A Potted History of Community Energy
Communities have been generating their own energy since Victorian times. This was undertaken by town and city councils setting up their own gas, water, and eventually electricity supplies.
During a time when the need to cut our carbon emissions comes part in parcel with our need to generate renewable green energy, we are seeing communities take these projects into their own hands. For generations, this has been the case, driven by local interest for these projects to be done ethically and sustainably whilst environmentally and economically protecting and benefitting rural communities.
Here is how community energy has developed over time, and what this means for Nottingham.
Early beginnings
The first municipal gas company was the London based Gas Light and Coke Company, set up 1812
The first safe municipal water supply was introduced in Nottingham itself in 1830, and based in the Meadows. It was the beginning of the eradication of Cholera and Typhoid from UK cities.
Electricity was introduced by municipalities a little faster. First in 1879, with the Liverpool (Corporation) Electric Lighting Act. Municipal supply was the norm until just before the Second World War when the national grid was coordinated, and wartime control of electricity was instigated. The Electricity Act of 1947 completed nationalisation with the setting up of 12 national electricity boards. It remained in public ownership until it was privatised in the 1980s.
The Beginnings of Community Efforts
Interest in Community Energy has been growing in the UK since the mid-1990s. In 2002, the Renewables Obligation Scheme placed a duty on licensed electricity suppliers to source a proportion of their electricity from renewable sources. It allowed Community Energy Groups to sell renewable electricity to the Big 6 energy companies to enable them to meet their renewables obligations.
The second spurt of growth came in 2008, with the introduction of Feed-in Tariffs. Under this scheme, the Government paid households and communities for the electricity they produced.
Then, in 2009, the Government set up a one-off grant Scheme promoting 11 Low Carbon Communities. The Meadows was one of these pilot communities.
Unfortunately, there was a change of Government in 2010, and further help was not given to these communities.
Municipal Ambitions Return
In 2015, Nottingham was the first Local Authority to try to set up its own not-for-profit electricity supply company – called Robin Hood Energy. The company aimed to undercut other suppliers in providing a low tariff supply to its customers initially in Nottingham and then to other (primarily) fuel-poor customers in areas beyond.
The company was sold to British Gas in 2021 after failing to pay the government monies owed under the collection of Renewable Obligation Payments. This was partly caused by difficulties in collecting payments from customers and partly because (unlike in other parts of Europe) it was never allowed to sell its energy to local communities at fixed prices.
Although it failed, Robin Hood Energy was hugely influential in encouraging other Local Authorities to set up their own energy supply arrangements.
Despite this, local energy generation and energy-saving schemes continued to develop across the UK. By the end of 2016, there were 186 communities registered with 118MW of generating capacity. Some community schemes are grant funded, but far more have issued shares to raise capital and invest in renewable technologies.
The Latest Ideas of the Government on Community Energy
Community Energy is the latest topic (February 2021) the Parliamentary Environmental Audit Committee will investigate as part of their work looking at technological innovation and Climate Change. They will be looking for fresh ideas about the future of Community Energy.
“We conclude that the emergence of local energy is a welcome development and one that is likely to increase consumer engagement and choice. We recognise that local schemes need proportionate treatment and that regulatory arrangements should enable the emergence of business models that are in the long-run interests of consumers. But that should not be at the expense of customers who aren’t included in a local scheme and will need to provide appropriate protection (such as opportunities to switch) if service standards and value aren’t maintained to the satisfaction of those customers.””
The Local Energy Bill
In April 2021 and late 2022, a group called ‘Power to the People’ attempted to introduce a Bill to Parliament giving the right to local groups to generate and share their energy, without having to pay the enormous costs currently necessary to obtain a license. This has considerable support among MPs but so far not enough to pass into law.
Different approaches to Community Energy
The European Experience
Other parts of Europe (and the USA) have a more open approach to local/decentralised energy.
In Germany, there are over 1,000 energy supply companies, with households in different areas usually having around 70 suppliers to choose from. Almost half of these are owned by local authorities, local communities, and small businesses. Almost 200 local areas run their own local electricity grid, and 9 of these are community owned. The community energy part of this story began in the small Black Forest town of Schönau in 1986.
After the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, people in Schönau asked their local energy company for the right to buy only non-nuclear electricity. The company declined this request. So, the community, led by a local primary school teacher (Ursula Sladek), began the long battle to run their own energy company, using only renewable energy. Schöenau’s success became the foundation of the whole German community energy movement. What motivated people in Schönau was the desire to be the answer to a problem, rather than the problem itself. German energy co-ops are full of parents, grandparents, nurses, farmers and innovators; a grand coalition of voices hungry for change.
Denmark went even further. After the 1973 oil crisis, Denmark nationalised its energy system, redefining it as a not-for-profit ‘service’ rather than a market. Companies must deliver integrated heat and power services, all of which are run either by local authorities or by community co-ops. They have one of the cleanest and most reliable energy systems in the world.
Now, there are lots of examples of communities taking the lead in innovative approaches to local energy generation, energy storage and sharing.
In September 2016, the village of Eeklo (Belgium) was one of 5 pilot areas in Europe developing their own dynamic local energy grids.
It set up Ecopower, a cooperative that is both a renewable energy producer and retailer.
Ecopower has nearly 50,000 cooperative members and more than 40,000 customers, consuming 98GWh annually.
The village already has eight wind turbines, a solar system and cogeneration based on biomass. Other areas piloting local grids include the Alginet co-operative (Spain), the public DSO in Terni (Italy) and the Meltemi eco-village (Greece). Even the Brooklyn District of New York has joined in, setting up its own ‘TransActive Grid’ supplying the area with clean, local electricity.
It is not only about electricity. Munich’s Ackermannbogen estate has a huge park and play area in the middle of it. But beneath the park, they built a huge reservoir, connected to solar thermal panels on all the apartment blocks on the estate. It delivers stored hot water heating for the whole estate, cutting everyone’s heating bills in half.
The Norwegian town of Drammen has been even more innovative, using the local fjord to deliver heating for its 65,000 residents and burgeoning business community. It takes water from the fjord (at 8°C) and uses it (under pressure) to heat liquid ammonia. In effect, some clever high-pressure chemistry raises the temperature enough to supply 85% of the town’s district heating needs.
In the Netherlands, the town of Heren is doing something similar. By tapping into the permanent hot water that fills the underground chambers of its disused coal mines, the community can provide most of its own heating needs.
What could Nottingham do?
Nottingham doesn’t have to go looking for fjords, but it could look imaginatively at the community energy possibilities of using the River Trent and disused mine shafts to do the same.
Click below to find out the smaller picture - what is happening here in the Meadows? And what potential does community energy have?