. Click here to read about similar Assemblies that have already taken place across the world. 

So, how do you join? The first thing is to fill out an Expression of Interest form. Then we will select 50 people to attend each Assembly. We will strive to ensure that the 50 people selected are a fair representation of the area’s population. 

Anyone (over the age of 16) is welcome to express an interest. We want your unique voice and contribution, whatever that may be. You don’t need to know anything already, all you need is to be willing to share your views and opinions and listen to those of other people. 

If you have any questions take a look at our Frequently Asked Questions. 

So, how about it? Click on your area below to fill in an expression of interest form. 

Pen Llŷn
Bro Ffestiniog
Dyffryn Nantlle
Dyffryn Ogwen
Dyffryn Peris 

GwyrddNi is funded by the National Lottery’s Climate Action Fund.

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What is a Community Assembly?

Black and white photo of a man holding his hand up in a presentation

What is a Community Assembly?

Assembly. It’s a word we hear often these days, and a word that conjures images of the Senedd in Cardiff Bay or a school hall I’m sure. But what does the word assembly actually mean? 

The Oxford English Dictionary states that in essence it’s a very simple thing; a group of people gathered together in one place for a common purpose. And that’s exactly what we’re planning at the moment; Community Assemblies. There are other names given to these types of democratic groups working together, such as jury, panel, or forum, but for us it’s the community that’s at the heart of it all, so we’ve called ours Community Assemblies. 

We plan on hosting four Community Assemblies on the Climate in five areas of Gwynedd in 2022-2023, and those areas are Pen Llŷn, Bro Ffestiniog, Dyffryn Nantlle, Dyffryn Ogwen and Dyffryn Peris. The Assemblies will be an opportunity for people to come together to share, learn, listen, talk and plan, before taking action, and the topic of the day is the climate emergency. 

It’s important to note that we, GwyrddNi, are a movement that’s part of social enterprise DEG (Datblygiadau Egni Gwledig), and GwyrddNi is funded by The National Lottery’s Climate Action Fund. So the Assemblies are not of a political nature – the aim is to create a clear set of positive actions for the community, to be delivered by the community for the benefit of the whole.

This way of working together already has, and continues to work successfully around the globe. Did you hear about the Climate Assembly UK? Their aim was to make recommendations to the UK Government of how to reach Net Zero emissions by 2050, and was made into a TV programme on the BBC, ‘The People V Climate Change’. Or you may have heard of the Climate Jury held online in Kendal, or the Decitizenship in Brazil, which looked at access to culture. The first assembly of this nature held in Wales was the Blaenau Gwent Climate Assembly, which took place in March last year. If you’re interested you can find more examples of such assemblies across the UK here, and across the world here. 

Clearly there is no way of getting all the people of an area such as Pen Llŷn into one room, so say if 500 people register an interest, who gets to attend? Well, people are chosen to take part in order to ensure that the Assemblies reflect the wider community, taking into account demographics such as age, gender, ethnicity and so on, and sometimes opinions as well, for example your view on climate change. But if you’re not chosen to attend, don’t despair, there will be opportunities for the wider community to take part before, during and after the assemblies too. 

We hope you agree that this is an exciting and interesting opportunity for us here in Gwynedd! We’re working on the logistics at the moment and look forward to sharing more information very soon, but in the meantime, if you live in one of these areas and you’d like to attend your local Community Assembly on the Climate please contact your local Climate Action Facilitator on email or phone to let them know – they’ll be happy to hear from you.