Everyday Climate Action: Lessons from Carbon Literacy at Castlefield
As an ethical, employee-owned business, Castlefield aims to hold itself to the same high standards it expects of the companies it invests in. One way we do this is through Carbon Literacy training for all co-owners. In this piece, Olivia Shields shares key learnings from recent Carbon Literacy sessions and highlights the everyday changes our team is making to reduce their carbon impact.
Carbon literacy at Castlefield
As a business committed to ethical investment, and mindful of our own carbon footprint, we see climate awareness as something that should be embedded across our whole team. That’s why we’ve prioritised Carbon Literacy training for our co-owners. The Carbon Literacy Project, which began in Manchester, was set up to encourage and empower people to take meaningful climate action. It defines Carbon Literacy as “an awareness of the carbon costs and impacts of everyday activities, and the ability and motivation to reduce emissions, on an individual, community and organisational basis.”
Manchester City Council is working in partnership with The Carbon Literacy Project to make the city the UK’s first Carbon Literate City, as part of its ambition to become net zero carbon by 2038. The initiative aims to train and certify the equivalent of 15% of the population (over 85,000 people) highlighting just how powerful collective action can be at a local level. At Castlefield, we aim for all new co-owners to complete Carbon Literacy training within six months of joining.
Led by Castlefield Adviser Helen Tandy, the training at Castlefield explores the carbon impact of our day-to-day activities, including calculating our own carbon footprint (using this online calculator), and creates space for open discussion, giving co-owners the chance to share ideas, reflect on their own habits, and think practically about the changes they can make.
Why Earth Day still matters
Earth Day takes place every year on 22nd April to raise awareness of environmental issues such as climate change, plastic pollution, and deforestation. It is the world’s largest environmental campaign, involving over a billion people in nearly 200 countries, and is a useful moment to pause and reflect on the role we all play in shaping a more sustainable future.
The theme for Earth Day 2026 is “Our Power, Our Planet”, a call to recognise the strength of collective action and the importance of community-driven change. It’s a reminder that people and communities do have power.
This idea of shared responsibility strongly resonates with us at Castlefield and underpins our approach to Carbon Literacy, not as a one-off initiative, but as part of a wider culture of learning, accountability and action.
What Castlefield co-owners took from the Carbon Literacy training
So what does that look like in practice? Below, some of our co-owners share what they took from their recent training, and what they want to do differently as a result.
Helen – “I have been delivering Carbon Literacy Training at Castlefield since 2017 and we get some fantastic ideas and thoughts from the sessions. As an organisation it helps us deliver our aims around Net Zero to know the team understand how to reduce their carbon footprint both on a day to day basis and within a work environment.”
As an organisation it helps us deliver our aims around Net Zero to know the team understand how to reduce their carbon footprint both on a day to day basis and within a work environment.
Olivia – “My estimated footprint was slightly below the UK average. I expect this is because I eat a plant-based diet, don’t own a car, and buy most of my clothing second-hand. I’m also very conscious of food waste, both for environmental reasons and because of rising food costs, so I make a real effort to keep it to a minimum.
I live in a rented property with housemates, which means we’re somewhat limited when it comes to making bigger energy-saving changes or carrying out work on the house. It can also be tricky to reduce energy use when everyone has different routines and needs. That said, something I’d like to improve is buying more locally grown fruit and vegetables, and volunteering at a community garden.”
Adam - As well as what's already been said by my fellow co-owners, I'm determined to be more organised when shopping so I never have to add to my stack of bags for life!
Gemma – “I was quite disappointed with my footprint, and have since the training been making a much more conscious effort to reduce my footprint in relation to my food habits. I've started to buy more local fruit/veg/meat, and have reduced the amount of meals that I eat with meat. I've also been "encouraging" the rest of my family to try a bit harder too. I found the training was really good for reminding me and teaching me about the ways we can all help to improve the carbon situation. Also, bananas!!”
I found the training was really good for reminding me and teaching me about the ways we can all help to improve the carbon situation.
Small habits, surprising habits
One of the more unexpected takeaways from the session was just how much we don’t always know about the carbon impact of everyday items, and how misleading our assumptions can be, even about everyday foods.
As Milena put it: “bananas rock!”
It turns out, bananas have a much lower carbon footprint than many of us assumed - they’re grown in natural sunlight, typically transported by boat (which produces around 1% of the emissions of air freight), and are often sold without packaging (as highlighted by Mike Berners-Lee in How Bad Are Bananas?).
The training challenged some of our assumptions and showed that even familiar choices can hold surprises; reinforcing the value of building our understanding and continuing to learn together.
It’s a small example, but an important one. The training challenged some of our assumptions and showed that even familiar choices can hold surprises; reinforcing the value of building our understanding and continuing to learn together.
What sustainability means at Castlefield
The habits and reflections shared above are just one part of how we approach sustainability at Castlefield. Our commitment to net zero has always been more than a target - it’s part of who we are. Since beginning this journey in 2020, we’ve built a deeper understanding of our environmental impact, strengthened the quality of our emissions data and learned a huge amount along the way.
As specialists in responsible investment, it’s important to acknowledge the climate crisis and use our influence as shareholders to try and prevent the catastrophic impacts on our planet and its people. The urgency of this isn’t lessening. We aim to convey that urgency by engaging with the management teams of the companies that we invest in to emphasise its importance on the corporate agenda.
Last year, we set out our intention to intensify our engagement with companies over their net zero plans – details of this can be found in our annual stewardship report, as well as our recent stock stories. Not only do we aspire to reduce our own emissions to Net Zero, but we also hope to inspire our team, partners, supporters and communities to take action.
Whether through training, investment decisions, or everyday habits, we believe meaningful change happens when people feel empowered to act. Earth Day is a reminder that progress doesn’t rely on perfection, but on participation.
We’re already working on the next stage of our net zero ambitions, so keep an eye on our website and social media for updates soon.
Written by Olivia Shields