This issue has become extremely complex since the Government introduced an obligation on suppliers to supply a certain (rising) percentage of electricity from renewable sources. The National Consumer Council has written a clear report of the issues, and compared the various suppliers, explaining the complexities and what you need to look for when deciding on a green tariff. Unfortunately, as the National Consumer Council is now called Consumer Focus, with a new website, they no longer have this report available. 

When buying green electricity it is important to decide what you want the company to be investing in: encouraging more consumers to play their part by buying electricity from renewables? Investing in new development of generation? Making renewables more accessible to people in other parts of the world? Where do you want your green premium to go? The reality is that the Government requires generating companies to produce 'green' electricity anyway (an increasing percentage every year under the Renewables Obligation), but currently consumer demand for renewables is less than is actually being produced. So it is really important that as consumers we show the Government that we do want our electricity produced by renewable means... and that we are prepared to REDUCE our demand.

 If your concern is for the company to provide a high percentage of electricity from renewable resources, you'll need to know the fuel mix that the company uses. This site gives that information.

Matthew Rhodes runs a consultancy called Encraft and has advised churches on energy efficiency and renewables. He has written a simple guide to help you through the first steps to making your church use less carbon dioxide.

Mark Harding is a Christian consultant heating engineer with experience of designing church heating systems. He provides advice to churches at a modest fee regarding improvements in energy-efficiency and incorporating renewable energy sources into heating systems. He is based in the West Midlands.

Contact him:

t: 01588 672012

e:mark@flowtherm.co.uk

Operation Noah is updating its resources, but you can still use this useful document to help you to calculate the energy use of your church building.

John Kibble was a heating engineer, and wrote a number of articles about heating in churches generally, which he made available to Eco-congregation.

William Bordass and Colin Bemrose have written a book called Heating your Church.

Beginning with the proposition that a well-heated church is largely a Victorian invention and a late twentieth century expectation, this useful guide explores and advises on the challenges of heating church buildings. Details are on the Church Care website above.

Property Points is a a downloadable document produced by the Methodist Church: a technical study of energy saving in religious buildings.

National Energy Action is an agency campaigning on warm homes, but also have a concern about community buildings. They have produced a detailed guide to looking at energy efficiency, which covers many of the issues of importance in church buildings.

Try www.low-energy-lighting.com for an increasing range of low energy lighting options, or call direct to 024 7659 2126. I met Nigel Dawes from this company (the company is called Warmmead and is based in Coventry) and he is happy to advise churches on lighting as he has looked at his own church's lighting needs. Or you can look and purchase online. You will be amazed at the huge range of low energy lights now available. 

The Sustainable Building Association have a factsheet produced for domestic buildings, but the principles of which are relevant to some church buildings, especially modern ones.

The MBS (Modern Building Services) Journal is a journal for the building industry. They have an article on an air source heat pump fitted in a Methodist Church. There are lots of other interesting articles if you are thinking about a building project at your church.

Operation Eden (now Faiths4Change) produced a fact sheet about photovoltaic cells, which also gives UK church examples.

Have you considered harvesting rainwater and using this to flush the church toilets? The Environment Agency has a helpful introductory document about this, and other aspects of conserving water. You can download the document below as a .PDF or click above to go to the web page. Section 7 is about rainwater harvesting, but there are other sections about toilets, detecting leaks and other relevant issues.

Are you considering toilet facilities but are not on mains drainage? A Trench Arch system is a shallow soak away trench which does not need connection to mains drainage, or septic tank. It was written for Gloucester Diocese by Mark Moodie from Elemental Solutions.

Perhaps you need to contact the Bat Conservation Trust. Many churches play a key role in helping these endangered mammals by providing a safe environment for them to roost in. Some churches take an active role in conserving bats, taking part in monitoring programmes by counting their bats and supplying data.

There may be scope to do more to promote positive images of bats among congregations to help more people understand the importance of conserving bats, and to realise what a big difference they can make.

BCT produce a range of publications and resources, eg for European Bat Weekend every August (what about having a bat walk?), or at All Hallows - BCT provide information and materials.

Community Sustainable Energy Programme (CSEP)

Please note that this new scheme is due to open in April 2008.

