Energy Challenge Project

Project background

The Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, formerly the Department of Trade and Industry, have awarded Scottish Hydro Electric a research contract, in partnership with Ofgem and the University of Reading, to carry out and evaluate a two year ‘experiment’ project with three communities in the UK, to explore the potential for communities to reduce their energy costs.

Why Alyth?

Three communities have been identified, one in England (North Leigh in Oxfordshire), one in Wales, and one in Scotland (Alyth), that meet certain criteria for the project, Alyth has been chosen as a suitable community for Scotland, due to its size (approx 500 homes), location in respect of the head offices of Scottish Hydro Electric in Perth, its suitable electricity supply infrastructure, but primarily because Alyth had demonstrated a commitment to energy efficiency through its recent and proposed activities with the Alyth Climate Action Town Project (CAT).

What will the project do?

The project will have two strands to it that will be combined to help Alyth residents reduce their electricty usage, and also provide Scottish Hydro Electric and the government with valuable research data.

Smart Meters

Firstly Scottish Hydro Electric will offer all its customers the installation of SMART meters in their homes, and will also offer most non customers in Alyth the opportunity to have a free slightly more basic consumption feedback device. Both these pieces of equipment will provide all homes with a more detailed reading of their current electricity usage in an easy to understand format (such a pounds and pence) that can be displayed in an accessible and visible position in the house. In theory the installation of Smart meters in homes makes users more conscious of unnecessary electricity usage, such as standbys and mobile phone chargers, and will reduce overall electricity use as a result. From this activity, SHE hope to get a better understanding of how the installation of these can change electricity users’ actions, but it also hopes to learn from the practicalities of installing these meters, prior to a possible roll out programme across the whole UK in the near future.

Community activities

The second aspect of the project is to look at the effectiveness of other activities a community can undertake to reduce its electricty use. Alyth will be given a budget of £30,000 over a 2 year period, in conjunction with a challenge to reduce the community’s electricity usage by 10% within this time period. This money will enable the community to carry out a range of activities to raise awarness, educate and provide some small pieces of equipment or services. It is not intended that this money will be used for any major installation of renewable energy equipment., however if the community do meet their target, then a further £20,000 will be awarded to them, and this is intended to be spent on some larger renewable technology project of benefit to the whole community.

Who will manage the project?

Scottish Hydro Electric will oversee all aspects of the project in all three communities, but they wish for each community to have ownership of the project and the freedom to be innovative. The project will be coordinated under the Alyth CAT (Climate Action Town) project, currently managed by the Alyth Environmental Group (AEG). Thus AEG will be the lead organisation for the project in Alyth, but they are looking for full community support and participation in all aspects of the project, not just to help meet the target, but to further put Alyth on the map as a leading example of an active and environmentally aware community in Scotland.

Project timescale

The project began on 15^th September 2007 with a launch event involving the ‘magic planet’ show by Sensation Dundee. This started the clock for the 2 years; at this point the community’s current average energy usage will be recorded. From this date a number of community workshops and meetings and training events will be held, in conjunction with the installation of Smart meters across Alyth.

What community activities are planned?

A community brainstorm event was held in mid October 2007 to consolidate and expand on the initial idea of a three pronged approach to this project, with the following objectives;

1. build community ownership and motivation for the project,
2. build community capacity to reduce electricity usage through awarness raising and specific training,
3. reduce real electricity costs in homes by providing residents with small and inexpensive, but effective bits of equipment that will reduce their electricty usage.

text from a leaflet produced by AEG September 2007