The energy and housing transitions are being led by communities

Across three continents, citizens are working with their local communities to build more sustainable futures for themselves in housing and energy.

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New housing in Solapur, India.

In Solapur, India, housing cooperatives have come together to build more than 15,000 affordable homes since 2001, relocating thousands of workers from slums.

The Solapur Housing Initiative, led by the Centre of Indian Trade Unions, began construction of another 30,000 homes in January 2018, and recently took out the housing category of the Transformative City award.

Many of these homes – typically around 50 square metres in size – are for beedi workers, poorly paid cigarette-rolling women who are often the sole breadwinners for their families. These women previously rented tiny shanties in slums.

The land purchase cost was shared equally by the worker, the central government and the state government, but the workers struggled for a long time to win their demand and have previous debts cancelled.

The award proves that the sheer strength of workers’ sustained efforts, with the cooperation of governments, can deliver results.

On the other side of the world, in Bolivia, the residents of San Pedro Magisterio village used to have to fetch water from springs near their polluted river daily.

Then the San Pedro Magisterio grassroots community organisation founded a water cooperative. They drilled wells and built the basic infrastructure to bring water to their homes. The funding to solve all these problems came from contributions made by community members, who did all the work themselves.

They followed this with a long campaign to build a wastewater treatment plant to clean up the highly polluted river. The community set up a reed bed ecological sewage treatment system serving 4000 people.

Resident Doña Magui says they are now trying to replace the reeds with arum lilies because they perform the same function and will help keep the treatment plant going in the long-term, because residents will sell the lilies and put the profits back into maintenance.

“As far as the state is concerned, we don’t exist,” Magui says, adding that it was the residents themselves who built the first school, the church and the first roads. This community was awarded the water category of the Transformative City award.

The third and final energy category was given to the Spanish city of Cadiz for its action plan against energy poverty.

The campaign featured active cooperation between local government leaders and ordinary citizens. A group of unemployed citizens were trained as energy advisers and given an eight-month contract by the city council to tackle unemployment, energy poverty and climate change simultaneously.

The team gives families in Cádiz advice on how to optimise their energy contracts so they pay as little as possible. In just three months, the team ran 60 workshops, gave 640 people training on energy issues, and advised 70 families in their homes, reducing their electricity bills by 20-50 per cent.

There have been 224 households that have changed their contracts to a time-of-day tariff, another sign of the knowledge gained by workshop participants.

The energy transition and energy poverty

While in the South, communities face more severe problems in transforming themselves to achieve sustainability, in the North it is energy poverty which is frequently the hidden but powerful motivator for change. Energy poverty is where building design and energy supply meet.

EU energy regulation still lacks a commonly agreed legal definition of energy poverty and this prevents the setting of mandatory targets and roadmaps.

Some national governments give low income households the chance to access social tariffs:

• In Flanders, Belgium, for example, each household can obtain an annual discount on bills based on its size.
• In Italy, low-income households and large families are offered discounts on gas and electricity bills, – a national plan supported by all municipalities.
• In France social tariffs have been replaced by 'energy cheques', which people can use not only to pay their utility bills but also to finance energy-saving works in their homes.
• In Germany, Berlin’s electricity grid is up for sale approximately every 15 years. When selecting the supplier in 2016, the citizens pushed for fuel poverty to be one of the criteria of buyer selection to be factored in by the local government.

In the absence of this, community energy groups are tackling the issue:

• In England, Plymouth City Council identified community energy as a potential solution to energy poverty and facilitated the creation of Plymouth Energy Community in 2013, which now includes 1200 individuals and organisations who are transitioning to an affordable and low carbon energy system by offering access to grants to cancel energy debt, free and assisted insulation and advice on the best tariff options.
• And a Low Carbon Hub Community Energy Fund is tackling the looming end of the British Feed-in Tariff subsidy for locally-generated solar electricity in March 2019, by fundraising frantically to install as many solar panels as possible on schools and businesses before the deadline. It has already successfully installed a new array at a primary school and is working with Oxfordshire County Council to encourage more schools to follow their example. It is campaigning to raise £1 million by 31st of July 2018, to bring in long term equity from positive investors.
• In Scotland, non-profit social company OurPower, which is owned by social housing providers, community organisations and local authorities, produces and sells its own energy. Profits are reinvested to benefit customers and their community and every member can access locally produced renewable energy at a fair price and is able to control their energy supply and distribution.
• In Wales, a similar approach is achieved by Awel Aman Tawe, which owns a wind farm and has installed photovoltaic rooves on community buildings.
• In the Netherlands, a new Climate Agreement was reached at the beginning of this month which includes a community energy target that requires all new wind and solar projects to be at least half owned by the local community. All 33 Dutch regions have regional energy strategies under development.

Siward Zomer, representative of ‘Energie Samen’, the Dutch sector association of sustainable energy initiatives of citizens and farmers, said that "We expect a great acceleration of the development of new renewable energy projects where communities can become owners".

The control over revenues from renewable energy projects means that citizens, farmers and local entrepreneurs can directly benefit the local community.

Zomer says that strong collaboration between the market and the community will accelerate the energy transition. "The transition to a carbon free electricity system needs to be a democratic transition, giving all citizens the opportunity to participate. As part of the overall agreement, five hundred districts off the gas pipeline will have a transition plan within three years, agreed between housing collectives and community groups, local municipalities and other parties."

In Mouscron, Belgium (58,000 inhabitants), the first community energy cooperative COOPEM was launched this year by the municipality itself, following a feasibility study and several public meetings, strong involvement of citizens and a partnership with two companies, Energiris (a Brussels citizens’ cooperative) and Aralia (a third-party investor in PV projects).

COOPEM’s equity is owned 55 per cent by citizens, 15 per cent by the municipality and 30 per cent by the two private partners.

Thanks to bulk purchasing and the government’s Qualiwatt subsidy (a feed-in tariff that runs out at the end of July) citizens benefit from a reduction on the cost of the installation. When residents use energy from the grid, their meter runs normally but when their PV panels generate electricity, the meter runs backwards.

Many such organisations are members of the European Federation of Renewable Energy Cooperatives (REScoops), a network of 1,250 European energy cooperatives and their 1.000.000 citizens who are active in the energy transition.

Villages in Transition

Luzy in France is part of another network, the Village in Transition movement. It boasts a farmers’ corner, associative café, the Horizon, the donation shed, all run by citizens, with municipality support.

