Forum for the Future has an exciting new project in the works: Gatecrashing the energy sector. The aim of the project is to seek out new ideas that will allow people to plug out and into better energy.
Here’s some more details from Forum’s website:
Gatecrashing the energy sector is about creating a sustainable energy system and prevent the worst impacts of climate change. We need to urgently develop radically different ways of generating, distributing, storing and using energy.
History shows us that real disruption rarely comes from within a system and the energy sector in the UK is currently dominated by powerful incumbents, the majority of whom are wedded to the current system. So, we are embarking on an exciting new project to invite people to ‘gatecrash’ the energy sector and create disruption by bringing expertise and ideas from outside.
Over the next five months we will be bringing together people from a range of disciplines and organisations to generate new ideas and prototype alternatives to current systems. We are reaching out to anyone with an interest in creating disruption in the energy sector; from multinational ICT companies and home tinkerers to social entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. Through a series of events and prototyping workshops we hope to generate and support alternatives. Our aim is to produce three or four projects that we can showcase in 2011 – these might be working prototypes or detailed business plans but will be at a stage where they can been seen as genuine alternatives to current systems.
There have been a number of ideas in the UK and around the world, with goals of changing how energy is generated, monitored and shared. There are people coming together in communities to buy and sell renewable energy, as well as people tinkering in their basement with DIY designs of energy meters.
Keen to get involved? There are two events in September, one on the 8th and one on the 15th. Go on, join the party. Err… actually, crash the party!
Katherine Hui is currently the Social site editor at Green Thing, a web-based public service in London that inspires people to lead greener lives through creative content.
Before this, she worked as the Development Manager at Social Innovation Camp, an organization that encourages people to use web and mobile-based technology to mobilise social change. She oversaw 300 ideas submission and helped build 20 prototypes – five of which have gone on to get further funding or investment.
Katherine’s came over to the UK form Canada in 2007 for an MSc program at the London School of Economics. Before arriving in London, she managed a small environmental start-up in Vancouver called the Canadian Climate Change Alliance.
Katherine is football mad. She is a loyal supporter of Arsenal FC, plays for Islington Borough Ladies FC and coaches for Gunners in Islington in her spare time. Her second favourite hobby is kite surfing and she can sometimes be found chasing the wind.
