Attendees

Doug Eltham                          Devon County Council (Environment Group)

John Amosford                      Public Health Devon

Bobby Hughes                       Devon County Council (Waste Management)

Donna Sibley                          North Devon and Torridge District Councils

Emily Reed                              Devon Climate Emergency

Victoria Hatfield                    Exeter City Council

Claire Gibson                         University of Plymouth

Helen Vines                             Resource Futures

Matthew Blythe                      East Devon District Council

Sophie Goodall-Smith          Environment Agency

Mark Burton                             Devon County Council (Economy and Enterprise)

Eileen Russell                           Wales and West Utilities

Adam Williams                       South Hams and West Devon Councils

Jason Ball                                 Mid Devon District Council

Apologies

Meg Booth                              Devon County Council (Chair)

Fiona Rew                              National Farmers Union

Matt O’Dowd                           National Grid ED

Isobel Fardon                          Dartmoor National Park Authority

Mark Kentell                            North Devon Council

David Eaton                            Teignbridge District Council

John Green                             Plymouth City Council

Penny Tranter                         Met Office

Drew Powell                            South Hams and West Devon District Councils

Stephen Walford                     Mid Devon District Council

David Rose                             South West Water

Claire Reid                              Exmoor National Park Authority

Polly Frost                               Devon County Council (Economy and Enterprise)

Keir Duffin                               Devon County Council (Economy and Enterprise)

David Edmondson                  Torbay Council

Chris Clarke                            Wales and West Utilities

Lewis Garvey                          Wales and West Utilities

David Bartram                        Exeter City Council

Sara Gibbs                              Public Health Devon County Council

Matt Dodd                              University of Exeter

Nick Bruce-White                   Devon Wildlife Trust

Carrie Piper                            Exeter Science Park

1. Minutes of previous meeting

The minutes were accepted to be a true record. No further questions asked.

2. Community Action Groups Devon

Helen Vines attended from Resource Futures to present the Community Action Groups Devon project.

The project is funded by Devon County Council and provides start-up and development support to communities wanting to implement an environment-focussed initiative. Initially operating in Mid Devon and Teignbridge, the project has received additional funding to expand to cover the whole of the Devon CC area.

This expansion was a result of the Community Engagement Sub-Group of the Devon Climate Emergency, which evaluated various approaches to engaging communities in environmental issues. It concluded that the CAG model offered the best opportunity to ensure a sustainable legacy in a community and to engage a broad spectrum of people in a community – not just those especially interested in environmental issues.

Helen reported that the number of projects being supported by CAG is 44. There are 1.8 FTE staff at Resource Futures facilitating the network. Groups can benefit from the Small Grants Scheme and from joint training with CAG Somerset.

The next Skillshare event is November 9^th 2024.

CAG is running for at least another two years with a potential further two-year extension built into the contract.

All districts can signpost communities to CAG for support. Helen can provide text to go on websites and in newsletters etc.

ACTION: District colleagues to ensure community support information on websites mentions the CAG Devon offer.

3.    Progress Reports

3.1  General Progress Report

The progress reported appended to these minutes was considered.

John noted that the combined authority is likely to put in place a low carbon advisory group. This Group noted that there are existing groupings within the climate emergency partnership that could probably deliver that function.

ACTION: Doug to speak with Keri Denton about how the climate partnership could help with the low carbon advisory group.

Emily highlighted that Devon has done particularly well in the latest round of South West Net-Zero Hub funding. There at least four successful bids from Exeter (solar on city council buildings), North Devon (hydrogen roadmap), Devon CC (solar on landfill) and Teignbridge (decarbonisation study for an industrial estate).

3.2  Food, Land and Sea Theme Progress Report

Emily highlighted the good progress made by the Devon Food Partnership and the Devon Agri-tech Alliance.

Actions that are red in this section relate to issues connected to spatial planning (which Doug will be sharing further with the Devon and Cornwall Planning Officers Group in June), and some actions need further engagement with government.

Communities looking for growing space could be referred into CAG for support to establish local groups to get these initiatives underway.

Doug said we should ensure the partners are working together to deliver more of these actions, rather than working separately – we can achieve more by working together. The combined authority may offer better opportunities to do this.

Appendix 1: Project Progress Report

Period: April to May 2024

1. Partnership Update 

 1.1 General Communications  

The newsletter continues to see the strongest growth of all platforms. The open-rate dipped this month to 34% from 45% (10 – 20% is considered good), possibly due to the time of day it was sent. Furthermore, Twitter/X saw a very slight reduction in followers (a loss of 12).

Figure 1. DCE Online Following

Eight partners have confirmed £2k contributions towards the Climate Engagement role – these are from seven local authorities and Wales & West. Still awaiting decision from a few partners.

The secretariat received permission to recruit into the role and for Devon CC to host via the University of Exeter Graduate Business Partnership scheme. The role was advertised in April and interviews took place in early May. The successful candidate has been informed. Partners offering funding have been invoiced.

1.1  Partners’ Notable Activity

Activity is recorded centrally on the Taking Action pages of the Devon Climate Emergency website.