What is the Community Sustainable Energy Programme?
The Community Sustainable Energy Programme (CSEP) is an open grants programme run by BRE, an award partner of the Big Lottery Fund. Part of the Fund's Changing Spaces programme, CSEP has been set up to help community based organisations in England to reduce their energy bills and environmental impact. The scheme is also designed to raise public awareness of the social and environmental advantages to reducing energy consumption and carbon emissions in order to combat climate change.
 

Who can apply?
Grants will only be awarded to eligible not-for-profit community based organisations in England. This includes:

• community groups governed by a written constitution

• registered charities and trusts

• parish councils

• schools and colleges

• companies with a charitable purpose and community focus

• mutual societies

• church based and other faith organisations

   

What can be funded?
Two types of grant are available: capital and project development.
Capital Grants are available for the purchase and installation of any of the technologies listed below along with various energy efficiency measures, including cavity wall insulation, loft insulation, heating and lighting controls.
Solar Photovoltaics
Solar Thermal Hot Water
Wind Turbines
Ground Source Heat Pumps/Air Source Heat Pumps
Automated Wood Pellet Stoves
Wood Fuelled Boiler Systems
Micro-hydro Turbines
Energy Efficiency Measures

Project Development Grants are available for studies investigating the feasibility of installing the above mentioned technologies.

How much can I apply for?
The maximum Capital Grant available is £50,000 or 50 per cent of the project cost (whichever is lower).
The maximum Project Development Grant available is £5,000 or 75 per cent of the study cost (whichever is lower).

When can I apply?
It is anticipated that the Community Sustainable Energy Programme will open for applications in April 2008.

How do I find out the latest information on the Community Sustainable Energy Programme?
They will keep their website updated with the latest news on CSEP. Alternatively, you can email your contact details and they will contact you with any updates.

You might find some help and support from the café project (Community Action for Energy), run by the Energy Saving Trust 08701 261 444. They don't have big grants to give out (you'd have to get in on the Low Carbon Buildings Phase 2 pot of money) but they might have small grants which you could put towards finding an architect who is aware of all the things that you could do (eg passive solar heating, rain water recycling, heating and lighting systems which could operate off renewable sources of electricity etc). They can put you in touch with experts in the field.

Do try the Low Carbon Buildings Phase 2 - they do say that churches are eligible!

See below for a basic primer on energy efficiency from the Energy Savings Trust. It is aimed at domestic properties, but some of the issues are transferable to newer church properties.

Funding is available for church maintenance, repair or restoration from the Landfill Tax Credit Scheme to churches within 10 miles of a landfill site. WREN (Waste Recycling Environmental Limited)  is the organisation which is responsible for grants. Their website explains:

"Welcome to the Waste Recycling Environmental Limited (WREN) website. Our directors, staff and the people who serve on our regionally based advisory panels are fully committed to the provision of grants under the terms and conditions of the Landfill Communities Fund (formerly the Landfill Tax Credit Scheme). By doing so we aim to enhance the social environment, natural conservation and heritage aspects of the world in which we live and create a beneficial and lasting legacy for future generations.

Funding is limited and not all requests for grant support can be satisfied. Project applications which demonstrate self help, viability, sustainability and offer benefits to large numbers of people receive priority for funding."

WREN Grant Scheme:

"WREN can fund a wide range of projects under Objects D/DA and E of the Landfill Communites Fund. Funding of between £2,000 and £50,000 is available for the following types of projects:

• The provision, maintenance or improvement of a public park or other public amenity in the vicinity of a landfill site.
• The delivery of biodiversity conservation for UK species or habitats
• The maintenance, repair or restoration of a building or other structure, which is a place of religious worship or of historic or architectural interest. "

You need to check the precise eligibility of the funding scheme to see if your project could come under their criteria.

The Church of England runs a site called Church Care with everything there is to know about looking after churches. It is geared to CofE churches, but a lot of the information is transferrable across to other denominations. Particularly helpful is their section on funding, especially their funding guides (which take you step by step through complete grant basics) and funding for community projects.

TRAID is a charity specialising in textile recycling. They will put recycling bins on church property and collect from them at no cost to the church. Recycling textiles is not only good for the environment but it also helps the worlds poorest people.

From their website:

CSEP is an open grants programme run by BRE as an award partner of the Big Lottery Fund (BIG). BRE carries out research, consultancy, training and testing to help create better buildings and communities.

