Community Energy Markets Conference 

Where Communities Meet Markets

Wednesday 20^th April 2016 – Steam Museum, Swindon

I am writing to confirm that unfortunately we have to cancel our community energy markets conference next week.

It seems that the timing is unfortunate; we had a great line up of speakers, and people we approached were very interested, but many had already attended a related conference or two earlier this year.  At the time we announced our conference these other events had not been publicised.  On the plus side, it’s good to hear there’s so much interest in this area of the energy sector and we will continue to be active in it.  Ideally we will host a similar event later in the year.

This was not an easy decision given the time and investment that we, our speakers, sponsors and attendees have already put into it, but we hope people will appreciate that we would rather be professional than go ahead with insufficient attendance.

We thank you for the interest you have shown in supporting our event.  We hope that you will join us at future events.

Kind Regards & Best Wishes

Community Energy Markets Team

Will Community Energy continue to evolve with the extinction of the dinosaurs?

Community Energy Markets Conference 

Where Communities Meet Markets

Wednesday 20^th April 2016 – Steam Museum, Swindon

This is the fourth conference in the series, and will discuss and debate how individuals can directly trade electricity with other local community members.  This is of particular relevance to individuals, communities and organisations with their own generation.

Simon Daniel, CEO at Moixa will be speaking at the event about the progress of their Maslow Smart Storage which has been developed for houses and small businesses. James Lancaster, who runs Alderney Electricity will chair the afternoon session on local supply and operations, bringing together the thoughts on post subsidy renewables, regulatory reform and making local and community energy markets work.  We also have our very own Jez Kent who will discuss security issues.  James Miller from Triodos will talk about investment.  These are just a few examples, why not take a minute to look at the full programme. 

To register for the event

Photograph courtesy of STEAM – Museum of the Great Western Railway

Tesla’s plans for distributed electricity storage is a good sign for Community Energy

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla Motors has recently announced plans to produce small scale lithium-ion batteries suitable for installation in homes or businesses. The introduction of such local level electricity storage would allow communities to store any excess energy they produce, which can then be released at times of peak demand. This US announcement follows recent UK Feed in Tariff generation statistics, which show a 29% increase in total Feed in Tariff installations, from December 2013 to December 2014. The UK total number of Feed in Tariff installations is currently 646, 281.

The combination of distributed generation and storage would be of huge benefit to community energy projects, as they could become increasingly separate from the grid. By independently balancing demand and generation communities would be able to set their own prices and local generation would stay local.

The next monster child of the Welfare State?

At the Community Energy Markets Conference the other week, several delegates picked up on Professor Furong Li’s remark that future energy markets are likely to offer tiered prices reflecting tiers of quality of supply. For example, a price for locally generated electricity may be low, but the reliability of generation will be low as well. Conversely, we may have to get used to paying a premium for the security of supply that our national generation, transmission and distribution systems offer. 

The idea leads to a view of a future where high quality energy supply becomes the preserve of the wealthy, and where poor folk have to make do with unreliable supply. 

Let me turn that round and use it to reflect the present situation: in our supply network we have an essentially socialist institution, delivering quality of energy supply to everybody, regardless of their wealth. Even the hard-up person on a prepayment meter gets top quality supply when they pay for it.
We’re used to the National Health Service being the ravenous beast that threatens to consume all of our taxes. Post Carbon, will the National Electricity Service be the next cash-hungry monster to come after us?

New Market Models for Community Energy Conference

Developing the Technology and Market Models for Local Energy Markets

Thursday 29th January 2015

Community and Localised energy supply can benefit consumers, small generators and network operators. However, in order to implement this new, efficient energy supply, communities need a new market model.

This conference discussed the role, technology and development of local energy markets. Session One gave an introduction to the current landscape of community energy and the potential for growth. This was looked at from both a renewable energy point of view, by Merlin Hyman from RegenSW, and from Reg Platt at Ovo Communities, an energy supplier working with local councils and communities.

The next session highlighted the social, commercial and regulatory challenges faced by community energy schemes, and the potential solutions that could help. This inspired some healthy debate amongst delegates! Finally our speakers explored the technical solutions, which could help the development of Community Energy.
Themes:
- Current status of UK and international projects
- Commercial and regulatory challenges for local trading
- Technological development

Community energy makes the headlines

During the development of party manifestos in the run-up to a general election it is always interesting to see what energy policy statements are made by the major political parties.

This week Labour called for a ‘national community energy revolution’, which aims to shift power from the ‘Big Six’ energy companies to the ‘Big Six Thousand’ community energy projects supplying electricity directly to homes. The Shadow Energy Minister Caroline Flint said ‘Community Energy has huge potential for the future of our energy mix’. Ed Davey, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, has previously championed Community energy stating that ‘We’re at a turning point in developing true community energy’. We previously wrote about Ed Davey’s comments on this blog. We look forward to seeing how, when or indeed whether community energy plans are acted on, following the 2015 General Election.

Our conference in January discusses how regulations should evolve to allow Community Energy to thrive, and how markets for Community Energy should develop. Speakers include Reg Platt from Ovo Energy, Merlin Hyman from, Regen SW, Christian Inglis from, Innovate UK and a representative from Open Utility. Please follow this link for more information.

Christmas Lights

Do you have a neighbour who has covered their house in festive fairy lights for Christmas ? Where are they getting the electricity from to power those lights? Here in the Old Cakehouse we are demonstrating a Community Electricity Market and our Christmas tree’s fairy lights are trading directly with our 250 Wpeak solar panel. So our office looks festive at a fraction of the cost of buying from  a “Big Six" (or even small) supplier.

Even as we approach the shortest day our solar panel is currently generating 135 W, which is more than enough for our tiny marketplace.
If you and your neighbour had access to a Community Electricity Market, you could make and sell electricity together, powering and empowering your community, while saving money.
Merry Christmas!