Our Town Stories: Conversations
Net Zero ambitions: a conversation between Lincoln and Scarborough
Our Town Stories Conversations brings together Towns to discuss a shared topic at the heart of their Towns Fund experience.
This latest ‘Conversation’ highlights approaches to embedding carbon net zero ambitions through the Town Deal with Kate Bell, Climate Change Manager at Lincoln Council; Alex Richards, Head of Economic Development and Regeneration Services and Harry Barros, Climate Change and Carbon Reduction Officer at Scarborough Borough Council.
Long read ~15mins
Kate Bell (Kate), Lincoln:
I'm Kate Bell, Climate Change Manager at Lincoln Council. I was involved with pairing the Town Investment Plan (TIP) with the climate agenda, on the basis that the city council declared a climate emergency back in 2019. My role has involved working with Towns Fund project leads to identify net zero carbon solutions for projects and help deliver on a commitment to reducing or decarbonising our public buildings within the city.
Alex Richards (Alex), Scarborough:
I’m Alex Richards, Head of Economic Development and Regeneration Services at Scarborough Borough Council. I've been leading the team in terms of the Town Deal process. We put together the TIP and subsequent masterplan for Scarborough and Whitby which incorporate a number of carbon reduction initiatives, both directly and indirectly.
Harry Baross (Harry), Scarborough:
Hello, I’m Harry Baross, Climate Change and Carbon Reduction Officer at Scarborough Borough Council. I worked with the counsellors to draw up our climate change strategy earlier this year. Part of it was focusing on making sure that the Town Deal projects include a carbon reduction focus.
Our Town Stories: Can you introduce some of the projects within your Town Deal that are enabling your Town to deliver on your Town’s climate and sustainability targets?
Alex:
Scarborough declared a climate change emergency in 2019, at about the same time as we started to develop the TIP. We've got a number of interventions in both Whitby and Scarborough which are very specifically targeted at carbon reduction. They Include investment in local cycling and walking, and a plan that we've had for some years but haven't had the capacity to deliver. So through the Towns Fund, we will be mobilising elements of that.
We are establishing a low carbon transport interchange within Scarborough rail station which is part funded through the Town Deal and is drawing in significant other funding streams. It includes electric vehicle hire for your onward journey once you've arrived by train; a large electric vehicle charging hub; and also onward travel by bus. We're working with the local bus provider which is converting its fleet to fully electric within Scarborough. It all links to pedestrian and cycling journeys, and potentially electric scooters.
In Scarborough we're establishing the Green Construction Skills village. It’s a bespoke construction training college within Scarborough which is going to deliver green construction training techniques and certification to existing and new entrants into the market.
In Whitby we are actually subsidising Broomfield Farm, a zero-carbon housing development site, which is seeking consent for circa 200 homes. We're looking to provide subsidy support for infrastructure to develop 60 zero carbon homes within the site. They will be eco-friendly, purpose-built homes with charging points, photovoltaics, superfast broadband, allowing people to work from home. All that sort of stuff.
Then we've got another 12 projects across the borough of varying scale. At least 11 of these are capital build projects and each incorporates carbon reduction technologies and modern construction techniques to mitigate climate change impact, both in terms of the construction and the lifecycle of those buildings.
Harry:
When we declared a climate emergency in 2019 – we stated that we will be doing ‘everything within our power’ to be carbon-neutral by 2030. It's not saying that the whole borough is going to become neutral by 2030 but it does mean that we have to put the effort in to move towards climate net zero in everything we do. I'll be honest, when we were developing our climate change strategy, it was quite a separate work stream to what was going on in the Town Deal. Most of the work before now had been focused on the council as an organisation, as an authority itself. But there is a widening acknowledgement from both staff and Members that it does have to be broader.
Kate:
In Lincoln, when we declared a climate emergency we took the decision to set a very ambitious target of reducing Lincoln's area-wide emissions to net zero by 2030. The reason for that was that when we looked at the emissions the council has control of, it was less than 1% of our area-wide emissions.
So for us, the priority is establishing a partnership arrangement, working with the universities, hospitals, the big emitters, residents and businesses to look at how we can work collectively to reduce those emissions. And that's where opportunities like the Town's Fund come in.
