News archive
week ending 9 October 2009
Carbon Reduction Commitment
The Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRCEES) still prevents organisations from putting renewable energy generated onsite towards their carbon emissions targets. If a business has a renewable installation for which it claims ROCs or a feed in tariff, it will have to buy emissions allowances to cover the energy produced. DECC say the focus of the scheme is energy efficiency rather than encouraging renewables, which it said are set to be incentivised by ROCs and FiTs. A league tables would encourage investment by companies wishing to be seen as “environmentally conscious.” But, critics said that a lack of incentive would actually dissuade investment in renewables and might also render the proposed renewable energy Feed-In Tariffs scheme unattractive to the commercial sector.
New Energy Focus 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Scottish Loan System
Homeowners in Scotland will be able to borrow up to £10,000 interest free in order to improve energy efficiency. The Scottish government has made £2m available for measures such as better insulation, more efficient boilers or small renewable energy systems. The loans are part of the Energy Efficiency Action Plan, aimed at helping meet a target of cutting C02 emissions by 42% by 2020. Ministers estimate it will cost each household £7,000 on average to do so. The consultation on the Energy Efficiency Action Plan takes a broad view of how energy is used and how its use could be reduced or improved, including potential regulation. Friends of the Earth Scotland welcomed the launch of the Scottish Government’s Consultation on the Energy Efficiency Action Plan but called for increased funding and effective regulation to cut energy use and create jobs.
BBC 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Scotsman 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Press & Journal 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Cumbrian Eco-logic
A new Cumbrian company says it can help homes and businesses cut their energy bills by up to 65 per cent. Eco-Logic Living, owned by Judy and Islam Pearson, offers renewable energy solutions including building assessments, grant advice, system design and installation through to servicing and after-care.
Cumberland News 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Croydon
Ambitious plans to expand a programme of building new council houses in Croydon has been boosted by an injection of more Government cash. Homes already completed have built-in energy saving devices, including wind turbines.
Croydon Today 9th Oct 2009 more >>
Haringey
Haringey Council has become the first local authority in the UK to pledge to cut its carbon emissions by 40 percent over the next decade. This reduction has been targeted as it is believed to be the minimum amount necessary to stop irreversible climate change.
Low Carbon Economy 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Stonehaven
Sustainable Energy Association Stonehaven (Seas), a community energy company with the aim of reducing Stonehaven’s carbon footprint, is undertaking a feasibility study looking at renewable energy options in the Stonehaven area. Seas is currently investigating the possibility of river, wave or tidal hydropower, biomass power, solar power, ground or air heat source pumps and small-scale wind turbines which could all be established around the Stonehaven area.
Press & Journal 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Miners’ heat pump
THE refurbished Miners and Mechanics Institute in St Agnes has gone green for its heating. To provide warmth and hot water for its events the MMI is using a system that runs on thermal energy recovered from the outside air, with the system’s £46,108 cost part-funded by £30,000 from EDF Energy’s Green Fund.
This is Cornwall 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Acton School
A NEW multi-million pound primary school was officially opened on Wednesday by Schools Minister, Vernon Coaker. There was an emphasis on being environmentally friendly with renewable energy sources used for heating
Ealing Gazette 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Scottish Efficiency
Green campaigners have called on the Scottish Government to include “bold initiatives” in a new action plan on energy efficiency. The Government is due to launch a consultation on its energy efficiency action plan. Finance Secretary John Swinney is also expected to announce a new pilot scheme where homeowners are to be offered loans for insulation. WWF Scotland is calling for the Government to include a comprehensive home energy retrofit strategy as part of its work. The group also wants to see council tax incentives for those who improve their energy efficiency and for work to improve energy efficiency to be focused on groups of houses, creating street by street ‘low carbon zones’.
Herald 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Halifax Hydro
A HYDRO-ELECTRIC generator capable of powering 15 homes could be built in the River Ryburn under an ambitious £150,000 scheme.
Halifax Courier 8th Oct 2009 more >>
Scrappage
More than a thousand people, including MPs and business owners, have signed a petition to introduce a scrappage scheme for household boilers. The campaign was launched by Portsmouth plumbers’ merchant Mick Williams and has so far gathered 1,396 signatures. Mr Williams said his idea would do more to help the economy and environment than the car scrappage scheme. The Department for Environment and Climate Change said it had no plans to introduce a boiler scrappage scheme.
