31st August 09:42

Reminder – RHPP2 Community Scheme applications will be invited until September 7th

This is a reminder that the RHPP Community Scheme is open for applications up to and including September 7th 2012. Details can be found below. There will only be one opportunity to apply. If you have any questions, the Communities Team will be more than happy to assist you further in support of your application.

If you are a community organisation looking for an opportunity to use bulk buying to bring down the cost of installing renewable heat in domestic properties in your area you may be eligible for the Communities Scheme

The Department of Energy and Climate Change Renewable Heat Premium Payment (RHPP) Community Scheme will support communities to deliver clusters of domestic renewable heating systems. The RHPP Community Scheme aims to provide communities with the opportunity to cost-effectively organise local buying groups for renewable heating systems, potentially accessing bulk discounts and facilitating easier deployment for installers. The Scheme will support installation of renewable heating systems in homes by providing vouchers to householders. It is targeted at making renewable heating affordable for middle to low income households and aims to maximise carbon reduction by reaching homes with high carbon heating systems that are expensive to run (especially those off the gas network) and ensuring that heating systems are installed after or alongside energy efficiency measures. Development support will also be provided to successful groups.

Technologies that are supported under the scheme include:

• Solar thermal panels
• Heat pumps (air to water, ground source or water source, excluding air to air and exhaust air heat pumps)
• Biomass Boilers

What is the deadline?

Applications will be invited until September 7th

Want to know more?

More detailed information, supporting documentation and an opportunity to apply can be found by accessing the Energy Saving Trust website

Please read documentation before applying, should you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact the communities team on 02920 467 015 or by emailing communities@est.org.uk

9th July 15:08

Following the LEAF event the Communities Team at EST forwarded on a number of questions from those unable to ask Greg Barker, MP directly on the day. Greg Barker has now responded, and the questions and answers are available in this PDF.

If you have any further questions please don’t hesitate to contact us on 02920 467 015, or by emailing communities@est.org.uk. Alternatively, should you wish to write to Greg you may do so using the address below;

Gregory Barker MP
Minister of State
Department of Energy & Climate Change
3 Whitehall Place
London
SW1A 2AW

24th July 16:08

Details of the Communities Scheme

The Renewable Heat Premium Payment (RHPP) Community Scheme will support communities to deliver clusters of domestic renewable heating systems. Applications opened July 24th and will run until September 7th. The RHPP community scheme aims to provide communities with the opportunity to cost-effectively organise local buying groups for renewable heating systems, potentially accessing bulk discounts and facilitating easier deployment for installers.
By piloting this approach, the Department of Energy and Climate Change is seeking to understand more about the potential financial, community and environmental benefits from community-led deployment of renewable heat. The Scheme will support installation of renewable heating systems in homes by providing vouchers to householders. It is targeted at making renewable heating affordable for middle to low income households and aims to maximise carbon reduction by reaching homes with high carbon heating systems that are expensive to run (especially those off the gas network) and ensuring that heating systems are installed after or alongside energy efficiency measures.
Development support will be provided to successful groups and they will be expected to collaborate with others to share information. The programme will also publish key findings to help other groups to replicate successful approaches in the future.

Technologies that are supported under the scheme include:

• Solar thermal panels
• Heat pumps (air to water, ground source or water source, excluding air to air and exhaust air heat pumps)
• Biomass Boilers

Please ensure you read all of the above documentation before applying, should you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact the communities team on 02920 467 015 or by emailing communities@est.org.uk. We anticipate a large influx of enquiries during July and August and will endeavour to respond to your query within 2 working days.

July 24th, 14:00

Low carbon heating scheme for communities open to applications today

Community groups up and down the nation will be able to bid for a share of £8million to install low carbon heating like solar thermal panels, biomass boilers and heat pumps into homes in their local area. From today, community-based organisations including community co-operatives, voluntary groups, social enterprises and development trusts will be eligible to apply.

Community groups will need to submit a first stage application to the Energy Saving Trust by 7 September 2012. Applications will be judged on a range of criteria, including the project’s vision, potential benefits for the local area, potential partners and any relevant experience of delivering similar projects.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) expects to support between 50 and 100 projects with the £8million fund and will announce the winners in December this year.

