From baby beavers to river walks, where climate action is quietly taking root
While national environmental movements have disappeared from headlines, climate action hasn’t stopped – community groups are now leading the charge on positive change.
At the tail end of last summer (the hottest on record), research by the University of Oxford found that the majority of the public supports action on climate. That support hasn’t vanished – but the way people are engaging has changed. For many, it now shows up in quieter, more personal ways: spending time outdoors, joining local groups, and finding pleasure in protecting the places they care about.
In recent years, environmental activists have encountered mounting obstacles, from the pandemic and the criminalisation of protest, to a hostile mainstream media, and a political landscape shaped by polluters. As a result, climate action today is far less visible than during the mass movements of the late 2010s. But away from the spotlight, people are still showing up – not only out of urgency, but because these efforts offer connection, purpose and moments of joy in the natural world.
The narrative that nothing is happening can fuel disengagement and climate apathy, but the real story is quite different. In fact, much of the campaigning is now happening at a more local level.
There are also tangible reasons for optimism on a wider scale too. Last year, wind and solar power overtook fossil fuels in EU electricity generation, and the UK has since joined a European offshore wind farm initiative aimed at creating the world’s largest “clean energy reservoir.” Universities have continued to sever ties with fossil fuel companies, refusing to advertise roles in the industry, while London reached a major air quality milestone, meeting the UK’s legal limit for nitrogen dioxide almost 200 years ahead of projections. Perhaps most tellingly, recent national census data shows that the majority of adults (around 84 per cent) have made changes to their lifestyle to help tackle environmental issues – suggesting a quiet but significant shift in everyday behaviour.
While the outlook on the climate crisis is far from good, people across the country are still engaging in tangible climate activism that is making a real impact. The Lead spoke with local grassroots groups about how they sustain positive momentum amid mounting environmental doom.
Finding a personal connection to nature
“Things I would never have imagined you would see have happened,” says David Gillan, the 68-year-old chair of the Save The Wye coalition. “From people who are very straight, older, potentially Reform-voting people, who have now taken [the issue] on board in a very different way.”
Across the UK, a plethora of grassroots movements have emerged in response to local environmental decline – from the race for volunteers to remove millions of plastic beads from Camber Sands to surfers exposing sewage pollution on our beloved beaches. For the past three and a half years, saving the River Wye from agricultural pollution has been a major focus for David, who previously protested with Extinction Rebellion, but was eventually drawn to a campaign closer to home in the Golden Valley, Herefordshire.
“The overhead of going up to London for a week or 10 days, spending time in police cells, and then coming out again, it just felt like we had done what we could immediately with XR,” he explains. “It seemed to us that the river not only connected with climate breakdown, but also was easier to talk to people about, because they’re very fond of their river and don’t like to see it in the state it’s in.” Increasingly, he notes, former national XR activists are channeling their energy into local campaigns.
The coalition has had considerable success in raising awareness about the condition of the Wye (we reported on the campaign this time last year). Public understanding of the issue has grown, and so has the sense that concrete action must be taken. Even more striking is how much the middle ground has shifted on the issue.
Despite detractors, David says that 18 months ago, the Conservative-led council in Herefordshire voted unanimously to consider the health of the Wye in all their decisions. At a recent event, the council’s leader and deputy leader read poems to the River Wye, and a key management board within the council even appointed a spiritual activist as the voice of the River Wye in their meetings.
Furthermore, Avara, one of the major poultry companies, agreed to transport more manure out of the catchment area, reducing nutrient pollution entering the river. David is clear that this outcome is a partial solution to the problem. “It’s not just about bad actors, Avara being a company with an appalling record, or farmers who don’t care – because most farmers do care – it’s about the fact that the regulatory system in this country is not fit for purpose, and there are regulatory gaps, which people are now identifying.”
In December, the Environment Agency unveiled its long-awaited report to clean up the pollution in the river, which had taken 10 years to produce, but it has been met with criticism from campaigners. The report also stops short of recommending a Water Protection Zone, a legal mechanism that could bring stronger regulation, and which campaigners and the council have been pushing for in recent years. Securing such a designation is now the coalition’s next goal.
Despite the long battle for the River Wye, David remains determined to keep fighting: “The thing that keeps all of us going is walking by the river.” Spending time outdoors, he says, both reminds him of what is at stake and offers its own reward.
