Afallen was a critical component of the Local Area Energy Plan process in Wales. Peter Trott led our involvement, and writes about our contribution
‘On the bank of the river he saw a tall tree: from roots to crown one half was aflame and the other green with leaves.’
Peredur Son of Evrawg, The Mabinogion
Overview
For the last 4 years, until the early summer of 2024, Afallen has been a co-delivery partner of 18 local area energy plans (LAEPs) across Wales. In that time we have led the stakeholder engagement for each Local Area Energy Plan and also led the regional stakeholder engagement for Ambition North Wales and Cardiff Capital Region.
The pilots were undertaken in 2021, with a further pilot LAEP for Pembrokeshire in 2022; all three in partnership with Arup. During 2023 and early 2024 we have provided stakeholder engagement to the regional delivery partners: Energy Systems Catapult for Mid-Wales; Arup and The Carbon Trust for Ambition North Wales and Cardiff Capital Region. City Science from Exeter delivered the remaining LAEPs for the south-west of Wales.
Afallen’s approach was guided by our core belief in the importance of people, people and people to sustainability. We understood the need to maximise social value of Local Area Energy Plans (LAEPs) as part of the national energy transition. People and the social aspects are as important as the technology in determining how the transition happens. At Afallen, the partners and our local associate network are driven by the need to improve the understanding and implementation of technological solutions to sustainability challenges.
Afallen’s role in LAEP delivery
During our involvement we have participated in the piloting, and delivery of the LAEP Ofgem/Energy Systems Catapult LAEP stakeholder engagement approach/methodology, and were fortunate to be asked to contribute to its development given our early and ongoing experience in the LAEPs in Wales. Alongside contributing our experience and expertise in stakeholder mapping, engagement approaches and how to involve stakeholders we were also able to use Afallen’s broader expertise in: the energy transition as a social and community issue, and not just a technological and investment challenge, local supply chain support and development, and approaches to technological innovation management, such as agile methodologies.
The core stakeholder engagement activities included:
- Stakeholder identification, mapping and engagement planning.
- Development of stakeholder engagement approaches, methods and techniques to enable stakeholders to contribute and for our clients to answer their research questions at each of the proscribed stages of the overall LAEP methodology
- Working closely with our delivery partners to continuously improve and learn from each step and each project.
- Bi-lingual delivery by a Wales-based team of expert associates and partners
Our delivery partners, who led the overall Local Area Energy Plan for each local authority, were Arup for the pilots and Pembrokeshire, Energy Systems Catapult for Mid-Wales and Arup/Carbon Trust for Ambition North Wales and Cardiff Capital Region. We are very grateful to them for the opportunity to work on the programme
Afallen’s supported the delivery of most Local Area Energy Plans in Wales:
- Conwy and Newport – the 2 original pilots in 2021
- Pembrokeshire – a further pilot in 2022
- Mid-Wales – Ceredigion and Powys (2023-2024)
- Ambition North Wales (2023-2024)
- Cardiff Capital Region, excluding Bridgend a local energy plan was put in place prior to 2021 (2023-2024)
We were able to engage hundreds of stakeholders from a wide range of stakeholder groups, including: local government, private sector businesses, social enterprise, community energy, local civic society, regional and national organisations, all with interests in and knowledge of their local energy system. We’ve helped hear, capture and understand their views on energy and the changes that could or should be made. And whilst we engaged with many we know there is more to do to engage people in the future of their local energy system.
Afallen and its aim to keep more of the economic and expertise in Wales
We were able to deliver this many LAEPs because of our bilingual team of a dozen associates based across Wales. These are local sustainability professionals, who were often active participants in the local energy systems. Our partners and associates are highly experienced in supporting clients with:
- Stakeholder engagement, including mapping, engagement planning and deeper involvement methods
- Social value
- Innovation management
- Supply chain
- Delivery governance
Afallen was founded to achieve a number of strategic aims, including the retention of the economic, knowledge experience of sustainability work undertaken, on projects like the LAEPs, in Wales by the local experts working on them. By leading the stakeholder engagement for so many LAEPs we have made a good start on achieving this.
Afallen continues to develop its thinking and will publish its research, analysis and reflections on key social-economic aspects of local area energy over the coming weeks and months. Initial blogs will cover lessons learned from other transitions and thoughts on social value.
We are committed to developing new ways to innovate to maximise the social value of technology driven changes to local energy system activities throughout the whole of Wales. Like Peredur’s tree these are dynamic opposites, which only when combined, make a whole. Look out for our blog posts.