Note that due to the absence of the Climate Engagement post we’ve been unable to get all stories on the website. We have been logging those sent to us so that when resource increases we can get them online.

 

• • The UK’s first ‘habitat bank’ has launched in Devon helping to provide opportunities for increases in biodiversity and carbon sequestration.

• • The first tree and woodland strategy for Devon has been published, helping safeguard and increase Devon’s tree cover.

• • The South West Peatland Partnership is undertaking a £13 million project to restore peat bogs on Dartmoor.

• • The Big Fix is taking place across Devon in May to repair a range of items and reduce waste.

2. Oversight of the Devon Carbon Plan

The Progress Reports detailing known activity against each action are on the website. A summary of the number of actions categorised by each RAG status is provided below, split by theme.

Note that each theme of the carbon plan is reviewed every 6 months, which means the RAG status will not change significantly within the monthly periods of this progress report. 

Blue = Completed

Green = Generally progressing well

Amber = Progressing but geography or scope is limited

Red = Not started or activity significantly limited

Grey = Not yet assessed

Built Environment

Common Issues

 

• • Finance required to expand geography.

• • Finance required for more people resource, particularly spatial planning.

Economy and Resources

Common Issues

 

• • Clearer guidance from government on aspects of waste management needed.

• • Finance required for more people resource.

Energy Supply

Common Issues

 

• • Government appetite to address issues e.g. grid capacity, planning for wind.

• • Availability of capital finance.

Food, Land and Sea

Common Issues

 

• • Complexity of agendas, e.g. Land Use Framework and Local Nature Recovery Strategy.

• • Finance required to expand geography and scope.

Transport

Common Issues

 

• • Public concern about EVs and reallocating highway space for sustainable modes.

• • Grid capacity.

• • Availability of capital finance.

Cross-Cutting Themes

Common Issues

 

• • Finance required for more people resource, particularly spatial planning.

 

• • Finance required to expand geography.

The first phase of publishing the monitoring indicators will go live on 3^rd April. The University of Exeter is helping to expand the indicator set, which will be added to the web page incrementally.

3. Oversight of the Devon, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Climate Adaptation Strategy

The Climate Impacts Group is continuing its programme to review all the risks and near-term actions each year.

The most common issue reported is needing to get better information about the extent to which communities are preparing for change. This is being explored with stakeholders.

4. Update on feedback from the Climate Task Force

The Climate Task Force held its latest quarterly meeting in March and made the following recommendations, which were considered by the Response Group in April.

 

• • Consider understanding what is needed to move each action from amber to green.

Update: No progress this month. Will be looked at following the appointment of the Climate Emergency Support Officer which will free-up some of Emily’s time.

 

• • Mass-market retrofitting of buildings is still not happening quickly enough because the costs are high and the revenue savings are small in comparison. A retrofit summit should bring together key players to have a deep conversation about long-term solutions and to prepare a retrofit strategy.

Update: The Energy Saving Devon partnership is preparing an expression of interest (led by Devon CC) in response to an invitation from the MCS Foundation to pilot a support package for local areas to develop retrofit strategies. A series of four full-day workshops would be delivered in the autumn if Devon is offered the support package.

 

• • The role of spatial planning in net-zero is not being delivered fully. Need to revisit conversations with the Devon and Cornwall Planning Officers Group (DCPOG) to refresh the needs of planning teams and subsequently reengage Team Devon. Initially the Secretariat will speak with the chair of the DCPOG.

Update: Doug has a meeting scheduled with the chair of the DCPOG in May ahead of its next meeting on June 6^th.

5. Devolution Update

Devon County Council and Torbay Council considered the results of the consultation at the end of April 2024 and prepared a Consultation feedback report. The final proposal for the was submitted to Government on 1 May 2024. This includes a table listing the powers and functions that will be devolved to the CCA: Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority – Final Proposal. See Section 4, page 15 for specific commentary on net-zero, however net-zero is a general thread throughout the document.

The next step is for the Government to draft and approve the regulations (a legal Order) to create the DT CCA. It is expected that this process will be complete in Autumn 2024.

Discussions about how to prioritise the £16m capital spend in 2024/25 are underway, much of which will contribute to net-zero.

6. Local Net-Zero Fund

The Tactical Group was aware of six bids from the area submitted to the South West Net-Zero Hub’s Local Net-Zero Fund. Projects known to be successful are. 

 

• • Devon CC’s project to look at advanced feasibility for solar PV on redundant landfill sites.

 

• • Devon’s CC’s project with Teignbridge looking at further energy efficiency works for leisure centres, street-scale decarbonisation for housing, and decarbonisation of heat and power for an industrial estate.

 

• • North Devon and Torridge are exploring a hydrogen economy map linking to their clean maritime innovation corridor.

7. Summary Comments

 

• • Communications activity and collation of partners’ activity against actions in the Carbon Plan has reduced due to resourcing of the secretariat but capacity will increase soon once the new Climate Emergency Support Officer, who is currently being recruited, is in post.

• • The success of at least two of the Local Net Zero Fund bids means progress on some of the energy issues facing the county will be accelerated