12th July 15:23

Following the success of the recent dissemination event please find a summary of the day below, also downloadable by clicking here

11th July 11:16

Ollie Pendered, a successful LEAF applicant, has kindly set up a LinkedIn page specifically for those that delivered LEAF funded community projects. Although the LEAF Team and DECC are not responsible for this page or content in any way, we would encourage you to sign up. We believe that this would provide a valuable networking opportunity for organisations to maintain contact with each other, share experiences and identify areas to concentrate on for the future. It could be the ideal vehicle for setting up smaller scale local meetings following the success of the event in London. It is certainly the aim of the LEAF Team to create a legacy and believe this would be an ideal tool to do so. Only you, the organisations themselves, have the ability to continue your outstanding work to date. Good luck !

If you have any questions please direct them to Ollie personally - olliepen@googlemail.com.

July 3rd 13:19

The photos from the LEAF dissemination event have now been uploaded to the Communities@EST Flickr account.

If you would like any copies of the photos, please email the communities team giving the image number (this will show up when you hover your mouse over the image, or will be displayed in the title bar of your internet explorer when clicking on the image itself) and we will happily forward them to you.

A full report of the day will be published on the LEAF Website by July 10th. Should you have any queries please don’t hesitate to contact the team.

June 28th 11:32

The LEAF Dissemination event was held in London last Thursday for all funded projects.

We will be publishing a full report along with photos from the event by July 10th – should you have any questions in the meantime don’t hesitate to contact the team by emailing communities@est.org.uk

May 29th 14:54

Financing Renewable Solutions is the conference exploring the future of the public and private sector working together to finance and deliver sustainable energy covering:

• Green Deal
• Economic development opportunities from renewables
• Developing renewable energy on public estate
• New developments, energy and local revenue
• Localism and funding communities’ energy priorities

Speakers include:

• Steve Ives, Green Deal demand team, DECC
• Mareike Schmidt, strategic energy programme manager, Bristol City Council
• Bob Ledsome, head, climate change and sustainable development division, CLG
• Michael Barlow, partner, Burges Salmon

Regen SW's Renewable Solutions Conference is part of Bristol’s Big Green Week: Seven days of events about environment, art and culture. The event is run in partnership with Bristol City Council and Burges Salmon.

Registration is now open for this event, please click the book now link above. There are discounts available for Regen SW business and local authority members, please ask for details.

• Public Sector Delegate £80.00 + VAT of £16.00
• Private Sector Delegate £125.00 + VAT of £25.00

If you are interested in sponsorship or profile raising opportunities at this event, please contact Rachel Hayes, event and membership manager on 01392 494 399 or email rhayes@regensw.co.uk

May 3rd 14:01

The latest round of Cardiff Councils’ Community Building Grants are now accepting Applications. The Community Building Grants Programme Leaflet and Strategic Statement 2012/2013 will inform you more about the scheme.

The community building grants programme provides funding to help improve the internal and external physical structure to community centres, meeting places and other community buildings. The maximum Grant available for the 2012/2013 programme is £5,000. To receive information about future application rounds for the community building grants programme please contact:

James Moore
City Development
Strategic Planning - Neighbourhood Regeneration
Cardiff Council
Room 227
County Hall
Atlantic Wharf
Cardiff CF10 4UW

Tel: 029 2087 3162
Fax: 029 2087 3466

Email: jamesmoore@cardiff.gov.uk

Please note this is for Cardiff based community and voluntary groups only.

May 2nd 10:07

Thank you to everyone for returning your final reports, claims and supporting documentation before the deadline.

The team are now processing your paperwork, if all of the required paperwork has been received your grant account will be paid and closed within 10 working days. We are currently responding to emails within 2 working days, please bear this in mind when contacting the team. If we require any further documentation we will contact you over the next few days.

Should you require any urgent assistance please don’t hesitate to contact us on 02920 467 015. If the timescales quoted above may cause financial implications for your group please call us and we will make every effort to close your grant account as soon as possible.

