Video to promote taking solar farm into community ownership to be shown at Shropshire cinemas
A scheme to take a solar farm into community ownership is hitting the big screen – with a special video screening.
A short video film promoting the Twemlows solar farm share offer is being shown among the adverts at both the Orbit Cinema in Wellington and the Festival Drayton Centre in Market Drayton – both of which are community run.
The groups Community Benefit Society Shropshire and Telford Community Energy (STCE) are both behind the share offer.
STCE has already provided a grant towards solar photovoltaics at the Festival Drayton Centre and its share offer has raised more than £200,000 over the last two months.
For every pound raised in the share offer, STCE is looking to deliver around six pounds or more in community benefit funds.
Dave Green, of STCE, said he hoped the cinema broadcasts would help the offer reach a new audience.
He said: “We are delighted that both the Orbit and Festival Drayton Centre are showing the video, which explains some of the benefits of the share offer and our partnership with a number of other similar projects around the country in an organisation called Community Energy Together.
“The Twemlows offer is a win-win for investors and the community. It offers a target return of six per cent on investment, represents the perfect opportunity to invest in environmentally responsible energy generation which will help fight climate change and means we can generate lots more funding for community projects around the county.
“By bringing Twemlows into community ownership, we think we will be able to distribute around £4.5million in community benefit over the next 18 years whilst saving more than 4,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year.”
Twemlows, which began operating in 2016, is a 10MW solar farm on the edge of Whitchurch which can power the equivalent of 3,400 homes.
STCE is one of five community energy groups from across England and Wales to have joined forces under the Community Energy Together banner to launch share offers for a total of seven operational solar farms.
The Community Energy Together programme will save a combined 317,000 tonnes of CO2 over the lifetimes of the solar farms, which have a collective capacity of 36MW – enough to power the equivalent of 12,750 homes.
You can watch the video at vimeo.com/847292891/657b94fe0d