Luzy is a member of POTEs (Ordinary Energy Transition Pioneers), fostered by pan-European initiative Energy Cities, whose Carine Dartiguepeyrou says "are every-day-life innovators and visionaries working in areas related to the energy transition that Energy Cities, the Bourgogne Franche-Comté Region and ADEME, the French national energy conservation and environment agency, are forming into a network.

"POTEs are efficient and innovative… they collaborate and take care of others by helping them make progress in their project and overcome difficulties."

She explains that "A good example of this is the 'hold-up' method, a collective intelligence tool used for the third place the Horizon and the farmers’ corner at Luzy. Starting with an issue faced by each project, the participants put forward solutions to help the Horizon find a new business model and the farmers’ corner perpetuate its activity.

"In order to solve concrete challenges faced by project leaders (social entrepreneurs, researchers, engineers, government, NGOs ...), the actors who participate in a Hold-Up discuss and exchange ideas."
Energy communities

The European Council and the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) are drafting models of local energy ownership and the role of local energy communities in energy transition in Europe.

Energy Cities has prepared a joint contribution together with ResCoop.EU, the European federation for renewable energy cooperatives for the European Parliament to move forward on this issue. They are arguing that "only by distributing control among local actors will we be able to get to a fair energy transition and effectively fight climate change. Furthermore, this would contribute to local development and the reduction of (energy) poverty."

They perceive an enormous interest among local authorities to take control of the energy infrastructure, but also a lot of uncertainty on the 'hows and whats', and fear of failure.

Energy communities represent a distinct market actor in the energy system. They can play many roles at the local level such as provision of clean renewable energy and technical expertise. They can also as a partner to support local economic and social objectives.

For REScoop.eu, renewable energy cooperatives are ideal partners to lead the energy transition to energy democracy.

Sharing best practices and organising exchanges between cities can fill in the current knowledge and confidence gap.

So the EU Energy Poverty Observatory has published a new Guidance on designing effective energy poverty policies in municipalities about how to implement realistic and appropriate local energy poverty policies.

The EU Energy Poverty Observatory is now inviting municipalities to apply for technical assistance with the implementation of this guidance, including insights from best practices and recommendations based on the local circumstances.

 Power to the people!

David Thorpe’s two new books are Passive Solar Architecture Pocket Reference and Solar Energy Pocket Reference. He’s also the author of Energy Management in Building and Sustainable Home Refurbishment.

Community bribes to host nuclear are one fifth those for wind farms

Ecotricity founder Dale Vince said: “This is a further move by the Government to rig the energy market against renewables in favour of nuclear and gas". 

The Government is rigging the energy market after its announced nuclear power would pay five times less than wind energy in community benefit.

Ministers announced yesterday that communities around eight sites (Hinkley Point, Sizewell, Wylfa, Oldbury, Sellafield, Bradwell, Heysham, and Hartlepool) in England and Wales could be in line to receive benefits - otherwise known as bribes - worth up to £1000/MW over 40 years from when and if nuclear power stations sited there begin operating. 

The founder of leading renewable energy supplier Ecotricity, Dale Vince, said: “This is a further move by the Government to rig the energy market against renewables in favour of nuclear and gas. Nuclear power is already being fast-tracked through the planning system and today they’ve announced nuclear will pay a fraction of the community benefit paid by wind power.”

On July 6 the Government announced that onshore wind farms should pay £5,000/MW in community benefit – an increase of five fold. At that time Mr Vince said: “Will we see the same logic being applied to the new generation of gas plants and nuclear power stations? This is a slippery slope.”

Dr Doug Parr, Chief Scientist at Greenpeace UK, commented: “Whilst wind farms and even shale gas developers have to pay community benefits, only nuclear stations will get a fat taxpayer subsidy to fund them. 

"Our entire energy policy is now absurdly distorted by the desperation to prop up EDF’s faltering Hinkley C project, with the government piling the costs onto the taxpayer to avoid the embarrassment of admitting they backed the wrong technology. We can’t go on like this.”

Dale Vince added: “This shows the Government’s approach to energy policy. Firstly, to fast-track planning for nuclear and gas; secondly, allowing nuclear to pay community benefit that’s one fifth the cost burden of wind power; and thirdly, the new mechanism of financial support (Contracts for Difference), which it’s widely believed will be two to three times higher for nuclear when compared to onshore wind.

“When you put those three parts together it shows an energy market being rigged. The Government shouldn’t be picking winners in the energy industry, they should be providing a level playing field for competition. Are they really saying the impact of nuclear power in one fifth that of wind power?

“After 25 years, windmills are removed and the land returned to nature. The impact of nuclear power remains for hundreds of years and those sites will stay radioactive and never be safe."

The Government is clearly only thinking short term. What happens after 40 years is up and the site is radioactive?

Its motivation is the expected creation of employment, which it estimates as "up to 40,000 jobs in the sector" but crucially "at its peak", ie during the construction phase.  

Its nuclear industrial strategy sets out the basis for a long-term partnership between government and industry to exploit those opportunities.

But communities hosting nuclear sites will be left with the toxic legacy long after these benefits have been forgotten.

Larger community renewable energy schemes to receive extra support

Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Barker said: "The expansion of our reformed Feed-in Tariff will encourage even more communities to get on board.”

New proposals to benefit community energy schemes have been unveiled by the Government.

In its response to feedback from community groups on the type of financial incentive that works best for them, the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has said it will increase the generation threshold under which community projects are eligible for feed-in tariffs (FITs) to enable larger projects to benefit.

Support for community renewable projects over 5MW is currently available under the Renewables Obligation (RO). But this pays a lower amount per kilowatt-hour than that available under FITs.

The reforms, to be written into the Energy Bill and underpinned by secondary legislation, will permit community schemes up to 10MW in size to continue to benefit from the levels of support available to those below 5MW.

Projects such as solar PV on school roofs or panels on libraries, community owned wind turbines and hydro power from local streams could all benefit under the proposed new rules.

There is also money on offer to pay for excess power exported back to the grid.

Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Barker said: "The Coalition is determined to drive a step change in the deployment of community energy.

"We want to help consumers, businesses and communities generate more of their own clean, green electricity locally, becoming less reliant on centralised power generation. The expansion of our reformed Feed-in Tariff will encourage even more communities to get on board.”

The announcement comes on top of the launch last week of a £15 million Renewable Community Energy Fund to help community groups with the cost of feasibility studies and seeking planning permission.

