This time of year is a great opportunity to reflect and so we’ve picked out a few highlights of what we got up to this past year, all possible thanks to the help and support of our investor and community members and partners.  We launched an exciting new opportunity to support community energy through the Community…

The Low Carbon Hub is to be awarded a European Solar Prize 2018 at an award ceremony in Bonn on 17 November 2018.  Every year EUROSOLAR awards the European Solar Prize to role models and pioneers in the field of renewable energy and brings a wide variety of energy transition actors from all parts of…

We’re really pleased to welcome our 28th solar school to the Low Carbon Hub. Longfields Primary and Nursery School in Bicester now have a fully installed array of solar panels that will provide around a third of the school’s energy needs.  Longfields is the latest to join a growing number of schools across Oxfordshire to…

Low Carbon Hub has joined forces with an expert consortium of partners in a new project called The Next Generation, a fund to develop new decentralised, decarbonised, and democratised energy business models.  The Next Generation fund will provide grants of up to £100,000 to ten community energy groups to work on new business models for…

The new generation season for Sandford Hydro is restarting again with the (slow) return of the rains! Clean electricity is now being generated by the hydro on the weir at Sandford, although not yet at full power. It is the large winter output of the hydro that brilliantly complements solar panels, which this summer experienced record…

There are lots of reasons to invest in the Low Carbon Hub. When we ask our investors, they talk about wanting to do their bit to tackle climate change, support local projects and make their money do a social good.  Check out our infographic below where we’ve picked out just ten reasons to invest in…

As you’ve probably noticed, it has been fairly sunny in Oxfordshire recently!  This means that at the moment some of our solar schools who are getting most of their electricity from their solar panels. They are not only using renewable energy and cutting CO2 emissions, but they are also saving money!  Percentage of electricity currently coming from…

The results are in for our 2018 ‘How are we doing?’ survey and they show that people continue to trust in our expertise around local, renewable energy and low carbon. Our respondents also continue to perceive us to be committed to the creation of a low carbon, locally owned renewable energy system. We’re really pleased…

Following a recent election, the community group members of Low Carbon Hub’s CIC have elected a new Community Director to the Board of Directors: Nina Alphey.  Nina is a long-term member of Westmill Solar Co-operative Ltd and has served on its Board since 2016. She was also an active member of low carbon community group…

Large grants We are offering two grants of up to £5,000 for this year’s large grants fund, available to our community group members. These grants are part of the ‘community benefit’ we return to communities.  The year’s theme is energy efficiency. We are interested in applications relating to residential, commercial and public buildings; your project…

2017 has been a busy year with some key milestones and achievements for the Low Carbon Hub, including the completion of the Sandford Hydro project, receiving £1.2m in European Regional Development Funding and producing our first ever Social Impact Report. And there were lots of other exciting bits of news in between.  Take a look…

As well as providing help and advice, Low Carbon Hub also offers financial support to  our community shareholder groups wanting to carry out carbon-cutting activity in their community. Here is a case study of what one group did with a small grant we awarded them. Westmill Sustainable Energy Trust (WeSET) was one of the last community groups to successfully…