BBC 7th Oct 2009 more >>
North East Low Carbon
A large open access innovation and technical support facility for the low carbon energy manufacturing sector is set to increase the turnover of small and medium sized regional companies by over £6m, creating and safeguarding nearly 350 jobs in the process.
eGov Monitor 7th Oct 2009 more >>
Feed-in Tariff Concern
The government’s consultation on proposals for a system of ‘Feed-In Tariffs’ will close on 15th October, with the renewables industry concerned about levels of awareness of the new scheme among the hugely diverse potential investors. Over the summer REA staff have met with around 50 diverse organisations. In many sectors awareness about the scheme’s existence and how it worked was low. Potential investors consistently reported concern about the low levels of return offered by the UK scheme.
Reneable Energy Association Press Release 7th Oct 2009 more >>
CRCEES
Some firms could face fines of a minimum of 24,000 pounds annually by 2015 under a new government plan to cut corporate energy usage and carbon emissions, the government said on Wednesday. The Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRCEES) is a mandatory scheme starting in April 2010 that will force businesses like banks, hotels, hospitals and schools to help Britain cut carbon emissions by over 4 million tonnes and save a total 1 billion pounds annually on energy bills by 2020. Under the programme, the final details of which were published on Wednesday, firms are obliged to monitor and report energy usage starting in April 2010, and buy allowances from the government for 12 pounds each to cover CO2 emissions from 2011.
Euro Investor 7th Oct 2009 more >>
The government is to delay the introduction of trading under its Carbon Reduction Commitment programme by a year it was announced today. The scheme, which aims to reduce carbon emissions from organisations which use in excess of 6,000MWh of electricity – around £500,000 plus - a year, comes into force in April 2010. The original plan had been to sell carbon emissions allowances to organisation based on their energy use in 2008. However, now the Department of Energy and Climate Change has said that “to smooth the introduction of the scheme and ease the upfront costs” organisations will only have to report emissions in the first year (2010-2011) without having to buy the allowances.
Building 7th Oct 2009 more >>
Government has announced that it will revise the treatment of onsite renewables under the CRC scheme, but the REA warns that that the commercial sector will still be put off installing renewables. If a business has a renewable installation for which it claims ROCs or a feed in tariff, it will have to buy emissions allowances to cover the energy produced, even though renewables have zero emissions! This data is then used to compile a league table ranking companies according to their environmental performance.
REA Press Release 7th Oct 2009 more >>
Botanic Gateway
Two years after construction began, the garden’s £16m John Hope Gateway building at the Edinburgh Botanic Gardens finally opens today. The roof is covered with a grass product, sedum, which acts as an insulator as well as attracting insects. Toilets use recycled “grey” water collected in a funnel. Solar panels and a wind turbine offset electricity useage, and heating boilers are fed with locally sourced woodchip.
Herald 7th Oct 2009 more >>
BBC 6th Oct 2009 more >>
Energy Efficient Advance
Their annual heating costs should be around £70 a year thanks to a pioneering build that combines British construction with German technology. Their new home in Denby Dale, near Huddersfield, is set to be finished in February and will be the first Anglicised version of the German Passivhaus.
Yorkshire Post 6th Oct 2009 more >>
Daily Mail 7th Oct 2009 more >>
Tory Plans
Plans include: Incentives for biodigestion plants to reduce landfill and green ‘New Deal’ for households to make households greener, with costs paid by savings made to bills.
New Civil Engineer 6th Oct 2009 more >>
Leeds AD Plan
Every home in Leeds should have a kitchen slop bucket to collect food scraps for generating renewable energy, Leeds MP and Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said today. The Leeds Central MP called on Leeds Council to collect food waste separately and then send the leftovers to small renewable power plants.
Yorkshire Evening Post 6th Oct 2009 more >>
Welsh Research
A £34 million programme to drive forward cutting-edge research to secure a low carbon future for Wales, create green jobs and help business to develop sustainable products and technologies has been announced by First Minister, Rhodri Morgan. The Low Carbon Research Institute Energy programme is aimed at meeting Welsh Assembly targets for reducing carbon dioxide emissions by exploiting the knowledge in Welsh universities and helping industry develop new products, technologies and services, turning them into commercial reality. As part of the programme, ground-breaking research projects will get underway in areas such as solar energy for heating buildings, hydrogen for powering transport, power generation using biomass and photovoltaic (PV) technology to generate electricity.
