Community Energy & the Meadows
As mentioned in ‘A Potted History of Community Energy’, Nottingham has played its part in the bigger picture of Community Energy. Nottingham introduced the first municipal water supply (1830) and was the first Local Authority to try to set up its own non-profit electricity supply company.
But what about right here, in the Meadows?
The people in the Meadows collectively generate a substantial amount of energy. At the beginning of 2021, we had over 250 PV installations generating over 329,837 kWh per year of electricity.
Currently, this electricity is fed into the National Grid, and in 2021 people were paid around 3.5p per kWh for generating it. When the same people bought electricity from the grid, they paid somewhere between 17-22p per kWh plus a standing charge. These figures vary with the market prices of electricity, but as prices rise, the difference between the cost and return tends to increase.
What if?
If we could use the locally generated electricity before it leaves the Meadows by selling it to each other, we could increase the amount we are paid for generating and decrease the amount we pay to use electricity. The benefit of our generation would stay in the Community.
What’s holding back a Community Energy Approach in the Meadows?
What initially makes a community approach difficult is the extremely high cost of the licence that is required to supply electricity. This is set at an unaffordable level for Communities to protect the business of the Big 6 energy companies like EON and EDF. There is currently (April 2021 and now Late 2022) a private member’s Bill gaining traction in Parliament which could change this. It is called the Local Electricity Bill.
Once that hurdle has been overcome, the Meadows would need to raise investment to put in place energy storage and control equipment and then sign us all up as customers. The way the system is organised could look something like this:
Community Energy enables us to become self-sufficient when it comes to powering our homes and communities. It helps to reduce our carbon footprints whilst maintaining access to affordable energy, developing our community’s economy and businesses in the meantime.
For more resources on community energy in the Meadows, check out www.mozes.org.uk.
References:
-‘Powering Parks: Unearthing the ground source heat potential from parks and public green spaces across Great Britain’, Louise Waters & Sandy Robinson, Dec 2019, www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/uk
- ‘Rescuing the Green New Deal’, preventing cheap politics from sinking the planet. Alan Simpson, Spokesman Books, 2021
- Community Energy: State of the Sector Report 2019: Community Energy England
- Transformation Moment; Can Britain Make it in the Age of Clean: Alan Simpson, 2017.
https://readable.com/ Wikipedia: Robin Hood Energy, and ‘Robin Hood Dies; the legend lives on’, www.alansimpson.org.uk, Aug 2020