The Community Sustainable Energy Programme will provide £8 million to community-based organisations for the installation of microgeneration technologies, such as solar panels or wind turbines and energy efficiency measures including loft and cavity wall insulation. It will also provide £1 million for project development grants that will help community organisations establish a microgeneration and energy efficiency installation will work for them.

It aims to achieve the following outcomes:

• Reduction in CO2 emissions

• Increased community awareness of climate change and how changes to our behaviour can reduce it

• Increased skills base of local trades (for example, local builders and building-service subcontractors working on renewable energy projects for the first time)

• Reduction in energy bills

• Reduction in reliance on imported energy and increased independence from commercial energy suppliers

• Stronger partnerships within local communities with lasting social benefits

• Growth of local enterprise in new technologies.

Applications are being accepted now. Capital grants will be awarded on a competitive basis at quarterly Selection Panel meetings. Please click here for a list of the funding rounds. Project Development grants will be awarded on a first-come first-served basis until all funds are spent.

Details of all aspects of the grant application process, consultants, installers and technologies are available on this website. We will also provide statistical information for all projects that have been funded, showing where the project is and the types of technologies used.

CSEP is managed by BRE. Call the Changing Spaces helpline on 0845 3 671 671 for more information or email them at info@communitysustainable.org.uk

Have you been wondering about offsetting your carbon emissions as a church? Why not use the carbon calculator on the Climate Stewards site. This organisation, part of A Rocha International, gives you the opportunity to make a donation to their work with communities in Ghana, South Africa, Peru and Kenya, enabling small communities to plant trees and reforest denuded areas, whilst giving those local communities access to sustainable livelihoods.

• Find out what you can do: use the Climate Stewards site to calculate the carbon dioxide you are emitting
• Donate to the work Climate Stewards, assessed by the Rainforest Alliance, and working with local communities to plant trees which will give them social and community benefits
• Check the evidence on climate change
• Sign up for prayer updates on climate 
• Find out more about Christians and climate change

There are two main types of wood fuels used with automated feed boilers:

• wood pellet boilers - these use a processed wood fuel, currently usually imported (although UK suppliers are coming on line gradually). It is a more expensive fuel, but requires a cheaper type of wood boiler. Fully automated (you need a big storage area for the pellets, but they can be blown in from a tanker, so the tanker can be up to 30m away from the fuel store)
• wood chip boilers - these use a 30% moisture content wood, chipped from the unused wood after logging in managed forests in the UK. Because it is less processed, it is cheaper compared to the pellets, but the boiler required is more substantial. Again, it is fully automated input, and automatic ash removal. The cost of the wood chip boiler is greater than a wood pellet boiler (although a wood chip boiler can be used for wood pellets too.

Wood fuel boilers are really best used in situations where a church building is used a lot during the week as well. They don't work so well if they have to start up from scratch weekly, but work better if they can simply 'slumber' between daily firings. However, you'd need to talk to the particular manufacturers about that.

What a supplier would need to know is what you are currently using in quantities of fuel - over the last 2 or 3 years. From this, they can calculate the number of kWh that you are likely to need, and therefore the supplier can tell you what size of a boiler you would require. Wood fuelled boilers are much bigger than oil or gas boilers, and you need significant space to accommodate the fuel. Particularly for wood chip, there would need to be access for a tipping lorry, and preferably a below ground store for the wood chip, next door to where the boiler is. The store needs to be significant in size so that you don't have to have the lorry delivering small amounts often.

The automated ash removal system puts the ash into a box or bin which needs then to be removed every 2 - 4 weeks.

The main questions you need to ask before contemplating a wood fuelled boiler are:

• do you have space for a large fuel hopper?
• do you have space for a large boiler next door to the hopper (or a space that could be separated easily - the wood fuel store needs to be physically separated but next to the boiler for safety reasons)
• do you have access for lorries to deliver into the fuel hopper? (This may not be so relevant if you go down the wood pellet road.)
• does your building get a lot of use during the week, which would work better for wood fuelled systems?
• are you prepared to put in a large amount of money up front for installation of a system which will save you money in the long run, and reduce your dependence on fossil fuels?

The National Energy Foundation's wood fuel site is regularly updated with suppliers' details, but the funding for the project came to an end, so other information on the site is not updated. However, it is still a useful source of information about wood fuelled boilers.

