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UK watch: Tracking renewable energy investment trends, Renewable Energy Focus 05 January 2015 KATHARINE EARLEY As we head into 2015, Renewable Energy Focus contributor Katharine Earley speaks to Triodos Bank about investment trends, including crowd-funding, community-owned energy and businesses opting for on-site energy generation.
With renewable energy set to be one of the key winners to emerge from the EU’s new three-year, £250bn investment plan, 2015 could be a promising year for renewables. We caught up with ethical investment pioneer Triodos Bank to understand what trends it foresees for the year ahead.

“We could see some real strides forward for renewable energy in Europe, particularly if the EU’s investment plan focuses on grid infrastructure,” Matthew Clayton, executive director of Triodos Renewables, explained. “As we move from centralised power plants to smaller, distributed energy generation, government investment could really help to address this important systems issue. Coupled with private investment in energy efficiency and generation, such a move could lead to more rapid progress.”

For Triodos’ part, its renewables company, owned by some 5,000 shareholders, operates 11 onshore wind and hydroelectric projects across the UK with a capacity of 53MW, enough electricity to power 34,200 homes. Founded in 1994, the company has seen a 35% increase in shareholders and a 50% increase in generating capacity in the past three years. Its projects generated more than 100m kWh of clean electricity in 2013. Having already raised £2m from its latest share offer, it is now extending the offer until 30th January 2015.

So what does Clayton see as the reasons for this prosperity?
“Investor confidence has grown as the nature of the projects become more robust,” he explained. “The technology is proven and is also decreasing gradually in price. Interestingly, we’re seeing interest from a wide range of investors, from individuals through to institutional investors. And we want to make investing in renewables accessible – that’s why we’re inviting minimum investments of £50 through our current share offer………..

Triodos’ Top Three Renewable Energy Investment Trends for 2015
1. More projects will be developed to supply a business
“We’ll see more projects developed with a direct supply of renewable electricity to a business,” Bazin stated. “This helps the developer to achieve a better price for the power and reduces electricity losses during transmission. Meanwhile, the business purchasing the energy benefits from greater security of supply, lower cost compared to using major utilities and a boost to its efforts to reduce its environmental footprint.”
According to Bazin, this direct supply of electricity will be a key component of roof-mounted solar projects, which are high on the UK government’s agenda in 2015. This type of direct supply model also helps to raise awareness of the positive impact of renewable energy among building users, he confirms.
2. Community-owned energy will gather momentum