Our
current projects
Our current projects listed below, this page will be updated with news on these projects. If you would like to find out more about one of the projects or get involved please contact us.
Toilet Block Refurbishment
Water Wheel
Ecoteams
Previous Projects
Toilet Block refurbishment - Turner's Ecolodge
To increase our outreach, and provide real live examples of low carbon buildings through which residents can learn from, we are seeking funding to refurbish a disused existing building into a low carbon demonstration project, to educate local residents and businesses in how to retrofit buildings to reduce carbon emissions. Turners Eco-Lodge, currently a disused toilet block of the more challenging solid wall construction, typical of many of the buildings in Bollington, will be an education and outreach centre. It will be available free of charge for other community groups to hold their meetings, and regular tours will be held, and form part of the planned Bollington eco-home trail. Full planning permission for the building has been obtained and the BCR are now seeking funds to undertake the works.
Benefits
The project is an important part of our groups plan to help educate the local community on a low carbon and sustainable lifestyle. Users will be able to view the sustainability features of the building. In addition, through working on such a project together, our own learning of low carbon building techniques will develop, and we will be able to share this knowledge with the wider community, through presentations, and data sheets which will be available on our website and at the building itself A wide range of stakeholders are involved in the redevelopment of the building, including Bollington Initiative Trust, Bollington Civic Society and Bollington Town Council. The project has already forged strong relationships between members of the community, and is an excellent example of grass roots action. Local sourcing is a central policy to this project, with local contactors to be appointed through competitive tender, and local materials sourced where possible, bringing economic benefits to the area.
Our bog – the story so far
The old toilet block at the end of Shrigley Road in Bollington was closed down around seven years ago. Since then it has been boarded up, unused but not forgotten. Its in a prominent place next to the bus stop at the top end of Bollington, and, for a toilet is quite an attractive building, built of local stone in mock Tudor style. A 99 year lease was secured by Registered Charity Bollington Initiative Trust in 2008 from Cheshire East Council, with the view to renovate the building for the benefit of the community. A number of ideas were floated, and then our group, the Bollington Carbon Revolution which is a sub-group of the Bollington Civic Society got involved, with the view to make the building as “green” as possible. We then struck on the idea that we could use it for our Head Quarters.
Our vision is to have this as an exemplar sustainable building, well as exemplar as we can get it given that its an existing building and they are always more tricky to green than a new building. We will record everything that we are doing, and produce information sheets of all the products and materials that we use, so that others can learn from our experience, and hopefully apply the methods in their own homes and offices. Its designed very much as a show case low carbon building. For example we are using three types of solid wall insulation, sections of which will be visible through honesty windows, so people can see what has been used, as well as learn how much it cost and how easy or difficult it was to install. This knowledge is very much needed in Bollington, where a large proportion of the housing stock is made up of solid walls. It will also be possible to see the insulation that we are using in the floor, and how deep it is, as well as pick up information about the other products and materials we are using, such as a sun-pipe, air source heat pump, low flow taps, eco-pains, eco-textiles and a kitchen work surface made out of recycled yogurt pots. Our lighting will be on two circuits, one with LED bulbs and one with normal bulbs, so people can see for themselves that there really is no difference in the lighting effect between the two , but they can see how much energy and money they will save from having low energy bulbs fitted. We will use a local contractor, and source our materials from the region, helping to tick the economic sustainability box.
So what will we use the building for? Well we will base our activities out of there, including our regular team meetings, and our Ecoteam meetings. Ecoteams is one of our most successful behavioural change programmes that we run, taking groups of householders through a four month programme learning what their impact is on the environment and making changes to reduce this, measuring the difference they make as they go along. Ecoteam members don’t just come from Bollington – we have had members from as far as Buxton and Manchester, and regularly have people join us from Rainow, Macclesfield and Pott Shrigley. We are also looking to open the building up to the wider public every Saturday morning, where they can come and learn about what we have done, and pick up information on who can help them make similar changes to their property. We have many more activities planned as a group, building on the success of the last four years since we formed our group in September 2006. This includes generating hydropower and creating a social enterprise, generating low carbon energy for our community and re-investing any revenue created back into low carbon projects.
Our activities are managed entirely by volunteers – a group of like minded people who want to understand their own impact, as well as helping the community understand and reduce theirs too. In our society we all on some level are battling to come to terms with the messages that our Government and the scientific community are giving us about climate change. Some believe its happening, and some believe its not. I believe it doesn’t actually matter - we are all united on the idea that we want our energy and water bills to cost less so lets focus on that first, and together we can have a huge impact just in these two areas. There is a lot of confusing messages out there, and people genuinely don’t know where to go. Our toilet block will give our community and visitors coming into Bollington a focus, showing people what they can do to reduce their environmental impact, and get them on the right track.
