The Climate Contribution Fund is about encouraging both businesses and visitors to do something positive about climate change.This group of projects creates a brand new theme for us and has been an exciting new development for this year.

It is becoming ever more apparent that the world’s population is living beyond its means and that we are using our natural resources at an unsustainable rate. In order to change this and help protect our planet for the future it is important that we all make changes now, whether big or small.

Our new projects aim to consider both promoting and supporting sustainable tourism projects and helping to fund projects that can reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. More importantly these are all local projects.

It is important however, that we also make simple changes now, to make a difference in our everyday activities. These involve reducing the amount we use our cars, using environmentally friendly cleaning products, reducing our home energy consumption, buying locally helping to reduce food miles and supporting our local community.

Cycleways
Good cycle access encourages visitors and local residents out of their cars, reducing carbon emissions. Within Cumbria a variety of projects are underway to develop and to diversify both on and off-road cycle paths, including sections of the new Hadrian's Wall cycleway. The cycle network is continually linking existing cycle paths into long distance routes such as the Coast to Coast cycle path, attracting an increasing number of cycle tourists who enjoy biking on cross country routes.

Woodland Planting and Maintenance
In order to ensure the long term health and survival of our woodlands, careful monitoring and management is required. Our projects involve some planting of new trees but often focus on work being done to maintain existing trees and sometimes ‘continuous cover forestry’. This term describes a management system which aims to keep balance in woodland conditions as opposed to occasionally and dramatically clearing or felling forest.

Peat Bog Restoration
Peat Bogs provide a fantastic ‘sink’ for carbon, however our bogs have been dramatically reduced over years of agricultural land management. By restoring these bogs, atmospheric carbon can be absorbed.