Boost community ownership to build support for clean power, says Commons Committee

Community-owned windfarms should be given priority connection to the national grid and communities entitled to take a 20 per cent stake in any onshore or offshore developments in their area, a powerful Commons committee has demanded.

I welcome a report from the Commons Energy Committee where I am a sitting member, which has backed my calls for local communities have a far greater role in the renewable energy transition.

The report provides a blueprint to transform communities across the UK by giving them a bigger role in owning the renewable industry.

The report - ‘Get Connected – how community energy can turbocharge the transition’ - also calls for community benefit to be material consideration in planning applications, giving local councils greater leverage to demand more from commercial windfarm developers. 

Speaking following the publication of the report, I said: “I have pushed the idea of community energy at scale since I arrived in the Commons and joined the Energy Committee.

“In the Western Isles, we have the highest rate of community-owned power anywhere in the UK, but if we are to deliver the transition at the pace required, we must bring the public with us.

“Communities across the UK host major renewable energy projects yet often have no stake in the benefits these developments create. They feel the profits are passing them by and they are left with the pylons. That sense of exclusion is fuels frustration.

“The government should grasp this opportunity and put communities at the heart of the transition in the Energy Independence bill before parliament, as the committee recommends.

“We can unlock the power of community energy, create wealthy communities and help bring down energy bills more quickly for the people who are hosting this infrastructure.”

The House of Commons Energy Security & Net Zero Committee says reform is needed now:

• Areas hosting large scale renewable projects must “see profits as well as pylons”

• Designate community energy as a strategic priority to move existing community-owned projects up the grid connection queue, and direct regulators and network distributors to remove barriers to connections.

• Implement the existing right for communities to take a minimum 20% stake in onshore and offshore renewable projects in their local area and lift the minimum stake developers must offer from 5% to 20%.

• Recommendations on community energy should be part of new Energy Independence Bill.

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