Thank you again to all of the LEAF groups, your dedication and hard work over the past few months has been inspirational. We look forward to reading all of the final reports and forwarding our findings to the funder.

April 4th 09:55

Claim Form and LEAF Final Report download

Please find downloadable copies of the Claim Form and LEAF Final Report here;

• Claim Form (Download here)
• Final Report (Download here)

Should you require any assistance with the above please don’t hesitate to contact the team on 02920 467 015

March 30th 16:36

Update from the LEAF Team

Firstly we would like to take this opportunity to thank the groups for their commitment for turning around so many exceptional projects within the time constraints of LEAF. The level of dedication from all of you has been reaffirmed in the results we are starting to see – a huge well done to those who have contributed so greatly to the support and effective delivery of your LEAF funded projects.

We are genuinely looking forward to reading your final reports and forwarding our findings to the funder, DECC.

Easter Opening Hours

Please note we will be closed on April 6th and 10th for Easter Bank Holiday

Current Processing Times

• Emails – Responded within 1 working day
• Project Amendment Forms – Responded within 1 working day
• Interim Claims – Paid within 10 working days
• Final Reports – Processing within 10 working days
• Final Payments – Paid within 10 working days if all sufficient documentation has been received

Completion of Works

All work funded by LEAF must be completed by March 31st. If you are experiencing any problems please contact the LEAF team.

Deadlines for Submitting Final Claims

We must receive your final report and supporting documentation no later than April 30th. Please note that we expect to receive an influx of claims at the end of April, and while we are planning for this we may experience a delay in processing of up to 5 working days. If you have invoices, receipted invoices, and any supporting documentation please send them in to us as soon as possible (stating your application number) to enable faster processing of your final claim(s). If you do not have a copy of the report template please email the team who will happily forward one to you.

Submitting Interim and Final Claims

To clear up any confusion please find below some clarification regarding interim payments, and the claim process as a whole.

You may claim up to 80% of the overall value of your grant, in advance. ‘In advance’ refers to work that has been completed, that you have been invoiced for, but have not paid.

If the full 80% is claimed in advance (via interim claim forms) you must return proof of expenditure, invoices, a completed project report and copies of all publications, before LEAF will pay your final 20%.

If you have made no interim claims, we will pay the remainder of your grant when all paperwork (proof of expenditure, invoices, a completed project report and copies of all publications) has been returned. This is based on the indication that if no interim claims have been submitted then groups are able to bankroll their projects, and submit a final, overall claim at the end of their project.

For example;

Group A have been awarded £100,000 in LEAF funding. They have automatically received £31,000 (Their initial 25%, plus £6,000 in community engagement and bid development). They have £69,000 of their grant left to claim. They may submit interim claims taking them up to the 80% (£80,000) threshold.

To receive the final 20% (£20,000) the group must;

1. Provide proof of expenditure for the 80% they have already claimed. This can be in the form of receipted invoices, bank statements, cheque stubs, receipts.
2. Submit a fully completed Project Report (including copies of feasibility studies, publications etc.)
3. Provide Invoices for the final 20%

Before April 30th. If the group have this ready they may submit now.

Example 2

Group B have been awarded £100,000 in LEAF funding. They have automatically received £31,000 (Their initial 25%, plus £6,000 in community engagement and bid development). They have £69,000 left to claim and have submitted no interim claims. They submit one final claim for the remaining £69,000 including proof of expenditure for all funding, receipted invoices, bank statements, cheque stubs, receipts and a fully completed Project Report (including copies of feasibility studies, publications etc.)

Once we have received your claim(s) we will pay this within 10 working days. This is the required time for quality checking, financial sign off, and sufficient time for the payment to clear into your account. Please note that we expect to receive an influx of claims at the end of April, and while we are planning for this we may experience a delay in processing of up to 5 working days.

We appreciate smaller groups may not have sufficient financial backing to pay contractors up front, if the processing times may impact your group financially, please advise the LEAF team and we will process your final claims and quality checks as soon as possible.

