October 2022.
Councillor Wilson attended a webinar (60 participants) on How to get your town or village to Net Zero (NZ)
This event was the first in an autumn series run by North West NZ Hub and North East and Yorkshire NZ Hub supported by Community Energy South through its Community Energy Pathways programme.
Kate Gilmartin of North West Net Zero Hub told us that £2.5 billion a year leaves the Lancashire economy on domestic fossil fuel spend; community energy can keep the money in the local economy and help to decarbonise. She recommended a 4-step approach to community net zero:
1. measure your energy baseline (parish-based carbon calculator and the Impact Tool);
2. consider ways to “power down” (reduce consumption – insulation etc);
3. consider ways to “power up” (community renewables);
4. a plan.
Community investment is vital to local action on community energy. Kate talked about her work at Chipping, and with Rossendale Valley Community Energy, which are both developing low-carbon heat projects, and suggested a “Carrot, Stick and Sermon” approach to engaging the community: Carrot (reducing energy bills); Stick (need to embrace renewable energy); Sermon (the Climate Emergency).
Sarah Wiltshire from Action on Climate Emergency (ACE) Settle and Area (4000 residents) talked about their local energy plan. ACE Settle was established in 2019 and now has 58 paid-up members, and a mailing list of 130. The group runs a monthly green café and other events, has regular articles in local media, is active on social media, and liaises with other community groups, local councils and politicians. The group has 4 working groups, on Energy, Transport, Food and Biodiversity. The Energy Group has been working over the last year to build community support and identify the elements of a Local Area Energy Plan focused on local renewable energy solar, hydro and wind projects. With support from the North-East NZ Hub and Community Energy South the group will now be progressing its plans with feasibility studies and identifying funding options. The first project will be to work with Energy Local CIC to set up a “club” running a local energy market, linking home owners to participating businesses whose premises have large roofs suitable for solar arrays.
Nicki Myers spoke about OVESCO, which is developing bespoke plans for communities in East Sussex wanting to get off oil heating, with the aim of achieving 100% of local heating by renewable energy. Nicki leads on the CommuniHeat programme and described the Ovesco Kickstart programme that helps a rural community develop a village energy plan, taking into account housing “architypes” and possible electrically powered heat solutions, and creating links with trusted local suppliers. The impact on the local grid of replacing oil with electricity also has to be factored in, so the network operator must be part of the planning process, and the plan must also help the community initially to make informed retrofit choices – powering down. Planning at the community level, rather than waiting for individual householders to switch in a piecemeal way, would allow the electricity distribution network to be developed more efficiently and cheaply.