Sheffield Renewables has received funding from the organisation Artists Project Earth (APE) to develop a new project called Powerstation Sheffield. The project aims to encourage low carbon lifestyles and the development of local renewable energy schemes within the city, in a way that is accessible and relevant to everyone.

A key objective of the project is to help foster a greater level of public understanding of renewable energy and to generate a significant amount of local interest in this field. The intention is to engage the public in a fun and interesting way, through the development of interactive tools, posters and games. Our current focus is the creation of a Renewable Trumps card game comparing renewable energy schemes across Sheffield. This will be available for people to play with both as a hard copy at our events stall and online through our website.

Whilst climate change is a global issue, Powerstation Sheffield aims to illustrate the significance of local community action and empowerment in fighting this. Through continually gathering data on renewable energy as it’s installed across the city, the intention is to build a clear picture of how schemes in the city are contributing to carbon dioxide reduction.

The information people contribute will be broken down to different levels, making the renewable energy generation figures relevant to local communities. In this way people will be able to see that every scheme makes a valuable contribution to reducing energy consumption in our neighbourhoods, no matter how small. The data can also be used to rank the performance of different neighbourhoods within Sheffield against each other.

Thanks to APE’s funding, Powerstation Sheffield aims to launch online in September so keep an eye out for the outcome of several exciting developments over the coming months.

For more information on Artists Project Earth, please check out their website.

by Matt H (Powerstation Sheffield Developer)