Net Zero Communities

This cluster works with communities in Clackmannanshire, Edinburgh and Glasgow to co-develop and evaluate place-based approaches to achieving net zero.

We are also exploring the key actors and decision-making processes and identifying potential barriers to success. Specific application areas include exploring local renewable energy opportunities, food production through community growing and vertical growing systems and models of community ownership/engagement. Projects use a range of research techniques from mathematical modelling and multi objective optimisation, to community engagement through creative writing and participatory action research.

The cluster involves research under all three University Missions. The research relates to Spaces, through exploration of the best use of local geography and landscapes for food production and renewable energy; Places, through improving outcomes for local communities in terms of green skills development, environmental benefits and community wealth building and Lives, through improved nutrition, health and wellbeing. It also links into Scotland’s International Environment Centre.

The cluster brings together researchers from Biological and Environmental Sciences, Computing Science and Mathematics, Marketing and Retail, Communications, Media and Culture, Social Work, Sociology, Management and Literature