DECC is also keen to explore what needs to be done to kickstart even more projects across the UK, with a call for evidence currently underway and the UK’s first community energy strategy to be launched in the Autumn.

The call for evidence wants to hear about the potential benefits of community energy, the barriers to community energy, and what might be innovative and new approaches.

The proposed changes to the FITs rules will be made as part of the Energy Bill process. Once this Bill comes into force, the Government will consult on what it will mean in practice for community schemes.

The Solar Trade Association welcomed the proposals. Its chief executive, Paul Barwell, said: “Community solar farms on lower grade agricultural land help farmers diversify their risk away from increased weather risks to their land, while at the same time fostering dual purpose land use and biodiversity. Community ownership will help secure better community acceptance for more ambitious solar farms over the existing 5MW threshold.”

However, the STA  believes that there is still an issue which needs clarifying that is preventing many community schemes from getting off the ground.

Currently all solar schemes over 50kW (the size of e.g. a school scheme) are subject to very stringent capacity constraints. For example, in any quarter, if more than 200MW of capacity of 50kW+schemes is installed, this will result in a 28% cut in all the tariffs from 50kW through to 5MW.

Furthermore, for schemes over 250kW (larger commercial or community schemes), the FIT is too low to work, leading to just a handful of projects at this size since last July. This is despite schemes over 250kW being more cost effective than many large-scale renewables supported under the Renewables Obligation (RO).

STA Head of External Affairs, Leonie Greene, said: “Solar is being unfairly constrained. It is this 'normal' mid-size of solar, dominant in markets overseas, that needs urgent attention.”

The STA is currently finalising its best practice guidance for high standards in solar farm construction, which recommend avoiding prime grade agricultural land, and provide a set of criteria which developers, builders and land tenants can use to ensure best practice.

£15 million for community-owned renewable energy in England

A new £15 million government fund has been launched to support community-owned renewable energy projects in England.

The Rural Community Energy Fund (RCEF), which is now open to applications, is targeted at helping rural communities pay for the cost of feasibility studies into renewable energy projects, and fund the costs associated with applying for planning permission.

But the fund stops short of paying for the actual installation of the renewable technologies. Instead, the hope is that projects will then be able to attract private finance to get projects up and running.

Crowd-funding is proving to be a popular way of attracting such finance. The most recent project to be funded this way is a community-run hydro-electric scheme on the outskirts of Edinburgh, Scotland. Harlaw Hydro raised £313,000 through a ‘community share’ offer to fund the installation.

Additionally, the Co-operative Bank’s loan fund, the Co-operative Enterprise Hub are offering support for renewable energy with their campaign for a Clean Energy Revolution in communities across the UK.

Within their £1 billion commitment to fund energy efficiency and renewables is a £100 million fund for small-scale community renewables and tackling reductions in fuel poverty.

The RCEF funding can be used to support most renewable or low carbon technologies, including: wind, solar, biomass, heat pumps, anaerobic digestion, gas Combined Heat and Power and hydro.

Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Barker said that he hoped the funding would "help kick start hundreds of clean green energy projects in rural areas across England. Not only can local generation bring people together, boost local economies and drive forward green growth, it can help save money on energy bills too.”

Environment and Rural Affairs Minister Richard Benyon added: “As well as boosting renewable energy production, the Fund will ensure that communities have the funding they need for local projects and priorities in future.”

The RCEF offers funding in two stages: a grant of up to £20,000 for feasibility studies into renewable energy projects in local areas; and, upon successful completion of this, a loan of up to around £130,000 to help with project costs, such as seeking planning permission and relevant environmental permits.

The loan is repayable to the government once projects have been commissioned, with an additional premium of 45%. This cash is expected to be derived from the income generated by their projects. The government will reinvest it back into the fund to help support further projects.

The funding is a successor to the Local Energy Assessment Fund (LEAF) that was launched in December 2011. This has led to 236 community energy generation and management projects across England.

WRAP is, perhaps surprisingly, the delivery agency for the RCEF funding, with the application forms available on their website.

Applications will only be considered from rural communities with less than 10,000 residents and larger communities located in local authority areas defined as ‘predominantly rural’.

Applications will be reviewed on a monthly basis by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and Defra with advice from WRAP, but there is no set deadline for submission of bids.

Call for wind farm developers to do more for communities

Helping communities to develop their own local renewable energy resources could boost the local economy and improve participation in community activities, according to a new report from the Joseph Rowntree Trust.

It says that the Government, instead of reforming planning processes to force unwanted schemes on towns and villages, should instead consider ways in which communities can benefit from low carbon energy.

The report, Wind energy and justice for disadvantaged communities, says that it is not simply about large companies giving a share of their profits to local communities when they put a wind farm in their neighbourhood.

Instead, it should be about bolstering local resilience in the face of difficult economic conditions and rising energy prices, which can have spin-off benefits in terms of improving local facilities and promoting a sense of community spirit.

The report does not consider community-owned schemes, which have their own, separate benefits. Rather, it examines how commercial, large-scale schemes can be more embedded in their locality. It calls on developers to directly invest in community resources or environmental enhancement.

There are community benefit funds from wind farms that now exceed £100,000 a year. As the size of these wind farms continues to increase so will the funds. With this, the report says, “comes the opportunity to achieve something transformational".

This “exciting vision" could, in 25 years time, leave communities with a more “sustainable, autonomous, locally embedded energy system, which retains more local employment and generates funds for other goals".

It quotes research showing that large wind farms tend to be in areas of social disadvantage, or of lower population and lower incomes. These include West Wales, Cornwall, Lincolnshire, North East England, Lothian and Scottish Highlands. By contrast, the affluent counties of southern England, often the most vocal against wind farms, have very few such facilities.

This is not surprising, since remote areas tend to be both windy and socially deprived. But it does show that there is an opportunity for wind farms to redress the economic disadvantage experienced by these areas.

The report cites communities already existing across the country with this transformational aspiration.

One example is that of Argyll and Bute, Scotland, which decided that the sum of £2000 per megawatt of installed capacity should be the minimum payment of the community benefit, with an additional £1000 per megawatt based on the actual output of the wind farm. 60% of this share of the profit is channelled to the immediate local community through a trust fund, and 40% to the wider community.

Another example is Forestry Commission Wales, which manages a lot of upland coniferous plantation land on behalf of the Welsh government, that is made available for developers. Tenders for wind farms are evaluated with considerable weight given to community and financial dimensions: 60% in total, with just 40% given to technical aspects.