Some of those projects are city council projects such as council buildings. Others are the responsibility of the county council, National Highways, the university, Lincoln College and the NHS in Lincoln so it was a perfect opportunity to bring them together to look at what the projects were in the round and identify where we can specifically make a difference.
There are two strands to this: the first is those public buildings that have in some cases been sitting empty for a very long time. We wanted to bring them back into use, but they're challenging buildings because most of them are listed. The Town Deal created an opportunity to use the funding and associated skills of the Towns Fund partnerships to learn about how we can refurbish existing buildings and reduce carbon emissions.
The other strand, similar to Scarborough’s, is transport-related where we've got some real opportunities. Other infrastructure work that's been going on over the years means we can begin to connect up our cycling and walking networks by creating green corridors within key city centre areas.
Our Town Stories: the surface transport sector presents a particular challenge to reaching carbon net zero with emissions still growing in this sector. How are you addressing this at a local level through your Town Investment Plans?
Kate:
In fact, in Lincoln, the emissions have been very slowly reducing in the transport sector although they remain stubborn compared to other areas where they have been reducing more significantly.
In Lincoln you've got very tight spaces; roads that were built in the 1960s and 70s that were focused on the car, not the pedestrian. So, it's about turning that on its head. The Towns Fund creates an opportunity to invest in reconfiguring those routes. It's not something we could have done 10 years ago because we needed wider infrastructure in place to move cars out of the city centre, and then prioritise pedestrian and cycling groups. Then there are the economic benefits of bringing people back into the city centre on foot and using public transport.
Harry:
We also have very stubborn transport emissions. They're about 40% of our carbon footprint according to the BIES data and they've been stagnant for about 10 years now. Everything else is coming down, so it’s something that we know we need to address.
We have a couple of big challenges with transport that are hard to grapple with. One is the general connectivity of the region. Our trains and buses aren't necessarily as connected as we would want them to be. We've got two Park and Rides for Scarborough that are not very well utilised at the moment. Then, in terms of car parking in the town itself, we have thinking to do as we as a council generate a fair chunk of revenue from car parking. This means that a move to discourage car travel is a move to discourage income for the council as well.
Alex:
We're a two-tier authority and the borough council is not responsible for transport although, as Harry says, one of our biggest contributing factors to climate emissions is transport and we have aspirations to change that. Our highways authority, the county council, is moving at a different pace and has different priorities within different towns.
But fundamentally without the injection of cash from the Town Deal, and without the partners which that investment has subsequently brought to the table, we wouldn't be able to do any of this. The Town Deal has made it possible to prioritise low carbon transport and investment in Scarborough whereas previously, we were further down the list for future investment. This was in part due to our peripherality, and the low take-up of electric vehicles within the borough itself but this funding has changed the game for the key partners to come on board.
Kate:
I really agree with what Alex and Harry have just said as we're in a very similar position in Lincoln. We're a two-tier authority and we have explored funding with our county council highways and National Highways colleagues over the last 10 years and we work very closely together. However, it's these funding opportunities, like the Town Deal, that bring us together. So, without those opportunities, we wouldn't be able to work together as effectively as we do. That's really important.
Our Town Stories: within your roles in local government, in what way have you been able to act as facilitators, supporting change through creating the right conditions at a local level?
Kate:
For us it is about acting as a community leader. We are not responsible for everybody's carbon emissions across the city and no local authority is, but if we don't work together, there will be no chance we'll achieve a 2030 or even a 2050 target. But it's our ability, as a district council, to have direct relationships with our residents and our businesses who we have that close connection with, so we're in a really good position to engage and get people on board. If we all act in isolation we won't deliver as much, so the Towns Deal is crucial for bringing people together.
Alex:
As a district authority, as Kate just said, we have the on-the -ground relationship with business and other public sector agencies within the Town. It's our role, as a district, to deliver economic development and that involves talking to everybody all the time. We are the gel that brings people to the table and keeping them there is the opportunity.
In Scarborough we've got our bus service operator willing to invest in its fleet as a quid pro quo for the development of the transport interchange; a third sector organisation bringing construction skills training and enabling conventional construction companies to redirect trading into modern pre-construction technologies and techniques; and lastly, a housing developer that had no intention of developing zero carbon housing on the site prior to these conversations. We've now created a partnership that’s brought the private sector together with the public sector to deliver the best benefit and outcome for the community and the climate.
