Forget about lending your hard earned money to banks to invest in oil, tobacco companies and goodness knows what else. You can support the development of renewable energy in the UK and give the benefit of cheaper electricity and income to a local community organisation.
Renewable energy is the future, and it just takes a small amount from each person to quickly add up to enough money to make a real difference.
The community shares model has been successfully applied to wind farms, hydro electric schemes as well as village pubs, housing projects and sports clubs. You can find out more about community shares at the Community Shares project.
A number of projects in the UK have successfully raised money to install Solar PV schemes. Ovesco in Lewes raised £307,000 to install a 98kWp sytem on the roof of a local brewery. Oncore in North Oxford and Green Energy Nayland have raised finance for systems on school buildings.
We have successfully run three share offers that have funded solar PV installations on community buildings. We are on the look out for new renewable energy projects in Gloucestershire, so we hope to have further chances for people to invest in local renewables in the future.