Finally the report looks at an example of offshore wind near Lincolnshire on the east coast of England. Here, community benefits have been substantially shaped by the developer, Centrica. For example, they have invested in a local community centre to give it heating and hot water, and provided a visitor centre and education officer.

The report has been welcomed by RenewableUK, which points out that already in Scotland there is a national register detailing community benefits already agreed with developers to help other communities negotiate with developers.

There is also an emerging UK-wide Coastal Communities Fund, which is beginning a debate about the equitable division of profits between the government and local communities, in cases where projects are developed on land owned by the Crown.

Many companies are seeing the benefits of investing in local communities. In Scotland, Scottish and Southern Energy are increasing their standard community benefit offer to £5000 per megawatt, half of which is put into a “Scotland Sustainable Energy Fund" with the aim of supporting the development of skills, community energy schemes and environmental improvements in the wider region.

The Rowntree Report concludes by saying: “The prize is a significant one: a low-carbon energy revolution that not only addresses global obligations to future generations, but which fosters long-term resilience in the communities that live alongside the infrastructure".

Cameron advisor urges policy change to support community renewables

The message that communities can come up with the answers to our looming energy supply crisis, which I promoted last week, is reinforced today by a report that urges the Government to radically overhaul the ‘closed shop’ energy market by unleashing the community energy sector.

ResPublica, a think tank founded by Phillip Blond, whom David Cameron has described as being "at the cutting edge of progressive thinking about public services", is warning that failure to recognise and back the community sector will have serious consequences on the Government’s climate change, emissions and fuel poverty targets.

They're calling for local people to be empowered to move beyond the status of passive users and consumers and instead become producers and distributors of their own energy supplies.

The report, Re-energising our Communities: Transforming the energy market through local energy production, which is backed by Friends of the Earth, recommends opening up the energy market, and highlights examples of best practice elsewhere, citing Germany where one-quarter of all renewable energy is community owned.

In the UK, it points to successful schemes in the Isle of Eigg off the west coast of Scotland, Torrs Hydro Ltd in New Mills, Sheffield, and Fintry Renewable Energy Enterprise in Stirling, which is it says could be replicated across the country.

Ed Mayo, ResPublica Fellow and Director General of Co-operatives UK, said, "The beauty of renewable energy that is co-operatively owned and community-level is that it solves the twin issues of social acceptance and economic efficiency".

The report’s authors say the Government wants to reform the market and increase community production, but that its current approach is doomed to fail.

And they criticise the regulator Ofgem, because its rationale "largely ignores the social and economic potential of the community energy".

They say that Ofgem's proposal in its Retail Market Review for suppliers to auction off 20% of power generation in order to help new suppliers enter the market "will not help community organisations" because they can't afford to buy bulk supplies, and this approach "will not change the type of energy that is generated”.

They are recommending that instead, a new hybrid company structure should be included in the upcoming consolidated Co-operatives Bill, launched last month by the Prime Minister, and that the policy should build upon existing coalitions, such as the Low Carbon Communities Network, or the recently established ‘coalition for community energy’ spearheaded by Co-operatives UK, Friends of the Earth, Forum for the Future and others.

Local authorities have a role, too, to work with communities, local asset holders and the energy industry to highlight underused assets and space that could be utilised for community energy projects, they add.

Community-owned renewable energy co-ops see a sustainable future

Baywind Community Energy

As onshore windfarms attract more opponents, support increases for community-owned renewable energy schemes that are managed co-operatively.

In Whitby, N. Yorkshire, a community-owned hydro-power scheme is nearing completion following the award of a ￡450,000 contract to a local construction company, JN Bentley Ltd., to design and install the turbine.

The scheme is exemplary not just because of its community status but because of the use of local firms and its co-operative structure, which all contribute to make it more sustainable as well as renewable.

The three aspects of sustainability are social, economic and environmental. The collective importance of these characteristics is often forgotten in the pursuit of renewable energy schemes that are imposed on communities by foreign-owned firms, where locals receive few economic benefits, and which thereby attract opposition.

A development meeting was held in London last night by industry participants, media players and a climate scientist with a view to amplifying the attraction of community schemes to shift Government policy, in the light of the uncertainty surrounding funding through Feed-in Tariffs for community schemes.

The slashing of the tariff has resulted in 40% of funding being returned to investors in one co-operatively-run community scheme, the Leominster Community Solar Co-Operative (LCSC), rather than being invested in another local scheme and the cancelling or mothballing of hundreds more schemes.

Eithne George of LCSC said that the LCSC's success in raising funds and getting local support "serves to illustrate how popular community solar initiatives like this are. It addresses issues around planning as well as providing the local community with a source of its own power.

“We hope the Government take note of the fact that other communities are being deprived of such schemes because of the unpredictability of the system, not because of lack of interest."

Last week, civil society groups including the National Trust, CPRE, Womens' Institutes and Church of England called for more government support of community-owned green energy projects, worried that many communities across the UK are missing out on the chance to produce their own renewable energy, improve their local economy and help the UK reach its low carbon objectives.

Ruth Bond, Chair of the National Federation of Women’s Institutes, said: “We see community energy as people working together, not having schemes imposed on them. This is a great opportunity for our 7,000 WIs across the UK to tackle climate change and leave a legacy for the next generation.”

David Shreeve, the Church of England's national environment adviser added that the Church of England "fully supports community energy projects as a way of working together to provide a clean, secure energy supply and to help heat and electricity become more sustainable for all”.

Farm energy – and not just wind farms

Tonight's meeting is being led by organic farmer, Green Party activist and eco-entrepreneur Adam Twine, who has a track record in tackling climate change at a community level having initiated and delivered a cooperative-owned 6.5MW wind farm.
Twine sees the community value of co-operatively run schemes, selling his farm produce to the Organic Milk Suppliers Co-operative and to the Organic Livestock Marketing Co-operative.

Later this month, Twine is launching a Farm Carbon Cutting Toolkit, to show other farmers what they can do to save energy on their farms and the benefits that will have on their businesses.

The launch event on the 27th February will also be a practical session where delegates will be shown how to calculate a simple carbon budget for their own farm and look at how that compares to other farms using a carbon calculator developed by the Farm Carbon Cutting Toolkit.

“We all know that we live in challenging times both for our businesses and also beyond the farm gate," Adam Twine, said. "This conference and the practical workshops are for busy farmers who know that energy saving and carbon emissions are probably important, or might be in the future, but struggle to find the time to do anything about them."

