 The Full StoryJulie's Bicycle and The Theatres Trust publish 'Energising Culture'
Julie’s Bicycle, the creative industries sustainability advocates, and The Theatres Trust, the national advisory body for theatres, have published Energising Culture, a guide to planning a cleaner, more sustainable energy future for cultural buildings.
Launched at The Theatre Trust’s Conference 12, ‘Delivering Sustainable Theatres’, on 12 June, the guide is the first of a two-part publication. This first part aims to set out the issues around energy demand, energy supply and the implications of these for an organisation's business models. It is intended to help companies make informed decisions about a long-term energy strategy for arts buildings. The second part, to follow, will take a more comprehensive long-term vision of environmental sustainability and how the cultural sector intersects with it, ranging across activities, business models, new technologies and emerging cultural values.
‘Energising Culture’ is available as a free download from Julie’s Bicycle and The Theatres Trust.
The guide considers how energy and climate policy and regulation, and the changing energy system are likely to impact on cultural buildings in the long term. It outlines voluntary schemes and standards which can help drive improvements.
The guide provides information on financial incentives, funding programmes and investment models to support initiatives. It provides a framework for developing an
energy strategy, for improving energy performance and for moving towards a lower or even zero-carbon future.
Other key points in the guide include that:
Cultural institutions can be in a proactive position to share expertise for greener energy use.
The challenges of the evolving policy and regulatory environment, increasing energy prices, uncertainty over future energy supply and climate change adaptation - also are opportunities for organisations to rethink how they use energy in ways which can save money and reduce environmental impacts; which can improve the fabric of buildings and guarantee a secure supply of clean energy.
The arts and culture are particularly vulnerable to reputational risk and it is critical therefore to address the concerns of patrons, artists, audiences and local communities.
The guide’s ‘how-to’ section addresses medium and longer term planning on issues including :
• Increasing energy efficiency through:
- awareness-raising and behavioural change
- energy monitoring and evaluation
- energy efficient appliances
- smarter controls
• Rethinking systems and services by
- managing heat, ventilation and cooling
- seasonal performance planning
- making buildings more multi-functional
• Rethinking energy supply by
- generating energy onsite
- community energy generation
-sourcing low and zero carbon energy
- looking at off-site and digital services
The 48 venues in The Theatres Trust's Ecovenue project contributed to developing ideas of how theatres
and small venues can manage their energy better and have been front runners in achieving Display Energy Certificates.
Energising Culture is co-funded by Arts Council England and The Theatres Trust’s Ecovenue project supported by the European Regional Development Fund.
www.juliesbicycle.com/resources/publications/energising-culture
www.theatrestrust.org.uk/resources/publications
12 June 2012
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