Since the end of the Feed-in Tariff Scheme (FITS) last year, the community energy sector in the United Kingdom has been struggling. At the same time, the lack of support from government incentives also creates an opportunity for new strategies and business models to thrive.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s see how community energy works and the state of the sector, according to the last official data.<\/p>\n
According to the data published by\u00a0statista<\/a>\u00a0last February, solar energy generation in the United Kingdom increased rapidly, especially between 2011 and 2018, thanks to a mix of technological development and launch of the government’s Feed-In Tariff scheme (FITs) in 2010. The last official data on electricity and heat production from photovoltaic generation recorded 12,857\u00a0GW hours in 2018 with a cumulative installed capacity of 13,098\u00a0MW.<\/p>\n This growth is also due to the contribution of the Community Energy sector, which evolved alongside solar panel distribution. Its exact size is unknown but around 300 community organisations have been counted, managing different kinds of community-owned renewable initiatives, not all solar. The first community-owned renewable project connected to the grid was a wind farm in Cornwall in 1991.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0UKERC research<\/a>, Community Energy includes any\u00a0energy project<\/strong>\u00a0completely or partially controlled or owned by a group of people identifiable as a community, for instance co-operatives. It also includes any project with two or more of the following features:<\/p>\n The\u00a0UK Government<\/a>\u00a0underlines that the keyword of Community Energy is \u201clocal<\/strong>\u201d: local engagement, leadership, control, and outcomes. Local stakeholders own or control the majority of the sustainable energy projects, voting remains democratic and social and economic benefits are shared locally.<\/p>\n Most of the energy community projects are focused mainly on:<\/p>\n The benefits of these projects are both economic and social: community energy enhances local acceptance and awareness of renewable energy sources and emphasizes the importance of decreasing fossil-based energy consumption. At the same time, local communities have the chance to access energy at a lower cost, to maximise energy efficiency and to create local jobs.<\/p>\n Regardless of whether you live in a flat in the city centre with a shared rooftop or a terraced house in the countryside, you can monitor and analyse your energy consumption and the performance of your PV and ESS (Energy Storage System), balancing the energy you share with other community members. In any of these scenarios, the benefits of sharing energy can be further improved by installing SNOCU units and joining the Regalgrid platform.<\/p>\n The\u00a0State of the Sector 2019<\/a>\u00a0report by\u00a0Community Energy England<\/a>\u00a0collects data for\u00a0England<\/strong>,\u00a0Wales<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Northern Ireland<\/strong>\u00a0and counts 275 Community Energy Organisations all across these regions. 136 of them are Community Benefit Societies, 42 are Co-operatives and 22 are Charity Organisations.<\/p>\n In 2018, the sector was still dominated by electricity generation, with a total generation capacity of 168\u00a0MW, composed of:<\/p>\n These projects require a decentralised system connected to the distribution grid. Organisations often reinvest incomes in low-carbon initiatives. Most of the projects funded are actually related to energy efficiency: energy switching, smart-meter installation, energy-efficient lighting and insulation.<\/p>\n Other communities deal with energy storage, heat generation (1.96\u00a0MW of generation capacity) and low-carbon transport.<\/p>\n London<\/a>\u00a0is a city that is particularly active in community energy. The\u00a0specific report<\/a>\u00a0shares some available data for 2018. The Non-Profit Organisation that has gathered the data mentions 35 projects under way, an installed solar capacity of 475\u00a0kW and crowdfunded investment reaching over \u00a3600,000.<\/p>\n For instance,\u00a0Repowering<\/a>\u00a0is developing a community-owned project, working with local people. They are planning to install solar PV panels allegedly with a capacity of 50\u00a0kW on rooftops in the Middlesex Street Estate in the Portsoken ward, and to fund this \u00a348,000 project by selling shares to community members and thanks to donations from corporations which want to increase sustainable actions.<\/p>\n In\u00a0Scotland<\/a>, the\u00a0latest report<\/a>\u00a0was published in January 2020, presenting data relative to June 2019. At that time 43 organisations were active and 58 more were in other stages of development. The operational capacity of active communities was 82\u00a0MW. Most of the energy was generated by wind farms (44% of operational capacity) and biomass systems (26%). Solar photovoltaic represents only 8% of the total capacity, but it is the most common choice for domestic systems (8,650 installations).<\/p>","protected":false},"featured_media":1924,"parent":0,"template":"","category-magazine":[40],"class_list":["post-1922","magazine","type-magazine","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-magazine-energy-community"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine\/1922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/magazine"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine\/1922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4339,"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine\/1922\/revisions\/4339"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category-magazine","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regalgrid.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category-magazine?post=1922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Definition of Community Energy<\/h2>\n
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Community Energy in England, Wales & Northern Ireland<\/h2>\n
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Community Energy in London<\/h3>\n
Community Energy in Scotland<\/h2>\n