Ad of the Day: Patagonia wants to start a community-led energy revolution in the UK
Outdoor brand Patagonia is continuing its mission to keep its customers eco-conscious through its latest environmental campaign, ‘We the Power’, which encourages citizens to imagine a new energy system that is local, community-owned, renewable, and rooted in bringing social and economic benefits to local communities.
In the UK, this would mean boosting the grassroots networks that are already taking shape and driving legislative change to ensure communities can financially benefit from producing their own renewable energy.
Currently, UK law differs from mainland Europe in that there are restrictions on harvesting and selling energy to your community. Not-for-profit organizations such as Power For People are campaigning hard for the UK to shift to 100% clean energy for the benefit of local people through laws such as the Local Electricity Bill.
The bill, which is now backed by over a third of the House of Commons, would enable people to directly purchase their energy from their local community, bringing community benefits as well as increasing the uptake of renewable energy.
Community Energy gives citizens the power to produce their own renewable power and share the benefits among their community. The popularization of community energy would mark a shift away from large, extractive energy companies that are currently contributing to the climate crisis.
Emma Bridge, chief exec of Community Energy England, says: “Community energy empowers people and communities to play an active role in helping to change the energy system.
“It is an incredibly effective way of not only tackling climate change directly, but acting as a trusted intermediary to engage people and enable behavior change, ensuring that climate action isn’t done to people but done with them.”
With ‘We the Power’, Patagonia aims to galvanize citizens to switch their electricity provider to one that sources from community-owned renewable energy schemes, and to join or invest in their own community energy group to support local jobs, communities and those in energy poverty.
“Community energy is a win-win situation, whereby local, renewable energy production puts money directly into local communities and speeds up the creation of a cleaner, healthier future for our children,” says Patagonia’s environmental action and initiative director, Beth Thoren.
“Patagonia is committing – through our voice, our support for grassroots groups across Europe and our actions as a responsible business – to advocating for this revolution in energy.”
The ’We the Power’ campaign demonstrates the advantages to people and the planet that this clean energy transformation could bring – culminating in a full-length documentary of the same name.
You can watch the documentary ’We the Power’ in full above or click on the Creative Works gallery below to vote for it. To get in touch about Ad of the Day, email: imogen.watson@thedrum.com.
