GB Energy and Thrive Renewables Community Energy Announcements

The UK Government’s recent announcement of £180m in capital grants for rooftop solar projects on 200 schools and hospitals is a significant step forward (read press release). Meanwhile, Thrive Renewables, has partnered with Better Society Capital, bringing together £40m for community-owned wind and solar projects across the UK.

We welcome these announcements as signs of growing commitment to addressing the community energy (CE) investment gap. These steps further validate the pooled fund concept we introduced in our submission to the select committee last week. Schools, hospitals, libraries and other community buildings stand to benefit from rooftop solar projects that provide both financial savings and promote sustainability.

Thrive Renewables fund is aimed at a different segment of the CE sector and will not cover the range of financial instruments that our fund will. In addition, GB Energy’s commitment to supporting CE groups with £20m for early-stage development is a crucial step forward, one we have long called for in order to expand the pipeline of CE projects.

However, the £80m allocated to 200 schools and an additional £100m for NHS facilities still leaves thousands of other essential community buildings without community energy. There are no provisions for libraries, community centres, sports clubs, or YMCA buildings, all spaces that are key to community resilience and development.

Importantly, the increased funding will help tackle bottlenecks in the solar installation industry. More money means more solar projects, which in turn creates more jobs, easing current capacity issues and speeding up project delivery.

These recent announcements highlight the need for a broader investor pool to meet the UK’s minimum £3-4bn target required to ensure every community building, school and hospital can access affordable renewable energy. 

If GB Energy were to invest £50m into our pooled fund concept, that £50m would unlock £400-500m in private capital, enabling 2-4 times as many rooftop solar installations as their £180m commitment to 400 buildings. That’s three times the impact for a third of the cost.

We look forward to continuing our dialogue with the government on how we can collaborate to drive greater impact and are actively discussing potential partnerships with Thrive to accelerate the growth of community energy solutions across the UK.