Infrastructure decisions made today will shape the lives of people living many decades into the future. As climate risks become increasingly complex and uncertain, public bodies and infrastructure providers need to work in new ways so that communities who want or need to understand, discuss, and influence how infrastructure will adapt to these challenges are better engaged and included.

As part of our 2024/25 year of work looking at climate change conversations, we are pleased to launch our toolkit for community engagement on this topic. This builds on our hands-on experience co-designing and delivering these tools in Grangetown, Cardiff in 2024/2025, and reflects our ambition of engaging with people from diverse backgrounds whose voices are not usually heard. 

Developed in collaboration with the School of International Futures, and co-produced and developed with participants using creative methods, the NICW Toolkit: Engaging Diverse Communities in Climate Adaptation Conversations offers a practical, hands-on guide for commissioners, community organisers, civil society groups, and planners across Wales.

This toolkit is more than a set of instructions, it’s a framework for building trust, fostering climate literacy, and empowering communities to imagine and prepare for the future. It includes:

• Session design guidance to help facilitators plan and run effective climate dialogues.
• A suite of creative tools such as Futures Walks, Climate Resilience Games and Futures Mindfulness
• Tips and reflections from real-world engagements, 
• Guidance for facilitators, including practical steps for preparation, feedback, and inclusive participation.

This toolkit addresses the difficulty of engaging with long-term climate risks. Documents that seek to address these risks are often filled with jargon, which can act as a barrier to action, and generate greater uncertainty within the audience. 

The toolkit can guide an approach to help communities move beyond passive consultation to active participation, enabling them to explore future scenarios, share lived experiences, and co-create visions for resilient local infrastructure. It is designed with the Wellbeing of Future Generations Act in mind, supporting its Seven Goals and Five Ways of Working. The toolkit promotes long-term thinking, collaboration, and a preventative approach that seeks to stop problems before they arise—core principles of NICW’s approach to infrastructure planning.

We are currently drafting our formal report to the Welsh Government on this topic and will be publishing our recommendations in October 2025.