Also involved in the initiative are National Farmers Union chief advisor on renewable energy and climate change, Jonathan Scurlock, and chairman of Natural England, Poul Christensen.

Co-operative enterprise

Back in Yorkshire, it is a community co-operative, Esk Energy (Yorkshire) Limited that is running the hydro-electric project.

It worked with The Co-operative Enterprise Hub to raise funds through a community share issue last year.

Michael Fairclough, The Co-operative’s Head of Community and Co-operative Investment, said: “The co-operative business model gives people a say in 
how services are delivered and it is a model that is being increasingly adopted.

"As more and more people rediscover the benefits of self-help and mutual ownership, the co-operative alternative will, without doubt, play an increasing part in fostering future enterprise – contributing to the rebuilding of a more balanced and sustainable UK economy.”

It is expected that the turbine's installation will start in April and that it will begin to generate almost 200,000kWh a year of electricity in the summer, and cut carbon emissions by 1,500 tonnes during its first 20 years.

Surplus income from the scheme will be ploughed into educational and further carbon reduction initiatives, including a grant system towards the installation of solar, wind and water energy generating systems in the Esk Valley; programmes for education providers, and green energy apprenticeships.

Following Environment Agency guidelines, the turbine is a single Archimedean screw designs that allows fish to pass.

Colin Mather, a retired civil engineer himself and Chair of Esk Valley Community Energy Group, said: “We’d like to thank all those who have helped us reach this remarkable milestone - our shareholders, The Co-operative Enterprise Hub, North York Moors National Park Authority, North Yorkshire County Council, CO2Sense, Key Fund and, Naturesave.”

Shares can still be purchased in the green energy scheme from as little as ￡250 (up to a maximum of ￡20,000).

The Co-operative Enterprise Hub has committed an additional ￡6m (between 2012-14) to enable it to deliver free advice and guidance to create and grow sustainable member-owned enterprises across the UK.

The Co-operative Energy Challenge

The Co-operative has also just announced the Co-operative Energy Challenge, which aims to provide financial backing and support, to a select group of communities across the UK to help them develop significant renewable energy projects.

Paul Monaghan, Head of Social Goals at The Co-operative, said: "Our aim is to stimulate an energy revolution that will enable communities up and down the country to benefit from community renewable projects.

"If you look at other countries such as Germany it is clear that the relationship between people and energy is completely different than it is in the UK. We want to change it from one where people are at the mercy of large profit-making energy providers to one where they control, generate and benefit from their own energy supply."

To be delivered by the Bristol-based Centre for Sustainable Energy (CSE), the programme will oversee development of up to eight projects such as wind farms, anaerobic digesters, biomass district heating schemes and hydropower stations.

Both the strength of local opposition to Big Wind projects and communities' enthusiasm for co-operatively-run schemes, two sides of the same coin, together highlight the immense amount of energy in local communities that is potentially available to be tapped, in order to generate truly sustainable energy.

Call for more community windfarms as Tories attack subsidies

On Tuesday 7th February, 8.30am-12.30pm, there’ll be a ‘Do-Tank’ at HOST Universal in Soho [address below], to look at how a proposed share-issue in the 5MW Westmill solar farm could help re-ignite the energy debate both nationally and locally.

The initiative comes hot on the heels of calls from 101 Tory MPs over the weekend to slash Renewables Obligation subsidies for onshore windfarms.

Part of their reasoning is that many of these windfarms are owned by foreign firms.

Historically, the Renewables Obligation has severely hindered the development of community-owned windfarms, because of the costs and timescales that have been required of the system.

If there were more of these windfarms, as in Denmark and Germany, they would undoubtedly have more popular and local support.
The Westmill project is led by organic farmer and eco-repreneur Adam Twine, who has a track record in tackling climate change at a community level having initiated and delivered a cooperative-owned 6.5MW wind farm.

It is a highly relevant, timely and facilitated session, (with 15 years experience in developing narrative across social and environmental issues including Fair Trade, Renewable Energy and Climate Change), the session will be attended by 15-18 participants representing a 360 perspective renewables.

Guests cover Climate Science, Investment, developers, community entrepreneurs, media commentators and political interest and some, like Climate Scientist, Piers Forster who’s coming down from Leeds.

It is structured to provide valuable insights into how we bring this story alive for a wider audience and add further momentum to the community owned and generated energy concept.

Community energy funds announced

Meanwhile, Ed Davey, the new Energy and Climate Change Secretary,  Davey began his work in post today by joining Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg on a visit to the Building Research Establishment’s Innovation Park near Watford, a testing site for energy efficient homes, where they are highlighting the value of green policies in stimulating jobs in the construction sector.
He also announced that a further 155 community energy projects are to receive a share of the ￡5.1 million of funding under Phase 2 of the Local Energy Assessment Fund (LEAF).

Mr Davey said: “These grants are designed to nurture the ideas and enthusiasm of communities up and down the country who want to cut energy use, cut emissions and save money”.



The meeting is at: House Of Sound Thinking. 6-10 Lexington St, London W1F 0LB.

Community energy schemes receive funding but mixed messages from Government

The first 82 local energy projects run by communities throughout England have won funding from the Government's ￡10m Local Energy Assessment Fund (LEAF).

But at the same time, many community-led solar PV projects are still waiting to hear if they will receive enhanced support from feed-in-tariffs.

LEAF is managed by a consortium of community networks administered by the Energy Saving Trust.

The money given is intended to be used for understanding energy efficiency and renewable energy generation issues at a local level and to help communities to prepare for new opportunities in sustainable energy and climate change arising from the Green Deal, Renewable Heat Incentive and feed-in-tariffs.

There was a high volume of applications for the first round of awards. The second round is open until 20 January and the website above contains full details of how to apply.

Many of the winners are part of the Energyshare network.

￡50,000 is the average size of the award for each successful bid, but it depends on the proposals put forward. Any work needs to be completed by end of March 2012.

Peter Lipman, Chair of Communities and Climate Action Alliance said: “Hundreds of communities responded fantastically to the opportunity afforded by LEAF with imaginative and innovative schemes. It’s wonderful to see that many of them will be funded and so will have a chance to show just what those communities can deliver.”

Feed-in-tariffs confusion

Government support for communities wanting to engage with the low carbon agenda has come under renewed criticised lately over the removal of their ability to claim high returning feed-in-tariffs for solar electricity.

