Funding Energy Efficiency in Community Buildings

Through its Community Benefit Programme, Thrive Renewables  is giving grants of up to £4,500 to cover improvements such as insulation, draught-proofing, LED lighting or improved heating controls to community buildings, like village halls and community centres.

2023 is the seventh year this grant programme has run, and this year a total of £33,000 is available. The programme is open to community buildings within a 20-mile radius of one of the 17 wind, hydro, solar or battery storage sites in which Thrive Renewables is invested. The nearest location to East Cambridgeshire is at PE15 0TY, near Doddington, March (see map below) An application form is downloadable on this page, as is the guidance document which will tell you whether your building is eligible and what we are looking for in the applications. The deadline for applications is 5 pm Thursday 21 September 2023.

Energy essentials training for applicants

In response to the energy crisis and rising cost of living, this year, they will be delivering energy essentials training to all applicants and the communities they work in. These will take place in October 2023, November 2023 and January 2024 with training run by the Centre for Sustainable Energy.

If The three online webinars will cover:

• Fuel poverty awareness and basic energy advice. A lunchtime webinar 12-1.15 pm Wednesday 25^th  October 2023. This session will cover what fuel poverty is and how it’s impacting our communities. We’ll provide guidance on how to identify if someone is in fuel poverty and how community groups can support energy saving initiatives.
• Community approaches to tackling fuel poverty. An evening webinar 6-7.15 pm Wednesday 22^nd November 2023. This session will explore community-level initiatives for supporting people in communities to act on energy to reduce their carbon emissions and lower their bills. This will help communities to understand how they can start building longer-term community energy resilience.
• Energy efficiency in your community building. A morning webinar 11-12.15 pm Thursday 18^th January 2024. This session will provide an overview of what to consider to make your building more energy efficient – whether that’s through zero-cost behaviour changes or higher-cost measures like renewable technologies. They will also showcase up to five of the successful groups at this online session to act as inspiration to other community groups.

If your Community building is within the 20 miles radius of PE15 0TY – the next step is to complete a basic energy survey to help you identify the most appropriate improvements. You’ll also need to get some quotes for the improvements identified, fill in the short application form

More information on the Thrive Community Benefit Programme is available on the Centre for Sustainable Energy website. Click the button below. Don’t forget it is still worth completing the basic energy survey, even if you don’t apply for the grant this year. And if you do apply you will get the online training from the Centre for Sustainable Energy, even if you are not successful in getting the grant.