The Centre for Alternative Technology Archives

Papers of CAT, including: diaries and notebooks; annual reports; minutes of committees, etc.; registers of share certificates and of directors and secretaries; correspondence; maps and plans; photographs and slides; VHS and audio tapes; reports, notes, correspondence, plans, etc., relating to CAT research, designs, projects and consultancy work, including the cliff railway and the WISE building; course details; conference reports; staffing and volunteers; task and resource lists; Welsh Language Policy; published material, including guidebooks, resource and information packs and leaflets, educational guides, publicity material, reference books, newsletters, articles, etc. This published material includes copies of 'Clean Slate,' 'Quarry News' and 'Zero Carbon Britain.'

The Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) was founded by Gerard Morgan-Grenville and Diana Brass in 1973 on the site of the disused Llwyngwern slate quarry near Machynlleth, in Mid Wales. It began as a community (largely made up of volunteers) dedicated to eco-friendly principles and committed to developing and testing new ideas and technologies. The first CAT workers arrived in 1974, living and working at the quarry where conditions were very basic and challenging. The Visitor Centre opened in the summer of 1975, to provide a permanent exhibit explaining CAT’s work and to help generate interest in alternative technology in general. The site grew to eventually include engineering workshops, a forge, a cliff railway, shop, information centre, and a restaurant.
Work at CAT relied on large numbers of staff and volunteers, with most of its members recruited through its Alternative Technology Association. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s CAT pioneered new methods in areas such as timber-frame building and composting. During this time they set up two companies – Dulas Engineering and Aber Instruments.
CAT has grown to become a leading eco centre, receiving around 65,000 visitors every year. They host school visits and group residential visits, run short specialist courses, run a graduate school with a range of postgraduate degrees in environmental architecture and renewable energy, and continue to research new approaches to environmental challenges through their flagship Zero Carbon Britain project. CAT operates as a public limited company (CAT plc, no. 1459589) which is governed by a Board of Directors, and also as a registered charity (CAT Charity Ltd, no. 265239), which is governed by an independent Board of Trustees.

The collection was sorted and a box list created at CAT by Christopher Williams, Amy Staniforth and Sarah Vaughan and subsequently edited at NLW by Lorena Troughton and Michael Pearson. The box list is not as yet arranged hierarchically, as with other catalogued archives, but by following the link under Finding Aids, readers will be directed to a PDF version of the list, and a simple word search should enable readers to identify relevant material. To order material for viewing: please follow instructions given under 'Finding Aids.'

Readers consulting modern papers in the National Library of Wales are required to abide by the conditions set out in information provided when applying for their Readers' Tickets, whereby the reader shall become responsible for compliance with the Data Protection Act 1998 in relation to any processing by them of personal data obtained from modern records held at the Library.

Deposited by Mr Allan Shepherd for the Centre of Alternative Technology, Machynlleth, August 2014 ; 006771846

The Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) was founded by Gerard Morgan-Grenville and Diana Brass in 1973 on the site of the disused Llwyngwern slate quarry near Machynlleth, in Mid Wales. It began as a community (largely made up of volunteers) dedicated to eco-friendly principles and committed to developing and testing new ideas and technologies. The first CAT workers arrived in 1974, living and working at the quarry where conditions were very basic and challenging. The Visitor Centre opened in the summer of 1975, to provide a permanent exhibit explaining CAT’s work and to help generate interest in alternative technology in general. The site grew to eventually include engineering workshops, a forge, a cliff railway, shop, information centre, and a restaurant.
Work at CAT relied on large numbers of staff and volunteers, with most of its members recruited through its Alternative Technology Association. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s CAT pioneered new methods in areas such as timber-frame building and composting. During this time they set up two companies – Dulas Engineering and Aber Instruments.
CAT has grown to become a leading eco centre, receiving around 65,000 visitors every year. They host school visits and group residential visits, run short specialist courses, run a graduate school with a range of postgraduate degrees in environmental architecture and renewable energy, and continue to research new approaches to environmental challenges through their flagship Zero Carbon Britain project. CAT operates as a public limited company (CAT plc, no. 1459589) which is governed by a Board of Directors, and also as a registered charity (CAT Charity Ltd, no. 265239), which is governed by an independent Board of Trustees.

Deposit Agreement signed 26 July 2014 at NLW. A hard drive containing the CAT Oral History Project interviews received from Allan Shepherd on 26 July. The drive (500GB capacity) contains about 90 interviews in total, about 150 hours in all, and taking up over 150GB of disc space. There is also a catalogue of the interviews in Word format.

TO VIEW / ORDER ARCHIVE MATERIAL: please see detailed instructions in the Finding Aids section above.

A box list of the archive was created at CAT by Christopher Williams, Amy Staniforth and Sarah Vaughan, and was subsequently edited at NLW by Lorena Troughton and Michael Pearson. The box list is not as yet arranged hierarchically, as with other catalogued archives, but by following the link below, readers will be directed to a PDF version of the list, and a simple word search should enable readers to identify relevant material.
https://archives.library.wales/external_documents/CAT_Archive_merged_catalogue.pdf
Once any relevant material has been identified, to order items please contact the Library's Enquiries Team and either complete the online enquiry form or email the Team directly with item details.
Please ensure that you include the full reference number (e.g. Box 14/4). You will need to give a minimum of 48 hours' notice to ensure that material can be made available in the South Reading Room.

June 2015

Compiled by Christopher Williams, Amy Staniforth and Sarah Vaughan at CAT; edited by Michael Pearson and Lorena Troughton at NLW. The following sources were used in the compilation of this description: Shepherd, Allan, 'Voices from a Disused Quarry' (Machynlleth, 2014); Centre for Alternative Technology website http://www.cat.org.uk; and material within the archive itself.

Usual copyright laws apply

All records donated to NLW have been retained apart from duplicates, which have been returned.

The records were held at the Centre for Alternative Technology prior to their transfer to NLW.

Accruals to the collection are likely.

Published

Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru = The National Library of Wales