"Why on earth have [the Government] not excluded housing associations, schools, council and other community projects from the damaging proposal to give multibuilding projects ever lower financial support?" asked Lord Judd during last Thursday's Lords debate on the Government's green record.

Lord Marland, speaking for the Government in reply, gave no sign that it would give way on the matter and revise its position on the tariffs.

On Friday, the judges at the Court of Appeals postponed their decision on the Government’s appeal against the High Court’s recent finding that its cuts to the photovoltaic feed-in tariff (FIT) rates were unlawful. A decision is expected later this week.

The Renewable Energy Association’s Gaynor Hartnell commented that no one has liked how the government has carried out the FIT review process, and that the judges should "ensure that the Government thinks twice about acting in such a cavalier manner again".

However, she added that "the majority of our members want to draw a line under this affair, look forwards, and get on with installing systems at the new tariff rates".

The Department of Energy and Climate Change has issued a statement saying that once the court arrives at a decision "we will consider our options and make an announcement on the way forward to provide clarity to consumers and industry".

Amongst the clarity required by communities is whether a much lower tariff will now be applied to schemes where an organisation receives payments from multiple installations on different sites, as happens in some cases (the proposed cut is of 80%), or, whether genuine community renewable energy projects will be given special levels of support in recognition of their enhanced efficiency and the spin-off benefits.

The benefits of community energy

These benefits include social cohesion, reduced crime, a better local environment and spreading awareness of renewable energy and energy efficiency, all aims of the LEAF scheme.

Many projects have been cancelled or put on hold as a result of the confusion over FITs.

The situation means that the community-scale schemes that are now proceeding are more likely to be privately owned.

E.ON is one utility giant that is pushing into this market. Its Sustainable Energy division specialises in district-level or 'distributed' energy, employs 500 people with a turnover of ￡100m, and is rapidly expanding.

The UK situation is in stark contrast to that in Germany, where most of its $100 billion of private investment in renewable energy is not owned by companies but by communities and individuals; a total of 51% according to Paul Gipe.

40% of this 51% of renewable energy generation is owned by individuals, and 11% is owned by farmers. Just 13% is owned by power utilities. The rest is owned by a combination of developers (14%), investment funds (11%), industrial ownership (9%), and “others” (1%).

"German farmers, community leaders and entrepreneurs are not only democratising electricity generation and renewable heat, but are also setting their sights on an equally ambitious prize, the transmission system itself," comments Gipe, an advocate of community wind power since the 1970s.

Though Britain has a long and proud history of community and co-operative ownership, it is perhaps hard for us to imagine how, if this pattern were to be repeated here, it would affect our attitude towards energy supply.

Communities everywhere clearly want to have more engagement with renewable energy, but for decades the Renewables Obligation financing system has unfortunately inhibited this natural inclination and meant that there is only a handful of community-owned windfarms.

One example of such a community is Sustainable Wallingford, established in 2003 by residents of this Oxfordshire town, and which is one of the LEAF winners announced today, for a project to use thermal imaging to show where energy is leaking from homes, and provide advice on energy efficiency and solar power.

The Government continues to send out mixed messages on community energy, but the message from LEAF is that communities do want to be empowered.

Alliance relaunches to help communities push for renewable energy

Tony Juniper, the former Friends of the Earth Executive Director is to spearhead a new campaign to drive grassroots support for renewable energy to make sure developments don't suffer due to the Government's changes to the planning regime and its apparent back-pedalling on commitments to fight climate change, as evidenced at the Conservative Party Conference this week.

The group, called ‘Action for Renewables' (A4R), is a partnership of NGOs, trade unions, grassroots voices and industry.

Its Campaign Advisory Board consists of journalists, environmental activists and politicians from across the political spectrum.

Tony Juniper, who has been appointed Chairman, said in a statement: “The case for renewable energy is clear. The UK needs to play its part in tackling climate change, which we can achieve by harnessing our extensive natural energy resources.

"The new green industries which will achieve this will also generate tens of thousands of new jobs in some of the most deprived areas of the country.”

The group has been set up to counteract "myths and hearsay" about renewables with information, and “is about setting the record straight and encouraging people to stand up and support properly-sited renewable energy developments around the country".

“The silent majority in support of renewables needs to make its voice heard (now more than ever. Action for Renewables intends to give it the tools to achieve just that.”

The group believes that the ‘silent majority’ includes 85% of the population who ″support the use of renewable energy″, as they responded to a 2009 Department for Energy & Climate Change market research exercise called 'Renewable Energy Attitudes and Awareness'.

The same research showed that 60% strongly ″support the use of renewable energy″, and even found an increase in those aged 16 - 24 who favour wind power, with 83% in favour of its use, and the oldest age group is the one most likely to actively disagree with wind power use (but only 9%).

When asked if they would be happy to live within 5km of a wind power development, the number in support dropped to 62% - still almost two thirds.

The Labour Government ran such a survey for several years, but the Coalition Government has not, so these are the last available figures.

Renewable UK therefore thinks that the anti-wind minority has an unfair and disproportionate impact on planning decisions. At the time, in response, Renewable UK launched an earlier campaign, called Embrace Wind.

This was relaunched in 2011 to encompass all renewables, as A4R.

Adam Bell, speaking for the campaign, says that A4R already has 3000 supporters, and will be able to supply resources to campaigners to let them support a particular development in their area.

The campaign is funded by the renewables industry, particularly wind power companies, and so faces criticism that it is a front for these large companies.

In response, Bell said that the "information we provide will be as objective as possible. If it is in any way inaccurate we will soon be picked up on it, so it is in our interests to make it as authoritative as we can and to use the best available science."

Indeed, the website's blog currently contains a lively debate between pro- and anti- wind activists on the topic of noise.

Evidence shows that local people are more likely to support a wind farm development when there are direct benefits to them personally, with the developer letting them contribute to its planning and receive some kind of financial return. A better educated public will be more likely to ask a developer to involve them in this way.

The campaign intends to fight for all renewable energies, but because of its origins in Renewable UK (although the campaign is independent from it), some technologies such as solar and biomass are currently poorly represented. Bell says this will improve with time.

Bell also said that although the government's changes to the planning regime can present a threat to the development of renewables, there are "plenty of opportunities".

"The fact that the communities can propose community development orders and even that there is a provision to organise referanda on a local scale about particular issues, are positive steps for supporters of renewable energy," he said.

