Presentation slides: http://bit.ly/2fmqNTX

Spirit is a European project through which eight partner organisations have been engaging faith communities in a programme of household energy saving. Through the project, the partnership has worked with faith communities to recruit volunteer Energy Champions, training and supporting them to give energy advice to their families, friends and neighbours. By securing energy saving pledges from these households, these activities are leading to measurable energy savings and CO2 emissions reductions. Alongside this a range of materials have been developed, offering guidance on engaging faith communities and helping volunteers to develop their understanding of energy issues, the role of behaviour change and how to deliver advice.
The seminar will focus on the aims of the project, key activities, results, resources developed and lessons learned – both through Groundwork London’s work across London and also through the work of the project partners in other EU Member States. Case studies will be shared, highlighting the challenges and opportunities of working in different countries and with different faiths, as well as what others interested in engaging faith communities on climate and energy issues can take from this
Spirit is co-funded by the Intelligent Energy Europe programme of the European Union. For more information, please visit the Spirit Project webpage. 

About the speakers: 

Hannah Baker, Programme Manager
Hannah is an experienced European Programme Manager. She manages multiple high profile projects at Groundwork London, including two European funded programmes: LIFE+ Climate Proofing Social Housing Landscapes, through which climate adaptation measures have been retrofitted to open spaces in three housing estates in West London; and the Intelligent Energy Europe funded Spirit project, through which eight partner organisations are engaging faith communities in a programme of household energy saving.  
Before joining Groundwork London, Hannah worked at the Institute for Future Cities at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, managing STEP UP, an EU FP7 project on sustainable energy planning in four European cities. Hannah has seven years’ experience working in the field of sustainability and environmental policy, spending four years at the influential environmental think tank Green Alliance upon completion of an MSc in Environmental Technology at Imperial College London in 2009.
Rebekah Phillips, Environmental Services Manager
Rebekah has oversight of Groundwork London’s behaviour change programmes and as part of this role heads up the London delivery of the Spirit programme, an EU funded programme engaging faith groups with energy saving. She joined Groundwork London in 2015 having spent the past nine years working on pro-environmental behaviour change programmes with government, businesses and the third sector. She helped initiate Defra’s first pro-environmental behaviour change framework and progressed the use of behavioural insights in policy development. Her work has spanned all elements of lowering the environmental impact of lifestyles, including focusing on waste reduction, recycling, re-use and product development.
Rebekah is a visiting Research Fellow at the Policy Studies Institute as well as an Associate at Green Alliance; Sustainability First and communications agency, Behaviour Change. She previously worked at the BBC and was an expert advisor on their recent programme ‘Hugh’s War on Waste’. Rebekah was also a co-founder of local re-use social enterprise the Remakery, which established a shared workshop for local SMEs using re-used materials as their base.

UCL-Energy Seminar: 'Energising Faith Communities: the Spirit project'

The EDiP seminar series, launched in January 2016, is led by UCL-Energy doctoral research students, in collaboration with the LoLo management team. 

For this seminar three recent PhD graduates from the UCL Energy Institute were invited to talk about their roles and give their tips about planning for future careers during a PhD. Between them they covered a range of roles in government, industry and academia. 

The panel: 
Jenny Love has worked for 2 years at a low carbon consultancy before returning to UCL as a Research Associate 
Richard Jack now works at Wilmott Dixon Energy Services following a year as a Research Associate 
Peter Warren joined the Department of Energy and Climate Change (now BEIS) after he completed his PhD in 2015.

Energy Demand in Practice Careers Event - UCL-Energy PhD seminar series

UCL-Energy seminar: 'A breath of fresh air - Air pollution: causes, impacts and policies' with Professor Mark Barrett, Dr Claire Holman and Paul Drummond

Seminar slides: http://www.bartlett.ucl.ac.uk/energy/docs/air-pollution-slides 

Air pollution damages people’s health and ecosystems. We first need to understand the sources of air pollutants, how they result in pollution concentrations where people live and work, and how they damage people’s health. Then we can construct policies for improving air quality and strategies and actions for implementing policies.

The talk will include:

Estimating the impacts of energy strategies on national and city pollution emissions leading to city air pollution concentrations, and the resulting changes in health impacts on city populations
Air pollution control strategy, including central and local government policy including legislation and legal challenges.
Different tax options at national and city level in the UK to tackle the ‘public health emergency’ caused by diesel cars which are a major (but not sole) contributor to air pollution in the UK. 

About the speakers:

Mark Barrett is Professor of Energy and Environmental Systems Modelling. He has worked on pollution and energy strategy in Europe and Asia. He is technical director of the Innovate funded project with the Energy Saving Trust developing a city energy and environment model linking city energy strategy to economics, air pollution and health.

Dr Claire Holman is a Senior Research Associate with 30 years’ experience in air quality, advising the European Commission, Governments, local authorities, businesses and NGOs on forecasting air quality and impacts, and emission control measures. She was the expert witness for ClientEarth’s successful challenge to the government’s Air Quality Plan.

Paul Drummond is a Research Associate in Energy and Climate Policy at the UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources. He researches policies for energy and resources efficiency and environmental improvement. A recent co-authored report is ‘Tackling air pollution from diesel cars through tax: options for the UK’, for Green Budget Europe.