BANZAI - Retrofit Action, at Scale and for All
The Leamington Terrace area
From community-building, cargo bikes and film screenings to attending climate demonstrations, BANZAI is taking on the challenge of decarbonisation in its area south of central Edinburgh in order to encourage change in the community and others.
BANZAI (Bruntsfield Area Net Zero Action Initiative) was formed in 2022 by an informal group from the Leamington Terrace area in the hope of encouraging more people locally and in surrounding neighbourhoods to consider personal and community action to help the move towards Net Zero. BANZAI is a constituted, unincorporated, voluntary association, with no staff or external funding, which allows it to be formalised, but lightweight and flexible. It covers a loosely defined but fairly large area because there are no clear boundaries between neighbourhoods in this part of the city.
BANZAI’s initial structure was chosen after consulting relevant information on different types of groups from The Resource Centre, SCVO and other sources found online and through contacts in the third sector. Given the simplicity and flexibility of the structure it seemed like the best way to go to begin with. A simple template for a flexible constitution came courtesy of Highlands and Islands Enterprise and was adapted to create the BANZAI constitution.
The group has five main aims: 1) Raise public awareness; 2) Practical and emotional support for local communal and individual actions; 3) Network, collaborate and galvanise complementary climate-focused groups and initiatives across Edinburgh; 4) Organise local events and activities and 5) political and campaigning activity and activism.
BANZAI organises local events and activities that support the move towards Net Zero and improve the environment and biodiversity in various ways. An overarching desire is for “green, healthy, inclusive neighbourhoods that meet the real needs of the people who live there” and warm, energy efficient homes is a key part of that.
BANZAI started making moves at the ‘building retrofit and improvement’ level with its Home Energy and Retrofit (HEaR) initiative, gathering and sharing information on techniques and approaches suitable for local properties (typically old stone tenements and both detached and terraced homes, some divided into flats). These have mainly been to reduce energy consumption and simpler ‘hacks’ to get the ball rolling, from heating control adjustments, to DIY secondary glazing and so on. HEaR was created as a small informal sub-group of supporters from across the BANZAI area with related interests in this area. As things develop it may make sense to formalise HEaR in its own right, again as an unincorporated voluntary association.
They’ve looked too at the potential to offer Infra Red thermal surveys to help people understand where heat is being lost in their homes and encourage engagement with the broader challenges of home energy improvement.
The community vision extends to seeing an obvious attraction in collaborative working for economies of scale and mutual benefit. But, like similar grassroots groups, BANZAI is aware of the limits of its local supporters’ non-professional voluntary action in this complex field, where professional expert guidance is often advisable, both on buildings and finances. It's keen not to reinvent the wheel, or replicate mistakes made by other organisations, but to share their collective experiences and learning for the benefit of others, as trustworthy locals.
BANZAI is excited to work with EdinBRIC, seeing it as a trustworthy “community intermediary”, with a compatible ethos, giving access to experts who care about retrofitting communities, at scale, with the attendant cost, quality and resilience benefits - not salespeople or private investors. Mick Patrick of BANZAI said “EdinBRIC gives local groups that are unlikely to have all the necessary expertise and experience the ability to access it as a shared resource between them all, and it allows the collective experiences of groups to be available for the benefit of all.”
A group of householders in a terrace of nine similar houses in the area have started working collectively to consider energy efficiency improvement and retrofit options that would be relevant to them all. Through the EdinBRIC connection they’ve engaged non-profit building professionals EALA Impacts CIC to survey their properties and present the options as a potential phased improvement plan, at a considerable saving per property.
Collaborative work opportunity in a terrace of 9 homes of the same archetype.
The HEaR group is working to identify a tenement of suitably forward-thinking owners to create a formal owners’ association (as planned by the Scottish Government to be made mandatory in the next couple of years, with an associated sinking fund and commitment to a five-yearly building condition survey) to demonstrate the cost and quality benefits of collective working at the shared ownership building level too.
With the need for dramatic decarbonisation action ever more pressing, the collaborative community model is attractive to BANZAI’s vision and aspirations to help decarbonise the homes of their area at a cost and in a way that makes it more accessible to all.