A4R's members include Alan Moore (ex-chair of the Renewables Advisory Board); Alan Whitehead MP; Bill Oddie; Charles Kennedy MP; Frances O’Grady (TUC Deputy General Secretary); John Sauven (Greenpeace CEO); Jonathon Porritt (former Director of the Sustainable Development Commission); Maria McCaffery (Renewable UK CEO); Peter Ainsworth (Chair of the Conservative Environmental Network); Polly Toynbee (Guardian journalist); Stan Blackley (Friends of the Earth Scotland CEO).

Tony Jupiter has recorded a video about the importance of renewable energy to support the relaunch.

Community hydroelectric scheme share issue opportunity shows how to do it!

A community renewable energy scheme is offering the chance for investors to get 5% dividend as well as helping a rural area become more energy efficient.

The share issue is being launched by a community co-operative, Esk Energy, to raise £320,000 to install a 50kw hydroelectric turbine, using an Archimedes screw, on the River Esk at Ruswarp, near Whitby, that will generate 200,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity a year, enough for about 60 houses.

The story of the scheme illustrates how hard it has been to get a community energy scheme like this off the ground, but shows that it is getting easier,

It also offers encouragement and hope for others wishing to do the same, since the rewards for the whole community will be greater than either individuals pursuing their own schemes, or outside companies undertaking fully commercial projects.

The project also illustrates the particular difficulties faced by hydroelectric schemes I highlighted recently, despite there being up to 4,190 eligible hydro sites in England and Wales alone.

Uphill struggle

“The Esk project began 6 years ago, and 2 years later we set up the Esk Valley Community Energy, following it up by creating an Industrial Provident Society, Esk Energy Yorkshire Ltd.," says Colin Mather, a technical director on the project.

“We originally had the help of the North Yorkshire National Park and the parish council. We began by encouraging energy efficiency in homes, and then did a survey of sites for the best renewable energy. We did look at wind power, but being in a national park, large turbines were not an option.

“Within surveyed a few potential hydroelectric sites before finally settling on this one."

The story of how the project gained approval illustrates the changing attitude that has happened in the last few years at the Environment Agency.

Initially, the organisation found it almost impossible to deal with the Agency. "They were against the scheme to start with," says Colin. “They had no staff who knew anything about hydroelectric power - all they knew about was fish.

“Then, between 2 and 3 years ago, they were getting so many enquiries about water power they realised they had a problem. So they organised a conference. We were among about 40 different groups invited.

“The Agency listened to their feedback and changed their attitude. They reorganised themselves and now deal in a more constructive manner with hydroelectric power," he says.

"At a more local level," Colin continues, "the Environment Agency people again were not cooperative. But when we reminded them that, in fact, it is part of the brief of the Agency to support hydropower they changed their tune too, especially since we were able to reassure the that we were not harming fish."

The turbine is situated next to the fish pass because fish swimming upstream automatically look for the fastest flow, and this is also where one wants to situate the turbine.

“We also had to negotiate hard to extract as much water as we could. We will be using 4m³ per second. The Environment Agency wanted to use less water, but we said 'you have more than the minimum amount of flow you need for the fish, why not let us have more?' and eventually they saw sense in our argument."

The turning of the screw

An Archimedes screw generator works by using the weight of water entering it at the top to turn it at a much lower rotation speed - under 100rpm - than other water turbines such as the Pelton wheel. The generator itself is situated at the top of the screw.

It is the preferred water turbine of the Environment Agency, because it is extremely fish friendly. This was an important consideration in obtaining approval from the Agency. Colin says that the River Esk is an important one for salmon and trout, being in the North Yorkshire National Park.

Since the device is 2.9 m wide, and a body of water entering the top of the screw is taken down without rotating itself, any fish entering it emerges unscathed at the bottom.

This particular type of device is also ideal for low heads; the head at the weir where it will be installed is only two metres.

The screw will have to be fabricated specially in Germany or Holland, since no one in the UK has the ability to make one. It will take 5 months, and so the group expects construction to begin next March and the project to be operational by the summer.

The share offer

The scheme will benefit from a rate of about 20p per kilowatt-hour from the Feed-in-Tariff, yielding a projected income of £40,000 per year.

Details of the share issue are on the Whitby Esk Energy website. The minimum share purchase is £250 (up to a maximum of £20,000).

Investors will receive a dividend from year three, rising to 5% by year five and shares are withdrawable from year five. Shares can be purchased through to Sept 2011.

A loan obtained from the Yorkshire National Park will be repaid in 12 years.

A surplus from the income will be retained by the co-op to run more energy saving projects such as solid wall insulation in the community's hard-to-heat solid walled properties.

In the past the group has benefited from a £40,000 grant from the National Park's sustainable development fund and £50,000 from the N. Yorkshire county council community fund.

A £20,000 grant from Yorkshire Forward had to be repaid when they found they could not spend the money soon enough to satisfy the grant conditions.

Communities key to reducing carbon emissions from buildings

If the Government is keen on reducing the carbon emissions from the domestic sector, it should ideally target efforts at the community level rather than individual households, according to a study of British Gas' Green Streets programme by the IPPR.

Not only are there efficiencies in scale at this level, there is also the knock-on benefit of households working together and inspiring each other, spreading the word to encourage their neighbours to participate, in a way that wouldn't happen otherwise.

British Gas has been running the Green Streets project for two years. It has involved 14 communities receiving grants and expertise to install micro-generation and energy efficiency measures in households and community buildings.

A competition to receive a further £100,000 to spend on additional greening measures has also been won by Llangattock, a village in the Brecon Beacons.

Based on robust meter readings and accurate modelling, the IPPR estimates that the communities involved will benefit from impressive ongoing annual savings:

• Total annual savings in energy: 726,450 kWh
• 
  Total annual energy generated: 104,804 kWh
• 
  Total annual CO2e emissions saved: 215,461 kgCO2e.

Many will also receive additional revenue from feed-in tariff payments for renewable energy installations - a total of £22,792 a year - as well as saving around £30,000 per year on their energy bills.

The report says, "The community groups were integral to the success of the technology installations, having engaged large numbers of people in their local area to take part in their projects."

IPPR Researcher Reg Platt told Energy and Environmental Management magazine that British Gas benefits from the £2 million investment that they made in the project - which is additional to their Carbon Emissions Reduction Target commitment - by "developing their knowledge of working with communities, internal capacity building in energy efficiency and micro-gen installations, and increasing their brand value."

As the Green Deal and the Renewable Heat Incentive kick in they will be better placed to take advantage of the market opportunities.

