Environmental Awards...the results

I'll put up a more detailed report on our main website later this afternoon, but for those of you who can't wait, here's the list of successful applications to The Castle Environmental Awards Scheme:

Project A - Community Action Nepal. The Castle grant will enable CAN to build a health post in Ghap, currently a six-day walk from the nearest health post.

Project B - Beekeeping in North Wales. Castle instructor, Cordelia Molloy, has been given an award to start some hives in Llanberis.

Project D - Growing Communities. The Castle grant will fund educational signs for Growing Communities' plots in Hackney to teach visitors about organic farming methods.

Project E - The Saha Atitsva Foundation. We'll be funding the purchase and installation of solar panels for this eco-farm in Ganeshpuri, India.

Project G - Our Head Instructor, Dean Plant, will be undertaking a part-time internship with Greenpeace UK.

Project H - Magnificent Revolution will use this grant to fully fund the construction of their new hub located at Hackney City Farm.

Project J - Pangea Project will use our grant to purchase a bicycle and trailer for deliveries as part of their larger aim of making their business 100% sustainable.

Thank you to everyone who voted by ballot and email- your votes did make a difference!

The Castle goes to Glastonbury with Greenpeace

A number of very tired sunburnt members of staff have just returned from the Glastonbury festival having spent 6 days building , running and then dismantling the Greenpeace "out of control tower" climbing wall. The Greenpeace field at Glastonbury this year was transformed into a replica of Sipson village and the Greenpeace AirPlot - which will be obliterated by a third runway at Heathrow, residents from the village were in attendance as well as dozens of Greenpeace volunteers who all weekend did a great job of informing festival goers about the issues surrounding the enviromental disaster that the proposed third runway at Heathrow would create. The wall was a massive success with over 1100 adults and children managing to keep Mike, Iwona, Richard, Aron, Olly and Dean busy in between their meditation and yoga sessions that made up their times off shift from the wall. (I think they may have also attended a performance or two of some popular music combos).

Thank you from the boss

Hi Everyone,

THANK YOU.

The Environmental Policy launch was a great success because everyone pitched in and helped out. I have heard so much positive feedback from our customers and other people who attended the day. A few personal mentions:

Janos- your food was divine. Thanks.

Ray – your illustrations and creativity made the event look amazing. Your support for the policy over the past months has really helped get everyone enthused.

Kerry- Thank you for all your hard work- you’ve done more things for this than I can begin to mention. Your commitment was evident when you stayed until the bitter end (nearly 11?)

Dean – In addition to all of the research that you’ve done for us on the issues, thank you for the tents and sorry about the banner.

Steve – It really meant a lot to us that you came down just for this on Saturday and your speech introducing the film was just right.

I’m sorry if I missed out specific people who organised things (Sieta, Min with the DJs, Caroline, etc…) but the list would be endless!

OK, now the policy is officially launched and we’ve got to keep the ball rolling! There will be new information on the Environmental Policy Intranet and the website this week. The Castle Enivronmental Awards will be publicised this week on the Intranet and by email.

In the meantime I’m going to be working on our Enivronmental Report 2008 and getting accreditation for our Environmental Management Scheme.

Audrey.

Environmental Policy is Launched

EP Launch Festival 2009

On Saturday 30th May, we launched our new Environmental Policy in style with a festival in the garden, DJs and a film powered by bicycles, a free BBQ, workshops, stalls and a surprising amount of organic pear cider! The environment must have sensed what we were up to and been pleased with our new initiatives as the weather was absolutely perfect!

…So where did our journey start? It’s a bit hard to say – it was mostly a dawning realisation that things can’t go on as they are. About 9 months ago, The Castle’s CEO Steve Taylor approached the core managers and the board of directors with his thoughts about the state of the planet. He’d been reading up on climate change, carbon emissions and peak oil and become certain that if he didn’t act now in any and every way he could then he too would be to blame for runaway global warming – the point of no return for human life on our planet.

Needless to say, if we weren’t already switched on to the urgency of the situation (and some had been for years) we all got excited by Steve’s approach that “now is not the time to panic or despair, now is the time to act!” as it became obvious that we can’t rely on governments to help us, and it is not enough to make individual changes in our own lives – businesses like us HAVE to change the way we do things.

Since last September, The Castle managers and staff have been reading books, watching films, debating vegetarianism, planting vegetables, going through the rubbish, looking at light bulbs, writing policy and trying not to panic. Finally around April we came up with our Vision Statement:

Our aim is to make The Castle Climbing Centre a benchmark for environmental and economic sustainability and to demonstrate that there is a place for sport and commerce in a sustainable future without compromising financial success and high standards.

The full Environmental Policy (EP) can be found here

And a thankyou letter to staff from Audrey here.

Included in it are our goals of:

• Producing our own energy
• Capturing our own water
• Zero waste to landfill by 2015

No greenwash here!

Our launch party was to be a celebration of our exciting new policy that has brought about so many changes since we began just talking about it, and with some help from our friends it was one of the best festivals The Castle has ever seen. (We might even do it every year…)

It wouldn’t have been what it was without all the other inspiring organisations who joined us on the day:

Magnificent Revolution (bicycle-powered DJ, film and workshop)
The Energy Saving Trust (info on helping everyone save energy in their homes)
Greenpeace (info on taking action for the environment. And lending us their tents)
Climate Camp (info on camping for climate action)
Growing Communities (organic local veg boxes)
The Pangea Project (veggie BBQ and delicious curries)
AK Press (Anarchist and Environmental literature)
Small Mountains (illustrations of the EP journey)
The Age of Stupid (the film)
Transition Finsbury Park (part of the Transition Towns Network)
Ecoclimber (climb harder, climb greener)
Ecoactive (the worms!)
Sustain London (the alliance for better food and farming and the lovely Ida with a planting workshop)
Capital Growth (2012 new green spaces in London by 2012)
London Plains (seasonal cookery demo. Get in touch with Deborah via Growing Communities)
The DJs: Ed, Mike and Simon.
(sorry if I missed anyone!)

Of course our journey does not stop here – it has only just begun!

Finally – the biggest thanks must go to you, the humble climber. For getting excited, for getting involved, for coming along and joining us in our love of climbing. It’s our love of climbing that has got us where we are and we hope to help preserve our wonderful climbing habitats for future generations.

Sieta