Further investigations are necessary to assess social acceptance of other types of renewable energy projects, which include: solar, wind, hydro and biomass. A database will be created and harnessed to identify renewable energy developments that are most acceptable to the public.

Community energy generation in the UK: The link between ownership of renewable energy developments and social acceptance

Feibei Chen, Prof Alice Bows-Larkin, Dr Carly McLachlan.

Tyndall Centre, The University of Manchester

The UK government launched the first UK Community Energy Strategy on 27th January 20141, which highlighted the importance of community energy development in maintaining energy security and meeting the 2050 climate change target.

Studies indicate that public support of renewable energy projects is high. However, this trend is reversed and acceptance is low when the proximity of projects is local to the public households. 2,3

This study investigates the public perceptions and expectations of community energy, in order to prescribe bespoke public communication strategies that lead to widely accepted recommendations for the community energy policy framework.

As part of the UK Community Energy Strategy1, local communities are encouraged to develop and work in a partnership with commercial organisations to create, operate and benefit from renewable energy infrastructure projects. In February 2015, the UK government published the ‘Government response to the Shared Ownership Taskforce’5 report, which defines three potential shared ownership models:

1. Split ownership: a renewable energy project where a community organisation owns a proportion of a commercial developer’s physical assets. For example one wind turbine in a multi-turbine project;

2. Joint venture: community and commercial developer work together to own, develop and manage the renewable project;

3. Shared revenue: the community own a percentage of a commercial project and receives revenue from the investment.

However, by definition these ‘shared revenue’ projects are not ‘community energy projects’ because the community only benefits from a shared income with no control of the project itself. Therefore, in this research, ‘split ownership’ and ‘joint venture’ are included in the ‘shared ownership and control’ model, while the ‘shared revenue’ is included in the ‘private ownership with community benefits’ as summarised below.

Three different renewable energy projects in the south of England have been selected as case studies:

1. Wedmore Solar Farm (100% Community ownership);

2. Berwick Solar Farm (shared ownership and control);

3. Woolbridge Solar Farm (private ownership with community benefits).

The first stage will involves a series of semi-structured interviews with the project stakeholders: mainly local communities, developers and local authorities and central government, to elucidate their understanding of community energy and attitude towards each ownership model in relation to a local solar farm project.

Information gathered from the interview and desk-based study will then be used to create a highly tailoured door-to-door survey for local residents in the second stage. As social acceptance of renewable energy developments is affected by numerous factors such as community ownership, project control and climate change concerns2, this survey will help assess the impact level of these factors.

It is anticipated that the findings from this study will lead to bespoke and widely accepted recommendations for local renewable energy development stakeholder groups.

Introduction

What are the ownership models?

The project concept & method

Future work

References

1. Department of Energy & Climate Change, 2014. Community Energy Strategy : Full Report, London. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/275169/20140126Community_Energy_Strategy.pdf.

2. Wüstenhagen, R., Wolsink, M. & Bürer, M.J., 2007. Social acceptance of renewable energy innovation: An introduction to the concept. Energy Policy 35(5): 2683–2691.

3. Devine-Wright, P. 2011. Place attachment and public acceptance of renewable energy: A tidal energy case study. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 31(4), 336–343.

4. Department of Energy & Climate Change, 2013. Community energy: Call for evidence. DECC. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/207920/community_energy_call_for_evidence.pdf.

5. Department of Energy & Climate Change, 2015. Government response to the Shared Ownership Taskforce. February 2015. URN 15D/063. Available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/408440/Government_Response_to_Shared_Ownership_Taskforce.pdf

Feibei Chen | PhD Researcher | feibei.chen@manchester.ac.uk | Tel: +44(0)161 275 4354 | Tyndall Centre Manchester, Manchester UK

100% Community ownership

- A wholly-owned renewable energy project by local communities. Local people fully control the project and receive all the benefits.

Shared ownership and control

- A partly-owned renewable energy project between local community and private developer. Local people partly control the project and receive a proportion of the benefits.

Private ownership with community benefits

- 100% privately-owned renewable energy project. Local people have no control of the project but still receive some portion of the benefits for example some financial supports from the developer.

This definition graph is adapted from Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC)4. Project control was added in the model as one of the parameter.

What is community energy?