Charity bank and community energy meet in an old barn at Hafod y Llan (it was cooler in the old building!)
Today and under the beating sun at Hafod y Llan farm on Snowdon we hosted a meeting with some of the team who run the charity bank who met community energy organisations we have been sharing or enabling with. The purpose of the meeting was to share, learn and gain knowledge from the charity bank and the community energy groups. We had people working on 5MW PV, several 500kw hydro and some 100kw hydros. There seems to be a loose network developing in NW Wales in terms of sharing and learning which is mostly down to Dafydd Watts of Ynni’r Fro. The National Trust is in strong place to facilitate this in terms of staff but also we also have some experience because we ‘do’ renewable energy and community energy projects. The meeting today felt a bit like speed dating but we all had a simple aim which was to introduce community customers to the charity bank providers. The bank itself even though they consider themselves small they have some impressive stats. £170m loaned over the last 10 years, 300 community/ charity or not for profit organisations assisted. 0.4% bad debts on loans. They also only loan money to organisations who have a clear social / charity benefit. They are a rare beast in that they can loan up to 25 years. I hope from this corner of NW Wales you will start hearing a lot more from the bank and the communities.
