This is the BBC’s new website on climate change. It’s all about informing personal choices on climate change, ranging from eating fewer prawns to parking a ground source heat pump under your back garden.
Basically, you can tailor the ‘action planner’ to suit your lifestyle (so if you’re already vegetarian, you don’t have to deal with learning about meat’s emissions, unless you want to of course) and then read articles about the wider debate behind the action. Each action is represented by a seed, and each seed’s size is based on the effectiveness of the action.
It deals with all the various climate culprits (CO2, CH4…) and is backed up with values from EST, DEFRA and academics.
And at the end you can plant the seed and watch it bloom…
Blooming review
david
I recommed people go straight to the html version at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bloom/index.shtml
The flash version is big and ugly and slow, and it really put me off on my first visit (a week or so back) – I couldn’t get quickly to the information I wanted!
All-in-all its a good information resource (see especially http://www.bbc.co.uk/bloom/guides/ for background guides and http://www.bbc.co.uk/bloom/browse for actions). They give the essential information (price, carbon savings, how it works) and provide links on to grants & installers.
The overall theme, design and hook I’m not so keen on. There doesn’t seem to be much link between growing flowers and saving carbon (although it is at least a positive metaphor, I’ll give you that!). The design is far more cluttered than, say, the Energy Saving Trust pages (eg. http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/generate_your_own_energy/types_of_re…).
The pledge side is not great either. It assumes you are “doing” such a major project as a biomass bioler with just a click of the mouse, so your figures are more likely to reflect the initial burst of enthusiasm rather than guiding people fully through to completion.
Good effort, though! I’m probably not typical of your target audience, anyway!