Turning climate anxiety into democratic power
Fossil Free London, a climate group that meets in person every week and stages demonstrations against polluters in the city, welcomes about eight new members every fortnight, equipping hundreds with knowledge and campaigning skills they can use both within the group and beyond.
Many arrive feeling lonely, anxious, or overwhelmed, but organisers help them find connection and purpose on their doorstep. An important part of this is the group’s protest rights walking tours around Central London that teach the history of local activism, legal rights, and how to stay safe at demonstrations.
The group combines local history with hands-on activism to show that the climate crisis is not an abstract problem, but is rooted in the city itself. “We’re in the belly of the beast,” Rosie, 28, a full-time organiser for Fossil Free London tells The Lead.
“This is where a lot of the oil conferences, glitzy dinners, and behind-closed-doors meetings to plan the expansion of oil and gas, and the collapse of the climate, happen.” For the campaigner, who lives just 30 minutes away from Shell’s headquarters, the city is a constant reminder of how close our chance to confront power really is.
Fossil Free London recently grabbed headlines for disrupting a gala dinner in Windsor for Republicans during Trump’s second state visit to the UK, they previously prevented a South London nightclub from hosting an afterparty for Jordan Peterson’s alt-right conference, and famously interrupted Shell’s 2023 shareholder meeting in London with chants of “Go to hell, Shell!” as part of their wider ‘Shut Down Shell’ campaign.
Rewilding London
The UK is now one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. Citizen Zoo is an organisation dedicated to tackling this issue through rewilding, the process of restoring an ecosystem to its natural state. With projects taking place in Greater London and East Anglia, their passionate team and volunteers are building hope through community action.
“We want nature to be part of the daily experience, not something to travel miles to,” says Elliot Newton, co-founder and director of the organisation. “We want to give everybody access to come out of their doorsteps and be surrounded by nature,” says Elliot Newton, co-founder and director of the organisation.”
One of Citizen Zoo’s “genesis” projects was to reintroduce the large marsh grasshopper to wetlands across Norfolk and Cambridgeshire. In collaboration with local wildlife groups, volunteers received Petri dishes containing grasshopper eggs, which they nurtured until the insects reached adulthood and could be released into the wild. “It’s helping to reverse species extinction from your living room,” explains Elliot.
In Kingston Upon Thames, the group has helped reintroduce water voles to the Hogsmill River, an animal that has declined by about 97 per cent in the UK within a single lifetime. Volunteers have played a central role in restoring the habitat, monitoring populations, and helping release the animals back into the wild. The result has been the reversal of a local extinction event as well as a renewed sense of local pride and connection to the animal.
Further north, in Ealing, the organisation helped deliver a project in which, for the first time in British history, beavers were reintroduced into an urban setting on a site fully accessible to the public.
“It’s fascinating,” says Elliot, “you park in a McDonald’s car park in Greenford in this big retail park, and you go under the underpass that is now being painted with these beautiful murals of beavers and wildlife. Hundreds, if not thousands of people, walk through it every day.” The dams the beavers have built now slow floodwaters, boost biodiversity, and have even helped prevent the nearby train station from flooding by reducing the buildup of water downstream.
The beavers – which have been named Willow, Woody, Chompy and Chewbacca (Chewy) by local school children – are now “part of the community,” says Elliot. “They are demonstrating that we can effectively make our landscape more resilient to impacts of climate change, and a healthier and happier place to live.”
Citizen Zoo’s work is deliberately community-led. Projects are shaped with local residents, councils, and volunteers, rather than imposed from outside. That approach also opens the door for people with no prior experience to get involved. Volunteers can take part in habitat restoration, wildlife monitoring, ecological surveying, or traditional land management techniques such as scything.
“London is about 52 per cent green and blue space, and is home to about 17,000 different species,” says Newton.“ And people just aren’t overly aware of this. We see volunteer days as a gateway to understanding the environment that we’re living in a bit better, and helps [people] appreciate it a bit more.”
In a time of accelerating environmental loss, Elliot, like David, believes protecting joy and connection to the living world is one of the most powerful drivers of climate action. Evidently, they aren’t alone. The momentum of these local groups suggests there is hope to be found in choosing forms of climate action that are rooted in day-to-day life, and as a result, feel genuinely achievable.
Beyond the noise and the setbacks, the groundwork is being done to pave the way for meaningful climate victories.■
About the author: Diyora Shadijanova is a writer and journalist based in London. She was previously a Senior Editor at The Lead.
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