Evaluating The Impacts Of Community Renewable Energy Initiatives

2013

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Energy Policy, 2004

The UK's renewable energy policy has been characterised by opportunism, cost-limiting caps and continuous adjustments resulting from a lack of clarity of goals. Renewable electricity has had a specific delivery mechanism in place since 1990. The Non-Fossil Fuel Obligation (NFFO) did not deliver deployment; did not create mentors; did not promote diversity; was focussed on electricity and was generally beneficial only to large companies. A new support mechanism, the Renewable Obligation, began in April 2002. This may result in more deployment than the NFFO, but is also beneficial to electricity-generating technologies and large, established companies only. The UK Government published a visionary energy policy in early 2003 placing the UK on a path to cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 60% in 2050. This paper argues that unless the Government 'learns' from it's past results, mistakes and difficulties, clarifies the reasons for supporting renewable energy and then follows through with a focussed policy aimed at delivery, diversity and the creation of mentors, it is likely to be no more successful than the previous 13 years of renewable policy. r

2013

Web: www.understanding-risk.org www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/tiki-index. php?page=Transforming+the+UK+ Energy+System UKERC/WP/ES/2013/004 www.ukerc.ac.uk The Meeting Place – hosting events for the whole of the UK research community – www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/TheMeetingPlace National Energy Research Network – a weekly newsletter containing news, jobs, events, opportunities and developments across the energy field – www.ukerc.ac.uk/support/NERN Research Atlas – the definitive information resource for current and past UK energy research and development activity –

Journal of Sustainable Development, 2020

This paper aims to analyze the implications of Feed-In-Tariff (FIT) support removal in the UK’s community energy sector and make recommendations for future business practices. European countries, including the UK, have recognized the critical role of Community Energy Cooperatives (CECs) in achieving low-carbon-energy transition targets through citizen engagements. However, due to the withdrawal of FIT support and other incentives in the UK, CECs struggle to sustain their profitability and growth. The subsidy-free, market-oriented policies have necessitated that CECs explore new business opportunities in collaboration with other actors of the business ecosystems. In this paper, we reviewed the impact of FIT support removal on community groups in the UK's member states, England, Scotland, and Wales. We analyzed effective business practices that CECs could follow to improve business viability and achieve growth. Based on our review, we make three recommendations for the business pr...

By early 2014, most countries had renewable energy targets and support policies in place, with policy support and investment in renewable energy continuing to focus primarily on the electricity sector. The United Kingdom (UK) is no exception, with the government committed to challenging renewable energy and climate change targets for 2020 and beyond. Resulting in the need to expand renewable electricity technology (RET) capacity, policy, legislative and regulatory activity ‘has increased almost breathlessly’ with an unprecedented increase in the pace and breadth of government involvement and action since privatisation in the early 1990s. This has led to a renewed urgency to analyse and understand the policy and legal interventions in terms of policy delivery. A key debate with regard to government intervention focuses on the approach adopted by governments to overcoming barriers to RET deployment. This chapter seeks to contribute to the debate by questioning the underlying rationale of the conventional approach adopted by the UK Government to addressing deployment barriers. Further, by arguing that a re-evaluation of the way in which barriers are resolved is crucial in order to optimise the effectiveness of policy delivery, this chapter proposes an alternative approach.

2017

The UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC) carries out world-class, interdisciplinary research into sustainable future energy systems. It is a focal point of UK energy research and a gateway between the UK and the international energy research communities. Their whole systems research informs UK policy development and research strategy. UKERC is funded by The Research Councils UK Energy Programme. For information please visit www.ukerc.ac.uk Follow us @UKERCHQ The UK has pursued a centralised approach to energy policy for many decades. This has remained the case despite the large changes that accompanied the privatisation and liberalisation of the energy sector in the 1980s and 90s, and the more recent changes to policies, technologies and markets that have started to change the face of our energy sector. Whilst the UK has made good progress towards achieving greenhouse gas emissions targets, there is significant policy uncertainty that threatens to slow down the rate of progress. Local Authorities have played a relatively minor role in the UK's energy transition so far. There is scope for them to do much more, and to help bring decision-making about the direction of this transition closer to the local communities that could share the benefits as well as the costs. This report highlights some important local schemes in areas of the UK that are making great progress-most notably Scotland, Yorkshire and the Humber, Greater London and the North East. But there is still a long way to go. Although 82% of local authorities surveyed were found to be active to some degree on sustainable energy, almost two thirds were either yet to start, or only just on the starting blocks. There are particularly significant levels of activity in a few areas such as combined heat and power (CHP), heat networks and improving the energy efficiency of buildings. A diverse range of other low carbon options are also being pursued-albeit in smaller numbers-including anaerobic digestion, LED street lighting, low carbon transport and solar PV. What this report shows, above all, is that where there is commitment and political will, progress can be made. Important drivers for action include an understanding of the economic benefits in terms of growth and jobs, improved council revenues from more energy efficient housing stock, and access to mechanisms such as grant funding or low-cost loans. But the report also argues that political will at the local level is not enough. The authors make a number of recommendations for action by central government to enable a greater Local Authority role in the energy transition. These include a statutory duty on Local Authorities to develop and implement low carbon plans, including plans for low carbon heat. Crucially, they also include policy proposals that would provide cash-strapped Local Authorities with additional resources to put these plans into practice.

2014

Energy Policy

The role of socio-political power is central to the development of policy, but systematic analyses of power associated with the development of energy policy are rare. Power is also an important yet somewhat under-researched aspect of socio-technical transitions research. The Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) policy aims to increase deployment of low-carbon heat in Great Britain and begin a transformation to a low carbon GB heat system. This article analyses the socio-political power associated with the development of the RHI policy based on Lukes' 'dimensions of power' approach using a methodology based on triangulation. We identify a number of policy change episodes during the development of the RHI and describe the influence of key actors on the policy. Despite the common assumption of the power of Highlights  Socio-political power is seen as fundamental to energy policy and system transformations  Power struggles have affected the development of the GB RHI policy  Lukes' 3 dimensions of power have been recognised in the RHI's development  Niche actors have been more influential in the RHI's early development than large incumbents  Strengthening the UK 'Lobbying Act' could provide more visibility over UK lobbying

Proceedings of the ECEEE Summer Study, 2013

Whilst much of Europe is turning to supplier obligations in order to compel energy companies to deliver energy efficiency improvements, the UK, after 18 years of using such schemes, will from 2013 have a financing scheme as the central delivery mechanism, relying fully on the market rather than government intervention. The remaining supplier obligation will focus on the areas that financing is not expected to fully support: more expensive insulation and help for those with no access to finance. In addition, the publicly funded fuel poverty policy is to be terminated: for the first time since 1978, there will be no taxpayer funded energy efficiency programme for the most vulnerable. These changes represent the biggest shift in the history of energy efficiency policy in the UK since the first and second oil crisis. Yet, despite appeals from many stakeholders, no period of transition will exist between the end of the current and the start of the new policies. The impact is likely to be stark: the expectation is for a dramatic reduction in the delivery of cost-effective energy efficiency measures leading to a big fall in employment and carbon reduction.