Surrey County Council (SCC) is supporting residents and communities to implement projects which align with the priorities of Surrey residents.
This programme will run until the end of March 2026, and all grants listed below are now closed. Additional funding for organisations and community groups is still available until 20 March for the Your Fund Surrey grant, and 31 January for Your Councillor Community Fund.
You can find support across a range of themes, including flooding and resilience, energy, and nature recovery.
Our resident surveys show that the overwhelming majority of residents think action on restoring nature and tackling climate change is important (in fact only 5% say it’s ‘not important’). Nearly half of Surrey residents say they are already witnessing nature and habitat loss, and 1/3 say they have witnessed increased flooding and disruption to services due to climate change.
Therefore, the support and grants on offer are aligned with restoring nature (under the Local Nature Recovery Strategy), reducing energy use and costs, preventing flooding and increasing resilience to extreme weather events
Below is a summary of the initiatives Surrey County Council are supporting through Surrey County Council’s Place Programme. For any queries, or to request an application form for a grant, please contact greenerfutures@surreycc.gov.uk
Flooding and Resilience
Resilient Schools grants
Many schools across Surrey face challenges with flooding or rising temperatures affecting students learning, and in some cases causing classrooms to be closed. This impacts young people’s learning, and can have significant knock-on effects, for example on Surrey’s local economy when parents need to stay at home to look after children when schools are closed.
We can provide grants of up to £7000 per school to pilot approaches that build resilience to the rising impacts of climate change. Under this scheme you can:
- Create a climate risk assessment for your school
- Install rain gardens or sustainable drainage solutions
- Plant tress
Application window: 29 September 2025 to 17 November 2025
Community Nature grants and giveaways
Community Nature and Flood Attenuation grants
Community groups, parish councils and resident associations can apply for a grant to assist in the delivery of Surrey’s Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS). Surrey’s LNRS is one of 48 nature recovery strategies across the UK, and to successfully reverse Surrey’s above-average rate of nature decline we need collaborative action driven by residents and community groups.
You can apply for funding of projects up to £4000, and in some circumstances, we may provide up to £10,000 for projects of high impact. Projects you can fund under this scheme include:
- Nest boxes – for example, for swifts, owls and bats
- Grassland, heathland restoration or creation
- Pond creation or restoration
- Road verge improvement or restoration
- Hedgerow creation or laying
- Pocket parks
- Rain gardens and small-scale SUDs
- Free water butts (Nork and Tattenhams only)
Tree giveaways
Our Countryside Team donated around 4,000 native broadleaved trees to support nature recovery and increase canopy cover for Surrey residents.
Our Tree Planting Team ran giveaways last winter at seven of Surrey’s Community Recycling Centres, where we gave away native trees suitable for garden planting.
Trees were donated with shared guidance on planting and maintenance, helping to give them the best chance of success and enabling them to both thrive and survive.
This scheme has now ended due to the close of the tree planting season, but you can find out more about the project here.
Resilience installation
In recent years significant flooding from rivers and surface water has affected communities across Surrey, often with devastating effects to livelihoods and mental health. Working with two of these communities, Surrey County Council is offering a community-level intervention to showcase the positive impact of flood prevention measures and reduce surface water entering drains and sewers, as well promote water conservation. This pilot will take place in Nork and Tattenhams, and Tadworth with the installation of 150 specialist water butts, working in partnership with residents to manage and mitigate flood risk.
Community flood advice
Following the success of the Home Energy Advice Team, a fantastic project run by Zero Carbon Guildford with Energy Action Redhill and Reigate and Circular Dorking - which has supported over 2000 Surrey homes with free energy advice - we are exploring ways in which to provide a similar community-led service for homes in areas at risk of flooding.
The scheme will be piloted in an area of high flood risk, but we encourage you to get in touch via greenerfutures@surreycc.gov.uk if you are either:
- Interested in training to provide flood advice to your local area
- Live in an area prone to flooding and are interested in creating a community-led initiative to safeguard residents with Surrey County Council’s support
Energy
Surrey’s One Stop Shop
We have partnered with Furbnow to support residents who are not eligible for the upcoming Warm Homes Local Grant with whole house home energy upgrade plans. If your property has an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) rating of D to G, you could benefit from up to 20% off a Home Energy Plan and 30% off Design and Project Management support. Please note this discount does not apply to the installation costs themselves.
Find out more on the Home Energy Plans webpage, or register directly with Furbnow to request a quote.
Community energy
We have partnered with Surrey Community Energy (SCE) to install renewables at sites which benefits community groups, charities, and local business. SCE is currently awaiting planning permission for the first site, and once successful a share offer will open to fund the purchase and installation of the solar array, whilst the billpayer receives a typically below-grid cost electricity price.
For more information read the Community Energy webpage, or get in touch with info@surreycommunityenergy.org
Volunteering
SCC has partnered with Team Kinetic to help community groups and charities across the county build capacity, manage volunteers better, and find new ways to attract a greater number and diversity of volunteers.
The platform is free to use for Surrey's community-led organisations, and links directly to the Royal Voluntary Society's national volunteer database. This will help to create a more streamlined volunteer journe, whilst providing greater coverage and exposure of your community initiatives, hopefully leading to increased volunteering capacity across the county.
For further information on the volunteering platform please contact us via environmentvolunteering@surreycc.gov.uk , or reach out to your local Council for Voluntary Service (CVS), of which Surrey has four across the county to support volunteer organisations.
Waste Prevention
Each year, Surrey households produce around 500,000 tonnes of waste, which must be collected, transported and managed. In response to this, recycling has been high on the agenda for many years, something Surrey residents have embraced. We are now joint second place for recycling in the UK, showing that we care about the resources we use and are doing our bit to protect our planet. However, it is even better if we can prevent it becoming waste in the first place, save our money and stop cluttering up our homes.
Figures reveal that, although an important behaviour to support, recycling is only one step in the waste hierarchy, with other behaviours of waste prevention such as reusing and repairing, having a greater impact. Waste prevention also reduces the need to manufacture and transport goods, all of which has a positive impact on the amount of carbon being produced.
Surrey County Council is therefore proud to launch a grant scheme in support of projects in local communities tackling waste head on. This grant of up to £2500 funding will support projects such as:
- Library of Things
- Repair Cafes
- Composting
- Clothes Libraries
- Mending Circles
- Upcycling Events
The grant application window runs until the 15 December 2025.
Cycling Circular Economy
Our Active Travel team is hosting a series of events to help Surrey residents learn essential bike maintenance and repair skills. These sessions aim to keep the 37% of Surrey adult residents, and the 74% of child residents, who already own a bicycle moving safely and confidently.
The Dr Bike events offer general check-ups, brake, or gear adjustments, as well as other quick fixes by of our trained mechanics. Whilst Bike Maintenance events are designed to teach basic skills to those residents who are keen to learn how to fix and maintain their bikes themselves. Both types of events help people to save money, learn new valuable skills, and encourage them to keep cycling.
There are a range of events taking place across Surrey and do not require a booking, just show up on the day. Plus, if you have an unused bike clogging up space in your shed or garage then why not bring it along to one of our donation events. Donated bikes will be repaired and rehomed to those experiencing challenging circumstances where access to a bike could be lifechanging.