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How to get involved and help make Nottingham greener.
Nottingham Clean Champions is an informal volunteering scheme to support you to make small changes in your neighbourhood. For example doing litter picks, reporting rubbish or fly tips, anything to help keep your neighbourhood free of litter. It is open to anyone living in the City, and there are already over 800 clean champions both adults and children. If you require a further chat about the scheme, email clean.champions@nottinghamcity.gov.uk or call 0115 8765752 or visit https://nottinghamcity.gov.uk/cleanchampions
Nottingham Open Spaces Forum is an independent charity which brings together Friends of Groups, other volunteers, community gardeners, partner organisations and other stakeholders to create a support network. They aim to work together and in partnership with Nottingham City Council and other public landowners to promote, protect, conserve and enhance the open and green spaces of our city.
The Too Good To Go app lets you buy and collect food from your favourite restaurants and cafes - at a great price - so it gets eaten instead of wasted. Here they share with us Tips and tricks for fighting food waste.
UK households waste £700 worth of food every year, these simple tips and tricks will help families to reduce their food waste.
• Plan your food shop each week to avoid buying more than you need
• Store your food properly and use airtight containers to avoid food going off early
• Make the most out of every ingredient, like roasting your broccoli stalks along with the florets or keeping the potato peel on when making homemade chips
• Save and repurpose your leftovers to make new dishes instead of throwing them away
• Trust your senses with food that is past its ‘Best Before’ dates to check if it’s still good to eat - ‘Best Before’ is only an indication of quality, not safety
• Use food waste fighting apps like Too Good To Go to rescue surplus food from your local restaurants and shops that would otherwise end up being thrown away
Refill believes in a world where everyone can choose to reuse wherever they eat, drink and shop.
From a coffee on your commute, to drinking water on the go, or even shopping with less packaging, Refill puts the power to reduce plastic at your fingertips.
Anyone can download the free Refill app to tap into a global network of places to reduce, reuse and refill. With more than 274,000 places offering free drinking water globally, over 300,000 app downloads and 100 million pieces of plastic avoided to date, they’ve proven that Refill has the power to create a wave of change and stop plastic pollution at source.
Download the app to see which Nottingham businesses have joined Refill.
Effective recycling helps protect the area you live in and helps tackle climate change. Use this information on how to recycle effectively to ensure your bin is always collected and is never contaminated with the wrong items. You can even become a Clean Champion!
On their website, you’ll find an expansive directory of food banks; social eating spaces; community gardens and other support services.
Nottingham Trent University has been named the fourth most sustainable university in the world by the 2020 UI GreenMetric World University Rankings.
Due to NTU’s strong position in the UI GreenMetric in recent years, delegates from international universities including Chile, South Korea, Australia and Austria have visited NTU to understand how to be more sustainable.
Charmaine Morrell, Head of Sustainability at NTU said: “It’s great to see NTU recognised as one of the top five sustainable universities in the world for the fourth year in a row as well as improving our ranking this year. This reflects the strong leadership and teamwork of NTU; not only the hard work of the Estates team, but the commitment of staff and students to embed sustainable practices across our University."
NTU’s Sustainable Development team has this year:
· diverted 99% waste from landfill
· planted 18,000 trees (over the last four years), on and off campus, with student and staff volunteers
· reduced carbon emissions by 51% since 2005
· developed plans for implementing hedgehog-friendly campuses
· started the Plastic Planet initiative, driving down reducing single use plastics in areas such as the Print Shop and Catering
· installed beehives at Brackenhurst and Clifton
· planted wildflowers at Brackenhurst and Clifton
· donated items through the British Heart Foundation donation banks, raising £800,000 for the charity’s work
· made sustainability improvements in new and refurbished buildings
· achieved Green Flag status at Brackenhurst Campus and Clifton Campus
· made a commitment to Fairtrade accreditation, joint with the Nottingham Trent Students’ Union
Learn more about NTUs sustainability and Net Zero Carbon strategy here or follow the sustainability team on Instagram @ntu_sustainability
If you're interested in helping to make the University more sustainable or are looking for opportunities to gain real world experience, UoN have a range of ways you can get involved - from one-off volunteering to outdoor projects and media roles.
Those looking for longer term experience can consider a project below, or get in touch with a project idea which can be supported by the Sustainability Team.
Brighten Up campaign assistant - promote our cycle awareness campaign when the clocks change in autumn
Waste composition analysis - spend half a day finding out what really gets thrown away!
Photographer - arrange a photo shoot to expand our media library
Practical experience
Make the most of your time at university by developing a range of practical and transferable skills that enhance your employability.
Student blogger - write guest posts for the Sustainable Nottingham blog
Become a Student Switch Off ambassador and help your hall win the Switch Off competition
Promote our fantastic green spaces as part of the Friends of University Park or Friends of Jubilee Campus groups
Put your sustainability ideas into action by taking part in Students As Change Agents
Get growing at the campus community garden or Sutton Bonington allotment
Check out further opportunities available through the Nottingham Advantage Award and Careers & Employability Service
Volunteer with the University's Grounds team on practical biodiversity and landscaping projects - contact the Student Volunteer Centre for details
For more information visit www.nottingham.ac.uk/sustainability/getinvolved/studentopportunities.aspx
Everyday people across the UK are going #OneStepGreener – helping cut carbon emissions and make the UK and the wider world a greener, cleaner place.
We’re doing better than we might think at tackling climate change – driven not just by politicians and activists, but by individuals, community leaders and businesses playing their part too. People across the country are going #OneStepGreener ahead of COP26 and making positive environmental choices, every day.
Perhaps it’s a school that’s going above and beyond in greening their communal areas. Or a distillery that’s trying to go zero carbon. Or a small business that’s making the switch to low-carbon energy. Other people are buying electric cars or embarking on careers in green industries. It might even be a combination of multiple #OneStepGreener actions – this is about us all doing our bit.
The UK’s #OneStepGreener Climate Leaders instinctively see the wider benefits of doing these things – that a greener way of life means a healthier population, more jobs and a sustainable future for us all.
This is a group for people interested in the proposal for a new Green Quarter to replace the half demolished Broadmarsh shopping centre in Nottingham.
Nottingham Cohousing, Nottingham Good Food Partnership, local residents and a number of local businesses focussed on sustainability, are calling for the new Green Quarter to integrate nature with affordable eco housing, A-rated green business premises, new visitor attractions, urban agriculture and healthy places to eat and buy fresh food.
The vision for the Green Quarter was submitted to Nottingham City Council on December 27th as part of their Big Conversation public consultation on what to do with the Broadmarsh following the collapse of Intu. On 14 January 2021, we held a public zoom meeting to introduce people to the ideas and and to invite questions, feedback and collaboration. Over 360 people signed up for details and over 250 attended. We have created this Facebook Group to help to continue the conversations we started and to help people to connect and to get involved.
Want to take steps to be greener but aren't sure where to start? Here's a full page of resources to...