Our Town Stories: In what ways have you been able to involve local residents in this work?
Kate:
We've been engaging with residents over several years around what climate change means to them and what impact it will have on the environment. Likewise, we’ve discussed how we as a local authority can help them reduce their own carbon emissions.
We've had a series of workshops with residents, specifically on our climate action plan and our carbon declaration to understand what our residents want us to deliver and vice versa. We've also had climate assemblies, where we've asked a smaller group of people to come together to scrutinise what we're doing more specifically on carbon emissions. They are there to hold us to account for what we've said we will deliver and question how our policies are integrated so that we can work together to make sure we achieve it. Like all authorities, we're not perfect and it's about perfecting that over the next few years.
Harry:
In putting together the formal climate change strategy, we went to parish and town councils, the third sector and community organisations and tapped into their knowledge and networks. That was a really useful two-way conversation as we became aware of what else we could do and acknowledged the role of community action for example. At the same time, we were also able to share information with community groups about how they might decarbonise community buildings.
Our Town Stories: What has been your experience around measuring impact - both of climate change in your place, and the interventions you are putting in place to mitigate climate change?
Kate:
We are grappling with this area, as I know every local authority is. So, what we decided to do with our district councils in the rest of Lincolnshire, and the county council, was to prepare a carbon toolkit. It’s a toolkit that's specific to our local area with all the datasets in one place so we can adjust the levers on it. For example, we can find out, say, the carbon emissions to retrofit a percentage of private sector housing in the city or public buildings in the city; or assess the impact of increasing cycling and walking routes.
We worked with consultants to define those measures to make sure the calculations were as accurate as they could be, and that they're based on the right datasets. We needed to monitor progress and what we’re achieving with our central Lincolnshire Local Plan as carbon emissions and climate change measures are embedded into it. In order to deliver, we need to be able to monitor progress and what we're achieving.
The data has also helped us secure additional funding through the Public Sector Decarbonisation fund, for example, and we can match that funding with Towns Fund money. We can use the data to demonstrate the outcome if we secure additional capital funding, for instance, for air source heat pumps, and what that would deliver in carbon savings. Monitoring how you're performing towards a net zero target, and particularly to secure funding is absolutely essential.
Harry:
I agree it’s really challenging to do. There are explicit calculators so it's very easy to put in your inputs and get your outputs but it’s difficult to get accurate figures, and we’ve found it quite difficult so far to really get quantitative measures. Qualitative data is much easier, as it's much easier to describe the general areas in which projects are going to have an impact. But that's never been an obstacle for us as we know we are doing the right thing, whether or not we've got the numbers for it.
Our public buildings are one area where we have the best data. Similarly we were successful in the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme bid at the start of the year and that all required a really good level of data - heat loss surveys and all that kind of modelling.
Our Town Stories: What advice would you give to other towns or borough councils who are committed to working towards achieving net zero? What's the most important thing they should focus on?
Harry:
In North Yorkshire we have a group of climate lead officers that regularly talk with each other sharing experiences, thoughts, plans, projects, etc and that's been really useful. We are also here to listen to anyone who has ideas that can be implemented.
Kate:
For me, it's around sharing knowledge and information between local authorities and it's really useful to talk to Scarborough. I'm very fond of Scarborough, I know it very well so I know exactly the type of buildings you're talking about, the geography and some of the challenges.
But through the Towns Fund, we've had an opportunity to connect with other local authorities miles away from Lincoln that we wouldn't have come into contact with, and then we shared information, policies and all sorts of useful information between us. So, my advice would be to reach out to other local authorities because we're all going through exactly the same challenges and you don't need to reinvent the wheel. There are things that some authorities have tried and tested that in my experience, they have been very willing to share.
Our Town Stories: Thank you!
This conversation was held on 17 November 2021 between Kate Bell, Climate Change Manager at Lincoln Council; Alex Richards, Head of Economic Development and Regeneration Services at Scarborough Borough Council and Harry Baross, Climate Change and Carbon Reduction Officer at Scarborough Borough Council and hosted by Our Town Stories.
Lincoln and Scarborough are two of 101 places with Town Deal investment from the government to develop and deliver projects that support long-term economic recovery, regeneration, clean growth, jobs and prosperity for their Towns. The 101 Town Deals are worth more than £2.4bn in total and are part of the £3.6bn Towns Fund.
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