Community Energy London Event
RetrofitWorks were delighted to attend an event at the Greater London Authority (GLA) on Wednesday evening 28th June, open to anyone with involvement or interest in community energy.
After an opening welcome to the event from Syed Ahmed, of Energy for London, Leonie Cooper AM, Chair of London Assembly Environment Committee made some very interesting comments focussing on a report released in May 2017, by the London Assembly entitled “Getting Warmer The Mayors Role in Domestic Energy & Fuel Poverty” which is well worth a read!
Dr Giovanna Speciale, Director of South East London Community Energy (SELCE), one of our RetrofitWorks advocate members, then spoke about a research project which surveyed existing community energy projects across the country. The key message being that London has both additional challenges, such as the complexity of tenures and uncertainty of buildings lifespans, the lack of consistent support from Local Authorities, low levels of social capital, and lack of coordinated support. London also however has unique opportunities, with carbon offsetting funding being a potential option for funding future projects and the role of the GLA who are releasing their Environment Strategy at the end of July this year, to outline their supporting plans in community energy and retrofit.
Finally, we heard from Afsheen Rashid, Chair of Community Energy England, which was founded in 2014 to lobby and create a voice for community energy, as well as build cross sector partnerships. RetrofitWorks is a proud member of Community Energy England, which now has over 200 members. An interesting statistic from Afsheen, was that for £1.9m of funding invested in community energy, this has leveraged a further investment of £190m, an amazing figure which shows the value for money in community projects.