News Wales 5th Oct 2009 more >>
The Engineer 7th Oct 2009 more >>
Low Carbon Economy 6th Oct 2009 more >>
Merton’s Greenest Building
The search is on to find Merton’s greenest building as nominations open for the 2009 Green Guardian Awards. This year’s winner will be hard pushed to match the green credentials of last year’s outstanding entry. Mitcham Eastfields station, one of the world’s first fully modular railway stations, was built almost entirely from recycled materials and pioneers cutting-edge environmental design. Energy use at the first suburban railway station to be built in London since World War II is kept to a minimum and features solar panels and wind power systems.
Local Guardian 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Wind powered heat pump
A Carlisle school is keeping toasty and green this autumn, with the help of a wind-powered heat pump.
Carlisle News & Star 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Scottish AD Plan
Shanks, the waste management firm, has announced plans to open an £8m centre in Cumbernauld where leftovers from kitchens will be used to generate “green” electricity capable of powering 3,000 homes. The company has won planning permission to build a plant in a joint venture with Scottish specialist Energen Biogas. This will employ the anaerobic digestion technology that Shanks is already using to generate power in Holland and Canada.
Herald 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Daily Mail 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Business East Midlands 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Windsave debacle
A creditors’ meeting has been called next week for Wind Save Ltd, the Glasgow-based roof turbine company headed by entrepreneur David Gordon which went into liquidation a month ago. Among the creditors are former employees who have confirmed The Herald’s report last month that they went unpaid since January. The biggest claim is believed to be £130,000 from HM Revenue & Customs, which forced the company’s wind-up in the Court of Session on September 4.
Herald 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Green Farms
New ways for farmers to help save the planet and improve their business are to be trialled at three new green farms. The Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) is to set up three Focus Farms with funding from the Scottish Government worth around £300,000 over three years. These farms will implement the steps outlined in the Farming for a Better Climate (FBC) programme. There are five key FBC action areas to be investigated, such as using energy and fuels efficiently and developing renewable energy.
Herald 5th Oct 2009 more >>
Feed-in Tariff
An alliance of construction companies, solar energy groups and politicians will tomorrow appeal to the government to increase support for renewable energy for households through its proposed Clean Energy Cashback scheme. As the government’s consultation period on the plan draws to a close, supporters of solar panels are urging the government to increase the amount that home owners would be paid for every unit of green electricity they produce. Just adding 10p per kilowatt hour to the proposed 36p rate would create 30,000 jobs in the next five years, the industry says, by driving demand for 400,000 new installations by 2014.
Guardian 5th Oct 2009 more >>
North East Money
Funding of £1.6m has been secured to help businesses in the North East utilise renewable energy technology. The cash, from the European Union’s regional development fund and Newcastle University, will be used to demonstrate how to boost output and reduce costs. Projects being developed in the region include wind, solar, biomass and wave energy systems.
BBC 4th Oct 2009 more >>
Equal FiT Demand
While some early investors have complained of not qualifying for Feed-in Tariffs (FiTs) at all, microgenerators with less than 50kW capacity have expressed ‘outrage’ at having to accept largely reduced rates when they are automatically transferred to the system next year.
New Energy Focus 2nd Oct 2009 more >>
Communities Challenge
Energy Minister Arlene Foster is encouraging local communities across Northern Ireland to get involved in the Low Carbon Communities Challenge. The Challenge is part of a two year joint initiative, led and funded by the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), in partnership with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI), Communities and Local Government, the Office of the Third Sector, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and Welsh Assembly Government. It aims provide to provide financial and advisory support to 20 ‘test-bed’ communities, including local councils, charities and social enterprises, across Northern Ireland, England and Wales.
Northern Ireland Executive 2nd Oct 2009 more >>
Dartmoor Farms
UPLAND farmers are being invited to attend the Dartmoor Farms’ Carbon Project workshop that will tackle the issue of how farms can be part of the solution to climate change. Topics will include nutrient management for upland systems, the value of clover in providing fertility and forage, and renewable energy options suitable for Dartmoor Farms.
Western Morning News 2nd Oct 2009 more >>
The first Dartmoor and Exmoor Low Carbon Festival an event promoting low-carbon living and business activities in and around the South West’s two national parks. The festival has been organised to engage moor-based communities and businesses in promoting innovative solutions to a low-carbon future.
Exter Express & Echo 1st Oct 2009 more >>
Alnwick
AFTER eight years of relentless fund-raising, the first sod has been cut for a new hall in a former Northumberland mining village. An array of environmentally-friendly technologies for heat and energy generation, such as a wind turbine and ground source heat pumps, as well as rain water harvesting and natural light and ventilation, will be incorporated.
Northumberland Gazette 1st Oct 2009 more >>