Platt added that every building was given an energy audit, with assessors regularly revisiting to check the results.

"The audits recommended measures according to the proper hierarchy - quick wins and efficiency first, then micro-generation - but in some cases communities wanted micro-generation like solar panels as a visible way of spreading awareness to involve more people in the community in their projects," he said.

IPPR surveyed approximately 1,300 people in households within 1.25 kilometres of community buildings that participated in the projects. 41% of those surveyed were aware of the Green Streets project in their neighbourhood, providing a strong testament to the outreach work by many of the groups.

Of those who were aware of Green Streets, 30% said they had changed their attitudes towards energy efficiency and renewable energy as a result and 46% had been inspired to take action on energy efficiency and renewable energy. 61% said they would be more likely to take action in the future.

The researchers were hugely surprised and encouraged by these findings.

The research has thrown up many challenges facing communities wanting to take these measures and come up with a series of recommendations.

Community groups without doubt need not only finance to get projects off the ground and buy technology and energy efficiency measures, but also the availability of expertise.

And they are not the only ones. Planners and local councillors also often suffer from a lack of knowledge and incorrect perceptions that can affect planning decisions and make it difficult to get micro-gen installed, IPPR researchers found.

The biggest challenge facing the campaign to make the nation's buildings energy efficient is the number of old, solid walled properties. There are 26.6 million homes in Great Britain, of which 18.7 million have cavity walls and 7.9 million solid walls. Only 104,000 of the latter have solid wall insulation.

The latest figures from the Department for Energy and Climate Change on energy efficiency measures show that in the last quarter, 128,000 cavity walls were insulated but only 7,000 solid walls.

This is because it is far easier to do the former, and the latter has, on average, a 30 year return on investment period.

Only one of the groups participating in the Green Streets project – terraced streets in the Meadows in Nottingham – opted to spend a proportion of their share of the British Gas capital on solid wall insulation. The IPPR report says that participants "were strongly averse" to this measure for "a range of non-financial barriers, including hassle and aesthetic considerations".

This is bad news, for it means that any group attempting to persuade households to take the measure in the future will have a seriously uphill battle.

In addition, because heat pumps are unsuitable for properties that do not have a relatively high level of thermal efficiency, it will be pointless to install them in these homes. The IPPR report therefore concludes that "the UK’s potential for domestic heat pumps is significantly compromised by the number of solid walled properties."

They therefore recommend that the Government should launch a solid wall insulation competition to challenge academic and private sector innovators to come up with 'break through' technological solutions, and fund an educational outreach programme on renewables for planning officers and local councillors.

Community energy sees a new dawn in the UK

It's a historic week in Scotland where a new community wind power scheme will be commissioned by the end of the week, epitomising a wave of interest in community-led renewables.

The project is in Udny, Aberdeenshire and has been five years in development.

Whereas many so-called community wind farms in the country are actually developed commercially and the developers give a share of the profits to the local community, there are very few examples of real community-led schemes of the sort pioneered in Wales by Bro Ddyfi Renewables and others in WAles detailed in this recent Daily Telegraph article.

A Community Trust Company has been formed to disburse the profits from the 800kW Udny scheme - an impressive ｣4 million over 20 years - which could go to fund projects such as a new community hall, a youth hut, a cinema or the expansion of a local paths network.

“The project serves two villages," Matt Kaye, its Development Officer, explains. "It's been installed in the last month and will soon be producing enough electricity to power 500 households."

The development of the project illustrates how hard it has been for pioneers of community energy so far to get projects off the ground although it is becoming much easier.

"The idea was introduced to the community council, the equivalent of a parish council in England, five years ago by one individual," Matt continues. "A group of five people then applied for a bridging loan of ｣50,000 from Social Investment Scotland with which we set up a grid connection which then enabled us to proceed with planning and negotiations, and apply for further money.

"We got half a million pounds in grant funds from organisations such as Community Energy Scotland (CES) and the Big Lottery and Aberdeenshire Council, which helped us to do a feasibility study.

"We have set up two limited companies: one, the Udny Wind Turbine Company is designed to operate the wind turbine, the other disburses the profits."

They then hit a snag, which was that they had to pay back the whole of the ｣137,000 grant to CES when it was found that if they wanted to be eligible for feed in tariffs, under European State Aid rules they couldn't also benefit from the grant.

Eric Dodd, of Community Energy Scotland, said this would ruin most companies but because they had already spent the money and it had done its work, they were then able to get a favourable 100% bank loan on the basis of the guaranteed income from the feed in tariffs and with the help of CES.

Dodd says, "The CES is currently supporting over 150 community energy projects in Scotland. Most of these are wind projects but about 15% are hydropower."

He attributes the recent increase in interest in community energy to the fact that many communities have now seen them become a success elsewhere and start generating significant funding for local projects. They want to do the same themselves to help them become more sustainable.

Dodd says Community Energy Scotland advises on funding and grid connection issues as well as obtaining planning permission.

In the Western Isles, for example, 900 kW of wind power is being installed without the need for agreed interconnector to the mainland by identifying how the local distribution system can adapt.

Dodd advises that "communities should start with an idea of where they're going, but things can change along the way."

British Gas support for community energy

In an attempt to make community energy projects easier to get off the ground, this week British Gas has launched a special tariff designed to help fund such projects and a website on which they can find support.

Geard Lane, managing director of British Gas New Markets, says its EnergyShare scheme will guarantee paying ｣10 into a fund for every year that the customer stays on the tariff. It is being run in partnership with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's River Cottage.

Individuals and communities register their projects on a website and consumers who are on the tariff will vote for projects they want to support.

British Gas has pump-primed the fund with ｣500,000. It has a target of reaching ｣15 million, which means signing up 290,000 customers.

Preapproved community projects will be able to bid for up to ｣100,000 each, and it could eventually fund about 150 projects.

British Gas claims that between 300 and 400 groups have already registered projects on the site although they won't all be seeking EnergyShare funding, as it is also intended to help share best practice.

"We're seeing a genuine groundswell of interest around the country from communities wanting to do their bit to tackle climate change - and their own fuel bills - by generating their own clean, green energy and reducing the amount of energy they use," Lane said.

GoodEnergy already offers customers 100 per cent green energy tariffs and supports community renewable heatA and electricity projects, welcomed the initiative. Its CEO, Juliet Davenport, described decentralised energy as "the key to unlocking the potential for renewables" in the UK.