sharenergy

Roofray Solar tool

admin — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 17:09:41 +0000

This is a useful online tool to help you calculate area and dimensions of a potential solar roof. The screenshot below left shows us calculating the potential of our own office roof, which is a bit small unfortunately although it points the right way.

The tool itself is on the right. You can search for your address using the address box at the top then use the buttons on the map to zoom in and out and find your roof. You will then need to follow the directions on the website. Basically you click four times on the corners of the roof and a fifth time back on the first point. It then shows you a red line: drag it so that it points up the roof (as if you were positioning a ladder up the roof). At the bottom of the page it will then tell you the area as well as the orientation (and give an estimate of the peak power you could generate. We will not use their calculation but it’s interesting to see). The area is given in square feet so multiply by 0.093 to get square metres

Example: our office in Ludlow:

Interactive tool:

Shrewsbury Weir proposal

admin — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 16:06:52 +0000

Sharenergy, working with All Rivers Hydro, have put in an Expression of Interest for the lease of land at Castlefields weir in Shrewsbury. Shropshire Council announced a call for expressions of interest, and our submission went in on Friday 4 June (the deadline). Our proposal builds on the detailed assessment and design work we have done on the site, working with our hydro consultants (IT Power) and many of the UK’s most respected hydropower suppliers and installers. As with all our projects, the hydro installation would be entirely owned and managed by local people, with the finance raised through a public share issue. We’re really excited by the opportunity to bid for this and confident that our proposal will bring the greatest benefit to the environment and to the people of Shrewsbury. Now we have to wait and hope the Council see it the same way!

New Feed-in Tariffs announced

admin — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 10:46:41 +0000

DECC have finally announced what should be the final values of the Feed-in tariffs, here:

http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/cms/news/pn10_010/pn10_010.aspx

Overall this looks like very good news for our projects, with a few caveats. Most of the tariffs have gone up by 10% or so, with a few changes of ‘banding’ which may make a big difference to some of our projects. A few headlines for you:

Hydro bands changed so the cut-off point is at 15kW, not at 10kW. Below this point tariff is up from 17p to 19.9p, above it tariff has jumped from 12p to 17.8p. This will have a major positive impact on schemes in Kington, Leintwardine, Ludlow, Neen Sollars. Above 100kW the rate is 11p (up from 8.5p) which is a boost for the proposed project in Shrewsbury.
Wind bands have also changed. Some of the sites where we were needing to stick to 500kW machines under the old proposals could now be suitable for larger machines (which are easier to source and maintain) with a new band of 500kW-1.5MW at 9.4p. We campaigned for this during the consultation and it may well be a step change for single community turbines. For sites where 100-500kW machines are more suitable the FiTs are slightly improved to 18.8p (from 16 or 18p).
The situation with AD is less clear. The 9p FiT has been retained but a new band has come in for sub-500kW generators (which would include all our schemes). Rates currently blank on the DECC site, hopefully they are offering more for smaller schemes as per other technologies
PV rates have also gone up, which may open up the possibility of community-owned PV…Bewdley are investigating this at the moment.

At the same time the initial rates for the Renewable Heat Incentive consultation have been announced. These are only initial rates and if the FiT consultation is anything to go by they could change quite a bit. Still working through but the headlines are:

Biomass. Rates of 9p up to 45kW, 6.5p above are proposed. This will help our projects in Woolhope and potentially also Bewdley.
Biogas. A rate of 5.5p might apply to our schemes in Leominster and Cleobury
There is also a propsoed rate for biogas injection directly into the gas grid, which might be possible in Leominster, although it is doubtful if the proposed rate of 4p/kWh would be enough to make it financially viable….need to get lobbying again!

Hydro study near completion

admin — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 11:27:54 +0000

Community groups in Kington, Leintwardine, Ludlow and Cleobury Mortimer are working together to get community-owned hydro power running on the Arrow, the Teme and the Rea. Sharenergy has funded a feasibility study which is due to report by the end of November. The consultants, RDC of Bath, are looking at the technologies and practicalities involved. Informal meetings have already been held with the Environment Agency to look in detail at the regulatory issues at each site. This work builds on the voluntary work already carried out by the groups finding the sites, contacting landowners and organising the smooth running of the study behind the scenes.

Technical Consultant starts December

admin — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 11:03:05 +0000

We recieved a large number of really good applicants for the Technical Consultant Job. It was tough choosing but we are delighted to say we have appointed Eithne Flanagan who will start in December. She will be working closely with our community projects helping them drive through the feasibility and planning phase and get their projects built. She’ll introduce herself here when she is in post… for now we are working on a bit of an extension to our tiny office here in Ludlow (above Myriad Wholefoods on Corve St.)

sharenergy network

admin — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 21:21:31 +0000

In May 2009 we launced a new networking website for groups to share information via mailing lists, forums, share pictures and files. It’s like a mini Facebook for renewbale energy groups. If you’d like an invitation to the networking site please email me.

renewable region

admin — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 19:42:28 +0000

At the moment there are no community-owned renewable energy projects in the whole West Midlands. In fact there are very few renewable energy installations of any sort. For example this is the only UK region with no wind power above 100kW!

At sharenergy we want to change that, by working with communities to develop renewable energy which is clean and green and which keeps the control and benefits local to the Rural Regeneration Zone.

In our projects list as of December 2009:

5 Hydro power projects using the natural flow of local rivers
2 Anaerobic Digestion projects using waste from business and farms to make heat and power
2 Biomass projects using locally sourced wood from newly managed woodlands
4 wind power projects on a variety of scales

welcome to sharenergy

admin — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 21:37:55 +0000

I’m Jon Hallé and I’m the project manager at sharenergy. I’m based in Ludlow town centre with a small office above Myriad wholefoods. Before joining Energy4All and taking on the sharenergy project, I worked for a not-for-profit biodiesel co-op in Oxford called goldenfuels

renewable energy in our back yard…

admin — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 21:28:48 +0000

Welcome to sharenergy.

If you are based in the Rural Regeneration Zone of the West Midlands and would like a real renewable energy plant owned and operated by your community, you have definitely come to the right place.

sharenergy is run by Energy4All, a not-for-profit company owned by the renewable energy co-ops it creates. It is supported by funding from Advantage West Midlands.

If you’ve ever looked at an old weir and wondered if it could be used to generate electricity, or thought about using food waste to make biogas, we want to hear from you!

You could:

be involved in running your local green electricity generation plant
invest some money and get a decent return
provide an energy generation site and earn rent

To find out more about how it works, take a look at our one minute introduction or dive into the details using the links at the top of the page.