Agenda item

Objective : To receive the Annual Climate Zero report.

Information/ discussion paper from Climate and Decarbonisation Manager – Mark Lawson

The Chair introduced the item and welcomed Isobel Filipova (Business Initiative Manager Cheltenham Zero) and Mark Lawson (Climate and Decarbonisation Manager) to the meeting.

It was explained that the team are working tirelessly to support local businesses, groups and charities to achieve Net Zero.  This was bought in house 2 years ago, they are working on redefining how to support people in the best way, looking at strategy and future proofing.  The Members had seen the report and had asked questions in advance, the responses were published as a supplement prior to the meeting.  It was confirmed that there were no follow up questions to the answers that were provided.

Members were then given the opportunity to ask questions, the responses of which were are follows:

-       There has been an increase in people applying for grants due to more advertisement of their availability on social media and due to a street pounding exercise.

-       Talking face to face to businesses has been an extremely helpful exercise.  Businesses seem to show a bigger interest when they are told that there is financial savings to take advantage of.

-       Accreditation is a new initiative and it’s complicated, it is a marketing opportunity and platform.  There are currently no examples of this.

-       They are working with Together Glos on their online pages to try and promote accreditation for smaller businesses.

-       Cannot say which businesses are the biggest polluters in Cheltenham, lots of the larger organisations are doing things in line with corporate standards to improve their effect on the climate.

-       GCHQ are probably the greatest emitters, but they don’t report the numbers.  They might be able to do something internally, they are working in their building, they have a certain tenancy length on the building, things will change for heating/carbon reduction etc in the coming years.

-       The new software (CeroEarth) that has been implemented at the Council will also be implemented here.

-       There is a promotions budget and there is also UKSPF funding available.  There is a budget of £2000 for events and marketing, some of this money will be used to promote the accreditation system.

-       New government funding is allocated every 2 years and there is currently no new information when new funding will be available, this is being monitored internally so it will be applied for as soon as it is announced.

-       With regards to the launch of accreditation, they have recently gone through funding with the CLG, they are building a new digital platform to manage the accreditation system which will hopefully be up and running in the autumn.

-       Looking at tackling landlords is a bit difficult, how to influence them is a difficult task.  There are plans ongoing to look at dealing with this.  There is no impetus on landlords of either residential or commercial dwellings to make changes.

-       Another area that needs to be looked into with Gloucestershire Highways is cross pavement charging and why this isn’t happening.

-       The limitation of charging points is that people like to have them outside their houses, some councils have already got charging points linked to lampposts as there is already electricity there, there is no plan to do this in Cheltenham at the moment.

The Chair thanked the officers for their input and hoped that they would come to the meeting with their next report.