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Category: Woodland

  • Next Generation Earth: Empowering Young Voices

    Next Generation Earth: Empowering Young Voices

    CAT’s Next Generation Earth projects kicks off with engagement in schools and an event at CAT exploring STEM careers and climate solutions.

    At the Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT), we believe that a better world is not only possible but is already being built by the next generation. That’s why we’re proud to be part of Next Generation Earth, a UK-wide youth-led initiative supported by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and coordinated by the Association for Science and Discovery Centres (ASDC).

    This programme is designed to break down barriers to environmental science and empower underrepresented learners to shape a more sustainable future. CAT is one of nine science and discovery centres selected to deliver youth-led initiatives that reflect the unique characteristics of their regions.

    What is Next Generation Earth?

    Next Generation Earth is a research-based programme exploring why fewer young people are choosing to study or work in environmental science and what can be done to change that. Rather than simply asking why, the project engages young people through the lens of climate change, a topic that resonates deeply with their concerns and aspirations.

    The focus is on underrepresented learners aged 12–14, including those from areas of multiple deprivation. Working with two Welsh schools and our community partner Reaching Wider, we’re creating a space where these young people can explore their interests, have their voices heard, and co-create a programme that reflects their needs and ambitions.

    What’s happened so far?

    The delivery phase has already begun with CAT’s Education Team visiting the schools involved to meet students and start conversations. We asked them:

    • What do you know about climate change?
    • How do you think it affects you locally?
    • What changes would you like to see?

    The responses were fascinating. Many students still see climate change as something distant such as floods in other countries or melting icebergs rather than something impacting their own communities. Through discussion, we helped them recognise local effects as well and to think about what could be done differently.

    We also explored environmental science careers and discovered that most students had little idea of what roles exist or how these connect to the changes they want to see in the world. They haven’t yet made the link between their future careers and creating positive environmental change. As part of the initial evaluation, students took part in a postcard exercise, sharing their thoughts and pledges. Common themes included air quality and litter, highlighting the importance of local action.

    Shocking responses about if environmental science is for them

    What’s next?

    On 12 January, the students will visit CAT for a hands-on day of practical activities and future visioning. In February, they’ll head to Bangor University’s Ocean Studies department to meet a professor and explore higher education pathways. These experiences aim to show that environmental science is not only relevant but full of exciting opportunities.

    We’ll also involve CAT postgraduate students and Bangor University students to provide relatable role models and insights into green careers.

    Why this matters

    Climate anxiety is rising among young people, especially in early adolescence, a formative time when they begin to shape their life interests and career aspirations. Next Generation Earth aims to flip that narrative, giving young people the tools, confidence, and support to take action in their own communities.

    By connecting environmental science with real-world relevance and personal empowerment, CAT hopes to inspire participants to take an active role in delivering the vision of Wales embodied in the Future Generations Act.

    Looking ahead

    The programme will culminate in a future community engagement event where young people will share their ideas and pledges with families, educators, and local stakeholders. This will lay the groundwork for a longer-term youth panel, enabling participants to continue their involvement and influence future programming at CAT.

    At its heart, this project is about learner voice amplifying perspectives that are too often unheard and helping young people build the skills and confidence to shape their own futures.

    Keep an eye on the CAT website or social media channels for updates and stories from the Next Generation Earth journey.

    Queen Mary Students on our Wind Power Workshop

    School Visits

    Find out more about CAT’s work with schools and make an enquiry about bringing your class to CAT.

    Learn More →

  • Protecting Our Planet Day 2025: Inspiring the Next Generation at CAT

    Protecting Our Planet Day 2025: Inspiring the Next Generation at CAT

    This National Tree Week, CAT hosts POP25, an inspiring live-streamed annual event for schools, presented by the UK Space Education Office (ESERO-UK) at STEM Learning and in collaboration with the European Space Agency and the UK Space Agency.

    On 27 November, thousands of young people from across the UK came together virtually for Protecting Our Planet Day (POP25), an extraordinary live-streamed event for schools that’s designed to inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers, and changemakers. This year, we’re proud that the Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) is the physical host location for this landmark annual event.

    What is POP25?

    POP25’s mission is simple yet powerful: to engage schools with the science and solutions that are helping to protect our planet. We urgently need skilled young people entering careers with the leadership and skills to continue exploring and implementing solutions to the climate and biodiversity emergency. Through live sessions, interactive activities, and direct links to research stations around the world, students will explore how climate change is being monitored and mitigated – from space missions to biodiversity conservation.

    This year’s programme is packed with inspiring content including:

    • Live link to ESA Mission Control to learn how Earth observation satellites track climate change.
    • A deep dive into biodiversity protection, featuring producers of the BBC’s upcoming Kingdom series and conservation projects in Zambia.
    • Live updates from the Sir David Attenborough research vessel as it journeys between Greenland and the Arctic.
    • Connections to the Halley VI Antarctic research station and scientists studying ice sheets in Norway and Northumbria.

    And that’s just the start. Every session is designed to show young people that science is not just about understanding problems but about creating solutions.