If you have any queries please don’t hesitate to contact us at leaf@est.org.uk or phone the LEAF advice line on: 02920 467 015. We are open Monday to Friday 9 – 5, with a voicemail facility out of hours.

Kind regards,

Ally Woodward
LEAF Programme Coordinator

March 20th 09:40

Update: Final Reports, Amendments and Interim Claims

Final Reports

The final reporting criteria has now been issued to all listed contacts for groups. If you have not received this please email leaf@est.org.uk and we will happily forward you a copy. This report must be completed and returned, along with the requested documentation (detailed on the final 2 pages) by April 30th, 2012. You may return this form via email or via post to the address below;

Amendments

This is a reminder to all applicants concerning project amendments. We appreciate that it is difficult to predict exact expenditure and changes may need to be made to projects. Therefore, we allow you to make minor changes. Where an underspend or overspend is identified within your budget headlines as listed in your original application, it is possible to move funding from one to another or a combination of others in order to ‘ balance the books ‘. All proposed amendments need to be completed on a project amendment form and sent to us at leaf@est.org.uk. It is important that you do not proceed with any requested changes to your project until you have received confirmation in writing from the LEAF team.

Please note that it is not possible to introduce any new measures to a project and it is also not possible to request additional funding.

Grant Claims

This is a reminder to all applicants to please submit grant claims at the earliest opportunity. The LEAF team will receive an extremely high volume as March 31st approaches, so we encourage organisations to submit these as far in advance of this date as possible. This will allow us to process your claims and pay money into your account sooner and avoid any delays with a potential backlog. You will be paid up to 80% of the overall value of your grant via the interim claims forms (if submitted). Your final 20% will be paid upon receipt of a fully completed final report.

If you have any queries regarding the above please do not hesitate to call the LEAF team on 02920 467015, or email leaf@est.org.uk.

March 2nd 09:00

The FSE Group and the National Energy Foundation announce free events to help communities apply for the Community Generation Fund.

In March the FSE Group and lead partner, the National Energy Foundation (NEF), will be holding a number of free workshops to support communities who wish to apply to the fund to help to finance their community-led renewable energy generation projects.

The fund, which opened for applications on the 29th February, is now available for pre-planning finance for community-led renewable energy projects. Funding will also be available towards construction for those communities whose plans are already more advanced. This will bring creation and ownership of renewable energy generation within the reach of those communities seeking to create clean energy, social engagement and a long term income source for the benefit of their community.

For further details of the fund please see the attached press release and visit The FSE Group website:

http://thefsegroup.com/funding/social-funds/community-generation-fund/

Events will be held across the UK and will provide interested communities with an interactive opportunity to learn more about the Fund’s ambitions and criteria. Community groups will also receive guidance on their suitability to apply.

Selected communities may then be offered further application support from NEF.

The workshops will be held in the following locations –

• The National Energy Foundation
  Milton Keynes
  15th March
  1pm – 5pm
• The Millennium Stadium
  Cardiff
  21st March
  1pm – 5pm
• The Melting Pot
  Edinburgh
  28th March
  9am – 1pm

Please note, the LEAF team will be unable to answer queries regarding the events, for more information and to request a booking form, please email communities@nef.org.uk.

February 17th 12:01

Funding opportunities - The Co-operative Community Energy Challenge and Plan LoCaL workshops on community led planning

The Co-operative Community Energy Challenge – a new initiative supporting large scale community renewable projects throughout the UK. Groups at all stages of project development can apply to get 12-18 months of expert mentoring, technical advice and community facilitation.

Plan LoCaL workshops on community led planning – a series of free one day workshops for community groups, and those working with community groups, to access information and resources to support communities to engage in the planning system.

February 16th 17:24

Funding opportunity - Western Power Distribution Community Chest

Western Power Distribution (WPD) have just launched their Community Chest grant scheme, and £50,000 is available to enable communities to install energy efficiency measures in community buildings. The grant is being administered by the Centre for Sustainable Energy (CSE) who can also provide expert advice and guidance to help groups to carry out an audit of their buildings.

