ScottishPower Foundation launches new Art for Climate Fund with £200,000 investment in creative climate education
Poetry and theatre projects to inspire climate action among young people across the UK
The ScottishPower Foundation has today announced the first recipients of its newly launched Art for Climate Fund, a £200,000 initiative designed to use the power of arts and culture to help young people better understand the climate crisis and feel empowered to take action.
Two pioneering projects have been awarded multi-year grants of £100,000 reflecting the Foundation’s commitment to sustained, meaningful change rather than short-term interventions.
‘Wonder - A Hot Poets and National Poetry Day collaboration’ is a major UK-wide collaboration between Forward Arts Foundation and Hot Poets that will bring climate storytelling into classrooms on an unprecedented scale.
Through poetry, the project will reach more than a million children, encouraging them to explore climate change and biodiversity through creativity rather than fear. The programme will culminate in a UK-wide environmental National Poetry Day, alongside teacher training, classroom resources and the publication of a new children’s climate poetry book - all designed to help schools build confidence in tackling complex environmental topics.
Alongside this, Welsh theatre company Theatr na nÓg will tour two original, bilingual productions - ‘We Need Bees’ and ‘Bug Hotel’ - using music, storytelling and interactive performance to engage younger audiences with biodiversity loss, climate displacement and environmental responsibility.
Written by award winning playwright Katherine Chandler, the shows uses the lives of insects as a powerful lens through which children can explore empathy, resilience and the real-world impacts of climate change, both in schools and in community venues.
Together, the projects demonstrate the breadth of the new fund - from poetry and publishing to live performance and the ScottishPower Foundation’s belief that creative expression can play a vital role in translating complex climate science into human stories that resonate.
Melanie Hill, Executive Officer and Trustee of the ScottishPower Foundation, said, “The climate crisis is the defining challenge of our time, and we know the arts have a unique power to make complex ideas accessible, emotional and impossible to ignore.
“Through our new Art for Climate Fund, we’re backing bold, imaginative projects that give young people hope, confidence and a real sense of agency. Both beneficiaries of this new fund show how creativity can spark climate action in classrooms and communities across the UK, and we’re incredibly proud to support them as the first recipients of this new fund."
Chris Redmond, Co-Artistic Director of Hot Poets, said: “We are thrilled to receive support from the ScottishPower Foundation to fund Wonder - A Hot Poets and National Poetry Day collaboration. For us, this project is about pride in place at a planetary level; it gives young people and local communities the creative confidence to talk about climate and science with hope rather than fear.”
Geinor Styles, Artistic Director of Theatr na nÓg, said: “It’s fantastic to be one of the first projects to receive funding from the ScottishPower Foundation Art for Climate Fund, allowing us to revive our much-loved production of 'We Need Bees' and the development of its new companion piece, 'Bug Hotel'. The project will reach thousands of children and families across South Wales, tackling important issues including biodiversity loss, climate displacement and the climate emergency.”
Further details on the Art for Climate Fund and the supported projects are available on the ScottishPower Foundation website: scottishpowerfoundation.com.
