Get on the Greenside

Community regeneration charity Vital Regeneration is encouraging residents of two social housing estates in the Queen's Park and Church Street areas of Westminster to live in a more sustainable way.

The Get on the Greenside project started life as a neighbourhood recycling initiative and now, as part of the Big Green Challenge Plus, the project team is tackling energy efficiency.

"We work in some of London's most disadvantaged communities, so our focus is on no-cost and low-cost ways of saving energy. This mainly covers behavioural changes such as turning down heating thermostats, closing curtains at dusk, turning off lights when you leave a room and making sure there's a full load in the washing machine," explains Marie Monaghan, Sustainability Programme Manager at Vital Regeneration.

"All of our outreach work promotes the financial benefits of saving energy as well as the environmental benefits."

Working with the community

To raise awareness of energy saving measures, the Get on the Greenside team is organising an energy fair and recruiting a number of volunteers to become 'community green champions'. The volunteers will help to promote energy-saving measures and positive environmental behaviour at community events and in schools.  

The team is also undertaking a major door-to-door initiative which will see them visit 5,000 local households across the two estates. "We'll be giving out simple information on no-cost ways to save energy in the home," says Marie. "We'll also be providing details on grants available from the council to improve insulation and other aspects of energy efficiency."

The Get on the Greenside team aims to get 100 of these households to commit to reducing their carbon emissions by 10-15 per cent. Marie comments: "We'll be working closely with these households over the rest of the Big Green Challenge Plus year, to monitor their energy use and to provide practical assistance with introducing energy saving measures and completing grant applications."

Linking up with other initiatives

Part of Queen's Park has been designated as a Low Carbon Zone by the Greater London Authority. This means that the area receives a package of funding and support to help it reduce its carbon emissions by 20.12 per cent by 2012.

The Get on the Greenside team is working alongside the Low Carbon Zone team to ensure that the two initiatives provide consistent information to local residents and to raise awareness of grants that are available through the Low Carbon Zone programme.