    CAT Biodiversity Engagement Ranger Sven Verbelen chatting to POP25 presenters.
    CAT Biodiversity Engagement Ranger, Sven Verbelen, chatting to POP25 presenters live from CAT.

    Why CAT?

    Hosting POP25 at CAT is a perfect fit. For over 50 years, CAT has been at the forefront of environmental education and practical solutions to climate change. Our unique location in the heart of Wales, surrounded by forests and renewable energy systems, offers an inspiring backdrop for a day dedicated to protecting the planet.

    CAT’s role goes beyond providing a venue. We share the event’s core mission: to empower people with knowledge and skills to build a sustainable future. From our postgraduate courses to school visits and hands-on workshops, CAT is committed to nurturing the next generation of environmental leaders. POP25 amplifies this impact by connecting our work with global efforts, including cutting-edge space technology.

    Living Wales at POP25

    We’re thrilled that Professor Richard Lucas is part of the programme, presenting his Living Wales Project. This pioneering initiative uses Earth observation data to monitor and understand changes in Welsh landscapes – a perfect example of how space science and local action come together to protect ecosystems.

    Professor Richard Lucas presenting from the CAT viewing platform with Professor Suzie Imber
    Professor Richard Lucas from Living Wales chatting to POP25 presenter Professor Suzie Imber

    National Tree Week 2025

    POP25 coincides with National Tree Week, the UK’s largest annual tree celebration, ran by the Tree Council. Forests play a vital role in absorbing carbon, supporting biodiversity, and combating climate change. CAT’s woodland setting and our commitment to sustainable land use make us an ideal host for a day focused on protecting the planet. By linking space-based monitoring with on-the-ground conservation, POP25 highlights how technology and ecology work hand in hand to safeguard our future.

    Inspiring Careers and Futures

    POP25 isn’t just about science – it’s about career possibilities for young people. Afternoon sessions will showcase 16 different career paths in sustainability and climate action, helping students see that protecting the planet isn’t limited to one discipline. Whether through engineering, data science, conservation, or creative media, there’s a role for everyone.

    With nearly 200,000 students and over 10,000 educators signed up, POP25 was the biggest yet!

    Queen Mary Students on our Wind Power Workshop

    School Visits

    Find out more about CAT’s work with schools and make an enquiry about bringing your class to CAT.

    Learn More →

  • Growing the value of homegrown timber

    Growing the value of homegrown timber

    To address the urgent need for a carbon neutral and economically regenerative future, how we manage woodland systems and value timber desperately needs rethinking. CAT graduate Jemma Ho explores inclusive, holistic and regenerative actions to sustain and develop the use of homegrown timber.

    Jemma Ho
    Jemma Ho

    The area of woodland in the UK is estimated to be 3.25 million hectares – 13% of the total land area. Forest Research breaks this down as 19% in Scotland, 15% in Wales, 10% in England, and 9% in Northern Ireland.

    In Wales, two thirds of woodland is on privately owned land, while only a third is publicly owned by the Welsh Government and managed by Natural Resources Wales. This means a large proportion of Welsh woodlands are at risk of being fragmentally managed for wildlife conservation, biodiversity significance, and mitigation of diseases and invasive species. As a result of this fragmentation and a lack of holistic due diligence across the construction industry, the maintenance of a secure supply of homegrown timber for construction is at risk. Today, the UK imports 80% of its timber for the construction industry, making it the second largest net importer of timber in the world.

    Delving into woodlands

    To discover how the timber supply chain operates, I toured nurseries, woodlands and sawmills. I studied structural timber joinery at the Centre for Advanced Timber Technology. And I enrolled on a 12-week short-course in Timber Technology and Engineering Design for built environment professionals at the New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering (NMITE) in Herefordshire.

    Through interviews with experienced ‘ground workers’, working with trees from the seed, through to plantation, all the way to felling and grading the tree for timber, I discovered that millions of UK-grown seedlings go unplanted simply because there isn’t a big enough workforce to plant them in the appropriate weather season. One operator at a nursery commented that there is a lack of government investment or subsidies in innovative forestry equipment to plant, maintain and grow trees to what is deemed as maturity.

    I also interviewed several millers across Welsh sawmills, ranging from mainstream commercial operations to small cooperatives, and discovered that while various species of trees are measured and graded as to their appropriateness for construction, tonnes of tree thinnings go onto a “pile of waste” or are sold as firewood.

    The UK can’t afford to keep throwing away these natural and precious resources. Woodland systems, land ownership, skills training, and innovation in timber development and its uses all urgently need collaborative rethinking.

    Wood thinnings

    Space to rethink timber

    The findings from both my Master’s research and timber short course were steered not only by my interests in carpentry since a young age, but also from an awareness that in the last century the UK construction industry has been heavily influenced by steel production. This makes a major contribution to the overall impact of the built environment, emitting around 40% of greenhouse gases (GHGs). But this doesn’t have to be the way. It’s time to shift building in a more sustainable direction, where bio-based resources can be used in a regenerative way for the good of both communities and the planet.