What's happening now - April 2011
Over the past few months we have been busy writing and submitting funding applications, and have had some great success. Thanks to Lend Lease for the £1.5K they have donated, and to the Peak District SDF for the £16.5K grant. We are about half way there now in securing our funds, taking us ever closer to our goal. To help keep costs down we have contacted our suppliers and asked for donations and discounts, which have been graciously given to us on the whole. We are busy writing the specification for the building, with our newly appointed Quantity Surveyor on board. We met with the planners last week to gain clarity on some of the conditions, and we have had some fun dowsing to find the location of the river culvert beneath the site, and the drains. You can see from the photos that we had some success, and have drawn on the location of the river in chalk.
Finally, we have undertaken what we believe to be the first ever transaction of its kind, using toilets in place of currency. In exchange for the old toilets (leaving one behind of course for us to use in the finished building!), we have received some free consultancy from the South Yorkshire Energy Efficiency Advice Centre. Thanks go to Heeley Farm and the SYEEAC.
You cal also follow developments on our project blog
Water
Wheel project
Using the River Dean to generate power for Bollington
Bollington has networks of old dams, ponds and mill races which were originally constructed to provide power for the town’s mills. In 2008 BCR were awarded funding by The Cheshire & Warrington Economic Alliance to study the feasibility of re-building some of these hydropower schemes, for a 21st Century application – green electricity generation. BCR appointed the Crichton Carbon Centre to carry out the study and Dr Phil Leigh, CCC’s Project Manager, explained in a presentation to Bollington Civic Society in the Autumn how he had assessed the power generating potential of the River Dean and Harrop Brook as both streams flowed over the historic mill races. Dr Leigh advised that Bollington has many sites where it is economically and technically feasible to construct micro-hydropower schemes, but concluded that the sites which offer the power potential are not the old hydro schemes themselves. Rather CCC proposed linking the former mill ponds at Dyers Court and Ingersley Road with the power generating potential of the culverted sections of both streams above the River Dean/Harrop Brook confluence, near Water Street. The potential returns from the scheme have been calculated and construction costs estimated. If the community, the local authority and the Environment Agency react positively to the proposals, our next steps will be to invite specialist contractors to provide outline designs and costs and then identify revenue streams to fund construction. The report is completed and we will make a summary available on this website shortly.
Links:
New Mills Torrs Hydro project (a hydro project in New Mills in the High Peak)
British Hydropower Association
Ecoteams
Many of us want to live a little greener but have never found the time,
or don’t quite know how to begin. Ecoteams show you how small, easy
changes can make a difference to your household, your community and
the environment. Past teams have achieved great environmental savings,
and it will only take about two hours of your time each month − it works!
You will also have fun and make new friends. Ecoteams are free to join.
What is an Ecoteam? A group of people who get together to learn how to reduce their environmental impact and save money. Ecoteams of six to eight people meet once a month for four months. At each meeting, Ecoteam members share experiences, ideas and achievements on the environmental actions that they have taken. Over the course of the four months they measure the reduction in their environmental impact, and as an extra incentive the household who makes the biggest reduction in waste, water or energy wins a prize.
An Ecoteam is not just another meeting – it’s a place to translate ideas into action. It’s something for all ages, and groups with children and their parents can be arranged. Past Ecoteams have made great environmental savings, such as Sonia, a Bollington resident who reduced her waste by 55% and electricity by 18% by being part of an Ecoteam.
“I thought that there wasn't much else that I could do to easily change my lifestyle and reduce my CO2 impact. I felt I had already hit the easy, big issues. However, I did learn that I was becoming complacent and that actually there are many, many small actions that I can take in my life choices. This I absorbed from our fun, convivial meetings and I made new local friends as an added bonus.” Sonia, Bollington resident.
4 households completed the Global Action Plan Ecoteam pilot programme in 2008, achieving a 42% reduction in electricity, 11% reduction in waste and 9% reduction in gas.
Read this case study of an ecoteam participant
Read the case study data (excel spreadsheet)
Go to the form to sign up
If you would like to join or set up an ecoteam please email ecoteam@bollingtoncarbonrevolution.org.uk
Learn more about ecoteams on the global action plan website
Previous projects
Carbon
footprint 2008
On 12th of November 2008 an intrepid group of second year students from Leeds University hit the streets of Bollington to gather data on the town's carbon footprint. The students were volunteers from the school's environment programmes, Students and staff participants managed to collect carbon footprint data from 287 households in Bollington in just three hours - this is a great result and represents about a 10% sample of the town.
The students were invited to Bollington by the BCR group to develop a baseline footprint to inform the group’s future work.
Work has been carried out by the students to extrapolate the data into a figure for the whole town. The outline results received recently by the group indicate that Bollington’s Carbon footprint is 38,494 tonnes per year. This was based on 14.5 tonnes of co2 per surveyed household. More information and analysis will be available shortly on the BCR website.
The project was featured in Macclesfield Express & local radio station Silk FM. It is planned that the survey will be repeated in the next few years to measure our progress.
