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Golden Valley Environment Group Community Wind Turbines Minutes from GVEG meeting held on Thursday 12 March 2009 at Peterchurch Community Centre Twenty-four members and guests attended the March meeting of the Golden Valley Environment Group which focused on Community Wind Turbines. Jon Halle, Energy4All, spoke for 90 minutes touching on a variety of alternative energy options. Jon explained the Benefits of Community Ownership, where each member as an investor is entitled to one vote, regardless of the amount of money paid in. Shares range in value from £250 to a maximum of £20,000. Community Ownership is not for private profit. Initial set-up can cost £250,000 which is lost in the event that the project fails to get off the ground. Jon cited the Reeves Hill Project as an example of where community ownership is working and how there is financial security by spreading set-up costs across the share holders. For more details about the Reeves Hill Project, go to www.sharenergy.coop. In addition to wind, other eligible technologies were discussed such as water, which only generates a quarter of the energy that wind does. There are two local Bio-digester projects. One in Ludlow and one in Leominster where the project’s goal is to heat a school. Biomass, when done correctly, is an excellent solution to managing woods to make energy / heat. There are no local community projects to date. He said unfortunately there is an industry evolving around talking about energy projects rather than getting starting and doing them. In the UK, only 5% of our energy is renewable, of which 30% of our renewable energy is generated by landfill gas. Co-Fired energy where coal and wood are burned together is our second most-used form of renewables and sadly the majority of the matter which is being burned comes from abroad! Wind power is third and Hydro, located mainly in Scotland, is our fourth source which makes up our 5% renewable energy. The goal is to be Zero-Net-Carbon by 2050 and the only way to achieve that is to reduce our consumption. The good news is that Britain generates 30% of all European Wind Energy. Everyone enjoyed Jon’s ‘Mythbusting’, two favourite anecdotes being: “Wind turbines are inefficient because the wind does not blow constantly”. Wind turbines can easily account for 20% replacement of energy consumption. “Wind turbines are so costly that you will never generate a profit”. Not so, normally cost is paid back in one year. Jon gave a brief update on investigating placement of a wind turbine in Bredwardine. sharenergy.coop is willing to put up money to do feasibility work, look at key issues of access and grid connections plus put together some financial models. Jon summarized the night by saying support for all of these projects needs to have politic support to be successful. If we do not reduce our consumption levels, it will be necessary to build more nuclear power stations. Jon is currently involved with 9 or 10 projects and the bottom line to their success is determination of the project members. Minutes prepared by Sarah Morgan, 15 March 2009 Click here to return to top of this page.
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