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5 September 2013 FARMERS are being encouraged to take advantage of new opportunities to diversify created by community green energy co-operatives. The first project of its kind in the UK is seeing a community joining forces to buy shares in a £1million green energy co-operative which will cut bills at John Cleveland College, Hinkley, Leicestershire, and raise money for good causes. The biomass boilers provided by Leicestershire-based Rural Energy, a Myriad CEG company, will cut carbon emissions by 400 tons a year, reduce energy bills by £45,000 a year and act as a blueprint for similar projects across the UK. The co-operative will also create a Local Community Fund to support initiatives to benefit the school and local community, which it is estimated will generate £227,876 over the project’s 20-year lifespan. Farmers and woodland owners in the area are now being encouraged to diversify into planting woods for coppicing over the 20-year lifespan of the project. The contract for wood-chip will be in excess of £60,000 annually (600 tons a year) and the project will act as a blueprint for similar projects across the UK. The Green Fox Community Energy Co-operative is already recruiting investors – ranging from the local GPs to manual workers and pupils’ parents and grandparents – to buy community shares with a projected return on investment of up to 13 per cent. This innovative renewable energy project, which is a collaboration between three not-for-profit organisations Green Fox Community Energy Co-operative, Transition Leicester and Sharenergy, aims to use sustainably harvested wood from local woodlands to fuel wood-chip boilers that will heat the college. Richard Halsey, a founding member and Director of Green Fox Community Energy Co-operative, said: “Investors in the Co-operative become its members and they will be contributing to the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions from the College by an estimated 400 tonnes annually. Furthermore the project will seek to source the woodchip locally, which will in turn sustain local jobs”. Scott Morris, head of estates at John Cleveland College added: “Currently the college uses oil and the heating bills are in excess of £150,000 a year. By switching to wood-chip, we will be saving an estimated £45,000 per year – which is significant to any school.” Continue reading →