    In my final year of study on the M.Arch Sustainable Architecture programme at CAT, I was able to develop a project that responds to and reinforces the role of architectural design within the environmental debate. My proposal titled ‘Wood Culture Wales’ is a public centre that provides interdisciplinary learning environments and practical facilities, addressing the fragmentation and inconsistencies in the Welsh and UK timber industries. The aim is to catalyse activities across the timber production cycle that reduce our reliance on imports, boost skills, promote economic growth, and develop a truly sustainable future for Welsh timber production.

    A new future for a derelict factory

    My final design project includes a design proposal to uplift the derelict Wern Works factory in Briton Ferry, Southwest Wales, which was previously used for aluminium sheet rolling for British Airways Concorde jets, bringing significant economic benefit to this small Welsh town.

    The theoretical scheme proposes celebrating and repurposing this historic building, reviving the existing heavyweight industrial steel frame, while ensuring minimal impact to the existing context by introducing innovative hybrid, reused and new-build construction strategies.

    Wern Works Factory-Design by Jemma Ho

    The four new-builds and two hybrid interconnected buildings aim to exemplify ways of using timber as a construction material – ranging from traditional timber frame, modern mass timber construction, and lightweight timber frame structures to adaptive reuse of other conventional construction materials. It’s a 21st century approach to industrial production and sustainable regeneration.

    The project is driven by the development of six strategic concepts:

    1. Uplift the economic context
    2. Address forestry decline
    3. Increase woodland creation and biodiversity
    4. Innovate with waste
    5. Catalyse timber craftsmanship
    6. Develop and sustain a wood culture for Wales

    Key spaces include:

    • Three interconnected passively climate-controlled greenhouses to act as a living exhibition on how our trees could behave in future climates
    • Makers’ gallery with hireable studios
    • Conference centre, break-out spaces, nursery and accommodation
    • Cabinet makers’ wood workshop, for adults and children
    • Specialist boat-making workshop
    • Visitor building for leisure activities, including a café and orientation gallery
    • Outdoor exhibition space for various timber interventions
    • Sawmill facilities (for local milling services)
    • Reclamation yard for timber offcuts and exchange
    FDP Visual by Jemma Ho

    Each building serves various user groups, ranging from young children to experienced professionals in the construction, timber and forestry industries to create a holistic knowledge-sharing environment.

    The aim of this project is to advocate for urgent innovative actions within current Welsh supply chains to increase the industrial value of timber by creating a holistically streamlined supply of structural timber and better use of the ‘waste’ byproducts of production.

    Greenhouse model - made by Jemma Ho

    The Wood Culture Wales project highlights the pressing need to act now to use the knowledge our timber industries have to drive the development of lowercarbon construction materials. Timber is a resource that not only captures carbon but also creates greener jobs for future generations.

    About the author

    Jemma Ho is a graduate from CAT’s 2022– 24 Masters of Sustainable Architecture programme. She is an Architectural Designer at Architype, the UK’s leading architecture firm for sustainable buildings, primarily in the education and healthcare sectors.

    In 2025, Jemma was recognised in The Architects’ Journal’s AJ100 Emerging New Talent list, recognising her rising influence within UK architecture. She is passionate about promoting the use of timber in construction.

    Find out more about our M.Arch in Sustainable Architecture

    Find out more about our M.Arch in Sustainable Architecture by looking at the programme description or by joining an upcoming open day.

  • WHY WE TEACH – ecological restoration

    WHY WE TEACH – ecological restoration

    Next in our series looking at themes and topics explored by students on CAT Master’s degrees, Dr Jane Fisher introduces ecological restoration, a key module for students taking our MSc Sustainability and Ecology programme and also a subject relevant to those studying MSc Sustainable Food and Natural Resources and MSc Sustainability and Adaptation.

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  • CAT joins Protecting our Planet Day for schools

    CAT joins Protecting our Planet Day for schools

    On Thursday 30 November, CAT is taking part in an inspiring day dedicated to environmental issues and solutions, livestreamed from experts around the world to schools across the UK.

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  • Helping hands: volunteering at CAT

    Helping hands: volunteering at CAT

    Throughout CAT’s near-50-year history, volunteers have been at the heart of our work. Dulcie Fairweather celebrates all that we have achieved together and gives us a glimpse into life as a CAT volunteer.

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  • Nesting Spots

    Nesting Spots

    Once a common sight for garden birdwatchers, the Spotted Flycatcher has suffered serious decline in the UK in recent years. Joe Downie looks at some who made CAT their summer home, and explores how we can help these and other struggling species.

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  • CAT Stories – Ro Randall: regeneration and renewal

    Recently we caught up with Ro Randall, a psychotherapist who has been active in the climate movement since 2005, to chat about her relationship and links with CAT over the years.

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  • Bobbing along – the songbird that swims

    The UK’s only species of aquatic songbird is a regular visitor to the CAT ponds and waterways. Dulcie Fairweather takes us dipper spotting.

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  • Greater horseshoe bat – hanging around at CAT

    The recent discovery of a greater horseshoe bat at the Centre for Alternative Technology is further evidence of the northward expansion of the species’ range. Dulcie Fairweather explores the implications.

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