Dear Lord Callanan

I urge you most urgently to support these two amendments to the energy bill 237 and 238. I have been working in the community energy field for a long time and we need to reduce the market barriers for community groups and give them more certainty. From my experience they are key to achieving zero carbon as they not only keep the financial benefits of energy schemes’ local, they also encourage people to reduce their carbon impact. We have a lot to do to keep global warming below catastrophic levels.

Why have community energy schemes recently ground to a halt?

I believe this is largely due to current energy market and licensing rules. The recent Government interventions have been attempted but have failed to reverse the slump in new projects. The “Smart Export Guarantee”, which places a requirement on larger existing electricity suppliers to purchase power from small schemes, has no guaranteed purchase price or length of contract, making community investment almost impossible.

What should be done?

Support the amendments to the Energy Bill numbers 237 and 238.

1. A Community Electricity Export Guarantee: a right for sites that generate low carbon electricity with a capacity below 5 megawatts to export their electricity to an existing electricity supplier on fair terms (Amendment Number 237).

2. A Community Electricity Supplier Services Scheme: a requirement on existing larger suppliers to work with community schemes to sell the power they generate to local customers. Existing suppliers can charge a fee for doing this, but that fee must be reasonable (Amendment Number 238).

Here at Hockerton Housing Project we have helped many community groups in the past and if you would like to see some of these you would be most welcome.

Please see Sustainable Hockerton and its community wind turbine.

Best wishes

Simon

Mr S Tilley, CEng MEng MIMechE

Director, Hockerton Housing Project Trading Ltd

I am moving on from my lecturing duties at Nottingham Trent University. There is now an opportunity for someone to take on this fulfilling role and the universities advertisement for it is below. Click for further the vacancy details. Please contact HHP if you want to discuss my experience of the work. Simon Tilley.

Nottingham Trent University

Hourly Paid Lecturer in Renewable Energy Technologies

Brackenhurst Campus

Job reference: 011117

Location: Brackenhurst Campus

Closing date: 11/12/2022

Salary : See special conditions

Employment type: Hourly paid/casual staff

Team: Environmental Science

School / Directorate : School of Animal Rural & Environmental Sciences

Get directions

Special Conditions: £44.45 per direct teaching hour. This includes the following elements: teaching, preparation and marking of the scheduled programme of work. (A flat rate of £17.78 will be paid for completing one of the above elements of the schedule.)

The School of Animal, Rural and Environmental Sciences is an exciting multi-disciplinary environment for learning, teaching and research. We are seeking hourly paid lecturers for a range of courses within the Environmental Science Department.  Our portfolio of undergraduate and postgraduate courses comprises subjects such as Horticulture, Geography, Conservation, Food Science and Environmental Science.

We are seeking to appoint an Hourly Paid Lecturer in the following area:

Renewable energy and energy policy

In addition to appropriate knowledge and experience, you should possess excellent communication and presentation skills and a willingness to contribute flexibly to teaching and associated duties on undergraduate courses in this area.

We need skilled lecturers to support students through delivery of a range of courses. You will work under the direction of the Head of Department and Course Leaders to deliver high quality teaching and learning to undergraduate students. Duties will include preparation, delivery and marking of work. You will be expected to deliver lectures and practical sessions, seminars and tutorials and may be asked to contribute to other areas of the School’s activities.

You will be able to demonstrate excellent interpersonal skills and have the ability to communicate ideas of a complex or technical nature to students effectively using a variety of teaching methods, have detailed knowledge of the particular subject area through significant teaching, and / or relevant industry experience.

If you have any specific queries in relation to these positions, please contact: Julia Davies 0115 848 5242

Interviews: Given the nature of these roles, interviews will take place throughout the year. The Head of Department or nominated colleague will be in touch following the submission of your application.

​​​​​​​Please note this role does not meet the UK Border Agency requirements for sponsorship. The University is unable to apply for sponsorship for any applicant not eligible to work in the UK and therefore we cannot progress applications from candidates who require sponsorship under the Points Based Immigration System.

Renewable Energy HPL JD & PS

South Brent’s community-owned Vestas V27 started production last week and 10^th September sees 2355kWh on the clock.

It is great to this project go live, as it is very similar to our local Sustainable Hockerton turbine, which is also fully community owned, and we have close links to one of the Directors who is also a member of our scheme! We wish them every luck and success as the commissioning process gets under way.

Is it possible that we will now we start to catch up with the Danes where back in 2001 over 100,000 families belonged to wind farm cooperatives installing over 86% of the countries wind turbines?  In Germany the national figure is 50%  but in some regions 90% of installed wind capacity  (700MW) is community owned¹.

Power to the people!

1 Renewable Energy Focus Volume 14 issue 4

If this property’s share in a community-owned wind turbine were taken into account, it would have the lowest energy use and CO₂ emissions of all properties in the recent Retrofit Revealed report.

Two of HHP’s retrofit projects were included in a recent report by the Technology Strategy Board, and whilst the published results look good, they are not the full story due to the role played in our design by off-site renewable energy.

The Technology Strategy Board (TSB) funded the Retrofit for the Future competition to encourage innovation in the retrofit market and understand what actually works.  87 projects were awarded up to £150k each to retrofit social housing units, aiming to achieve an 80% reduction in CO₂ levels compared to 1990 averages.  HHP won funding for a project to retrofit 2 semi-detached houses in Newark, Notts, which have now been re-occupied for over 2 years.

The TSB has recently produced a report, Retrofit Revealed, providing the first analysis of data from the monitoring of 37 of the projects.

As we had split the (not inconsiderable) budget between two properties, we were pleased to see that one of our retrofitted houses (property number TSB023) still had the 8^th lowest level of CO₂/m² (3^rd best of the all-electric properties) whilst the other (property number TSB022) was a credible 26^th.  In terms of total energy use (per m²), our properties were 4^th and 12^th respectively.  This shows the impact of being an all-electric property, as electricity has a much higher carbon intensity than gas; and the impact of resident behaviour, as the houses are built and retrofitted to identical specifications.

Our choice of going ‘all-electric’ was deliberate: it is not a finite resource like gas; and because our design off-set that electricity use through investment (from the project budget) in a local community-owned wind turbine.

The impact of this investment is not recognised by the TSB report but it has proven much more cost-effective and a lower maintenance approach than on-site renewables.  Analysis of the energy data for Property TSB023, for which we have 2 years of meter readings, shows that if its share of SHOCK turbine generation were taken into account, it would have the lowest energy use and CO₂ emissions of all properties. A £1,500 investment offset 43% of the annual energy use, and at the same time the social landlord has a regular income rather than a maintenance overhead.

This offsite offset would not be recognised in the properties’ Energy Performance Certificates (EPC) either.  This matters because the Government said in their Energy Efficiency Strategy that it intends to make more policies conditional on energy efficiency. Onsite renewables would be recognised, but what about all those unable to install systems onsite due to property type, leasehold or planning restrictions? Or simply unable to afford an onsite system at higher upfront cost per kW?

Further key aspects of our design (passive solar gain, high thermal mass and buffer zones) are not fully recognised by SAP, the Government’s assessment tool, and so similarly the benefits would not be fully registered in the EPC.

Here’s hoping that TSB take a technology-neutral look at the results and feedback into SAP what really works for different properties, and their residents.

The Sustainable Hockerton community-owned wind turbine continues to turn a profit! Members of the Society have received payments of 8% interest and there is enough money left in the bank to donate £10,000 to the village to pursue sustainability and energy saving projects. Not bad for the second year of full operation! The most frequent quote from investors was “I only wish I had invested more!”

If you would like help with setting up a community wind turbine project please contact us.