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Globally, about 70% of renewable energy is supplied by biomass. Research by the Supergen Bioenergy Hub shows that modern bioenergy can contribute significantly to climate change mitigation by reducing the greenhouse gas emissions of the energy and transport sectors, in addition to providing wider environmental, economic and social benefits. In many Global South regions there is a huge biomass potential that can be combined with various energy conversion technologies to deliver sustainable energy solutions.
What is the Global Bioenergy Stories project?
We are working to engage global communities about climate change and sustainability, and create an interactive multi-language online tool to visualise the local narratives of energy futures in our digital global bioenergy stories.
With a strong focus on the Global South, we will give young people a voice and make use of the wide international engagement platform and connections of bioenergy researchers and the Supergen Bioenergy Hub to get their thoughts, experiences, concerns and visions communicated.
We will capture the perspective of local communities, especially younger generations, through the following questions:
- What is bioenergy?
- How is it or could it be used?
- What would a sustainable, inclusive future that benefits people of all ages look like?
We will carry out a range of outreach engagement activities, including:
- Applied multi-directional and multi-method communication and engagement to visualise the global bioenergy stories to reach a wider audience than written words, overcoming language and literacy barriers.
- Researchers and artists will work with young people from different global regions, to illustrate similarities and differences between social and cultural contexts across the world.
- Workshops with young people in different countries will share knowledge about bioenergy, climate change and sustainability. Local artists will visit schools, joined virtually by researchers, and virtual workshops will be arranged to allow direct and interactive engagement with participants.
- Bringing together early career researchers of diverse cultural backgrounds from our SHARE network to support the workshops, also enabling delivery in local languages with easier communication.
- Building relationships between artists and scientists to develop local narratives through interactive virtual engagement using imaginative play, storytelling, alter-egos, group sketching, etc.
- Capturing narratives (eg, via sketching, videos and recordings) with artists from different countries.
- Creating a virtual meeting room where participants can engage with the project’s progress.
- A reflection workshop to present the final output to participants and get feedback on experience, process and output.
What’s next
The team, led by Mirjam Roeder at Aston University has been carrying out a series of interactive workshops with young people in the UK and across the globe in Rwanda, India and the Philippines. The workshops have provided a space for future generations to share their ideas on sustainable energy and how they think it should and could be used to help tackle climate change.
All the outcomes of the workshops will be shared on this webpage.
Interested?
If you’re interested in getting involved – as a youth group, an artist or a researcher – please get in touch with Mirjam at m.roeder@aston.ac.uk.