Community groups within WPD’s distribution area, which serves the Midlands, South and West Wales and the South West of England, can apply for grants of up to £1000, in order to pay for simple but effective energy efficiency measures to not only reduce their energy costs but also reduce the carbon emissions of the buildings they use for their activities.

Eligible measures include insulating loft spaces, installing energy monitors, draught proofing windows and doors, fitting effective heating controls and installing low energy lighting.

The application process is simple. Groups are asked to submit a short application form and provide quotes for recommended improvements, as well as completing an audit of their building. Guidance is provided on CSE’s website.

February 15th 09:19

Congratulations to all of the successful applicants. LEAF received a phenomenal amount of interest and we are looking forward to watching your projects over the next few weeks. Please ensure your lead organisation have signed and returned your grant claim form to enable us to pay your initial 25%. If your project was eligible for community engagement and / or bid development this will follow at the earliest opportunity.

Commiserations to our unsuccessful applicants, competition was tough. We understand the benefit of feedback and will be looking to publish a number of hints, tips and useful pointers for applicants within this section of the website over the coming weeks. We appreciate that this result is disappointing, however please be assured that we will report our findings to DECC, and hope to generate further awareness for community grant schemes in the future.

January 30th 10:02

We received a great deal of interest for Phase 2 and are currently reviewing applications. Announcements will be made by February 6th.

Successful applicants from Phase 1 awaiting their initial funding will receive an update on this via email by the end of the week.

January 18th 11:44

We are currently receiving a large volume of enquires and apologise if we are yet to come back to you. Please be assured that we are working round the clock to support both submissions, and resubmissions for Phase 2. Successful applicants from Phase 1 have been emailed and posted paperwork, unsuccessful applicants will receive feedback via email as soon as possible.

We thank you again for your interest in the LEAF Programme, and wish you all the best with your proposal.

January 16th 17:00

Following a large number of submissions we have put together a brief list of ‘hints and tips’ to help those applying, or reapplying for Phase 2;

Some common problems with phase 1 proposals were:

• Missing quotations – The most common issue with applications for Ph1. Please remember, all items over £1k must include a quote, and items totalling over £25k must have 3 quotations
• Missing documents – Don’t forget your signed accounts, actions of associations and supporting letters where possible
• Poor outcomes and details of project monitoring/reporting - Lack of information about the outcomes and how they relate to the aims of the programme and how they will be monitored
• Community involvement and engagement - Lack of clarity about how the projects will engage and involve local community members, how many, over what duration and with what resulting change in behaviour
• Carbon emissions - Lack of detail about how carbon emissions will be achieved, the possible amounts and over what duration

When completing your online application you must clearly demonstrate that your project;

• Has clear outcomes, deliverables and an affective monitoring/evaluation schedule
• Is responding to a clearly identified need
• Has a clear vision of how it fits into any long term plans for the community
• Has the ability to be replicated amongst other communities
• Delivers a potential carbon and energy saving
• Has clear strong community engagement
• Is achievable within the timescale as well as the scope and reach of the community involved
• We will not fund capital projects in phase 2 other than in exceptional cases where you are able to show very clearly that you will definately have time to install them before the 31st March 2012. We will also only fund capital for carbon saving measures that need to be demonstrated (e.g. solid wall insulation), not well established measures such as loft and cavity wall insulation and heating systems. Please also refer to the LEAF guidance for further information on eligibility
• Has members who can demonstrate relevant experience and a clear ability to successfully lead the project
• Represents value for money

Please take the above into consideration before submitting for Phase 2 to ensure your project displays its full potential to our Assessors.

Good luck with your proposal and we look forward to working with you!

January 10^th 10:00

All applicants will be notified of their result via email and letter. If you are unsuccessful you will be able to reapply for Phase 2.

Feedback may be available – please contact the LEAF helpline should you wish to discuss this in detail.

January 9^th 14:06

Due to the high volume of applications, the results of Phase One will now be announced no later than January 16th by the Secretary of State. We apologise for the delay, please be assured that you will be notified as soon as possible.