THE children and staff of Okehampton Primary are celebrating after being named regional champions of the Total Green School Awards

Their project, 'Eco Man Returns', not only took top spot in the 'Totally Powered Up' category across Wales and western England, but was also declared the best project in all categories from the entire region, making it the regional champion for 2013.

The Total Green School Awards is a nationwide competition for five to eleven year olds, which is run by the Young People's Trust for the Environment (YPTE) in partnership with Total.

The competition, which aims to generate interest in the environment and raise awareness of the need for sustainable energy sources, has received entries from almost 44,500 school children.

All the children at the school were involved in learning about the need to reduce dependence on non-renewable energy in order to avoid climate change. They held a campaign to reduce energy use and monitored the impacts of their campaign on the school's energy use in subsequent weeks.

Classes competed in a Switch Off Fortnight to save as much energy as possible and the classes making biggest savings were given awards.

'Eco Man' visited the school to tell pupils about how they could save energy and the children put up displays around the primary, explaining how they could reduce energy use. The children saw demonstrations of an electric car and an electric scooter as examples of cleaner forms of transport.

The school now provides 30% of its energy through solar panels fitted on the roof.

Fran Rickwood, the school's eco schools co-ordinator, said: 'Taking part in the Total Green School Awards has helped us to think creatively and imaginatively about how we deliver and interpret sustainable issues in school. The children have loved helping put together our entry.'

Eighteen children representing the school will join other regional champions at the national awards ceremony at the Science Museum in London today (Thursday). All the regional champions will receive a specially commissioned trophy and a cheque for £1,000 to put towards school funds. The UK champions — to be chosen from the regional champions and announced at the national awards ceremony — will receive £5,000 for school funds.

YPTE director Peter Littlewood said: 'This is just what we want to see in the Total Green School Awards — a fantastic amount of learning, combined with practical application of that new knowledge to benefit the environment. The entire school has been infused with an ethos of saving energy whenever possible so as to minimise environmental impact.

'This kind of learning filters through to the children's families and will hopefully affect some of their decision making as adults to benefit the environment.'