Do you own or rent a building used for the community and would like lower electricity bills?

Sheffield Renewables Ltd is looking to install medium scale solar PV on buildings in Sheffield, financed by community shares. Ideally buildings should be owned by a charity, social enterprise or organisation that is working to:

• Benefit the people and organisations of Sheffield and its surrounding areas
• Benefit Sheffield e.g. through educational activities, youth organisations
• Benefit the environment, or
• Provide housing

Other criteria includes:

• Expected lifespan of building at least 20 years
• South-West to South-East facing roof
• Minimal or preferably no shading  of the roof
• Approximate size of roof 200 m² – 350 m²
• Roof to be in good repair

What we offer to the building owner/tenant:

• The owner/tenant will benefit from lower cost electricity
• We will promote the scheme on our website and in local and regional press
• The building owner/tenant will be able to demonstrate reduced CO2 emissions
• We will clearly display the energy being produced by the panels along with educational material for the building to use to promote to visitors
• We can also arrange for energy advice/training sessions to be arranged at the venue, if this is considered to be useful

What we provide:

• We will arrange for an approved installer to install the solar panels at no cost to the building owner/tenant
• We will insure and maintain the installed system at no cost to the building owner for the full term of the lease (likely to be 25 years). The building owner will need to inform their insurers that they are being installed
• We will arrange for a structural roof  assessment
• We will get an Energy Performance Certificate for the building

What Sheffield Renewables requires:

• The building owner to sign an agreement for us to lease their roof space. This will include provision for us to visit the roof to maintain the solar panels and will also mean that they will need our approval if they need to do anything to the roof
• The building owner will need to agree not to put anything on the roof that might interfere with or shade the panels
• The building owner will need to provide space for an inverter and generation metre. They will have to give Sheffield Renewables access to read the metre at agreed intervals

What Sheffield Renewables gets:

• We collect the Feed-In Tariff which will help us to continue as an organisation and develop further community-owned solar schemes
• Our community investors will receive a modest return on their investment (up to 3%)

The wider benefits of the scheme:

• The remaining surplus from the operation of the panels will go into our “Community Benefit Fund”. This will support local initiatives that have an environmental and social impact. For example, it may fund home visits to give energy efficiency advice to those in fuel poverty. By hosting the panel, the building owners will be contributing to this

For more information please email emma@sheffieldrenewables.org.uk or phone 0114 250 8367