For more information about using geothermal heat, try the Ground Source Heat Pump Association site.

Join the Methodist church in their campaign to 'Stem the Tide' using resources online.

It includes information on buildings, but also powerpoint presentations about climate change, resources for small groups and so on. Excellent resource!

English Heritage produce information leaflets on all sorts of issues to do with historic buildings. I've pulled out a few that may be of interest to those with older church buildings who are wanting to become more energy efficient or develop renewables technologies. They are all downloadable from the Historic Environment: Local Environment page of the English Heritage website. Here are just a few examples that I've picked out:

• Bats in Churches 2.4mb .pdf
• Biomass Energy and the Historic Environment 1mb .pdf
• Building Regulations and Historic Buildings - Balancing the needs for energy conservation with those for building conservation. Guidance notes.   1mb .pdf
• Climate Change and the Historic environment  1mb .pdf
• Energy Conservation in Traditional Buildings 1.5mb .pdf
• Flooding and Historic Buildings  500kb .pdf
• Green Heritage Sites 230kb .pdf
• Lightening Protection for Churches 2.7mb .pdf
• MicroWind Generation for Traditional Buildings  1mb .pdf
• New Work in Historic Places of Worship 670kb .pdf
• Principles of Conservation Practice  700kb .pdf
• Regeneration and the Historic Environment  300kb .pdf
• Small scale solar electric (Photovoltaic) energy and traditional buildings  1.5mb .pdf
• Small scale solar thermal energy and traditional buildings  1.2mb .pdf
• Wind Energy and the Historic Environment  1,2mb .pdf

One church has a scheme which collects rainwater, and then uses that water to flush the toilets: Christchurch, Chislehurst, Kent. This is all part of energy saving, as it takes lots of energy to clean water up to drinking quality, and yet we then use that drinking quality water to flush the toilets. Using rainwater harvested from the roof saves a lot of energy (and water).

Sustainable drainage systems make use of the water run-off from buildings and areas of tarmac eg car parks. With heavier rainfall, the amount of water run-off means that the drains can't cope, and that water is lost to the ground. It would be much better if that water could be saved (for example in the rainwater harvesting scheme above) or allowed to soak into the ground. These systems are called SUDS Sustainable Drainage Systems.

There are a number of SUDS now available including permable surfaces such as gravel, special block paving and special ashphalt. These systems could be cheaper because of the reduced need for pipes. They prevent flooding and puddles.

See the links for more information.

The Academy for Sustainable Communities is a website with lots of information about all sorts of things, but for our purposes, it has a really useful page of things to build into your new build project which address environmental sustainability in practical ways.

For example on this page on design, it includes a check-list of issues to consider:

See also the GreenSpec website which takes you through all aspects of green design from materials, energy, design with lots of examples, and a check-list (CAWS) to work your way through as you work your way through the construction process.

If you are in the process of looking at sustainable options for developing your church plant, or looking at a new build, you could sign up to receive the Green Building Press newsletter, and receive information about the sorts of things that are going on currently.

From the Dept for Energy and Climate Change:

The Fifth Round of the Bio-energy Capital Grants Scheme
funded by DECC

The purpose of the Bio-energy Capital Grants Scheme is to promote the efficient use of biomass for energy, by stimulating the early deployment of biomass fuelled heat and biomass combined heat and power projects. It will do this by awarding capital grants towards the cost of equipment in complete installations.

This round will be funded by DECC and is for England only.

It is aimed at businesses, organisations and charities in the commercial, industrial and community sectors that are considering investing in biomass-fuelled heat and/or combined heat and power projects, including anaerobic digestion.

It is not aimed at householders or individuals who should consider the Low Carbon Buildings Programme, funded by DECC.

There is no minimum grant aid in any one application and the maximum is £500,000 per installation. An application form and Guidance notes can be downloaded here.

Please note that the deadline for the receipt of applications is 16.00 on the 30th April 2009

All enquiries should be addressed to biocapitalgrants@aeat.co.uk

There is a Frequently Asked Questions page and a Key Features page. Please refer back to this site at regular intervals whilst you prepare your application.

Links

• Guidance notes (pdf file)
• Application form (Word Document)

The Bio-energy Capital Grants Scheme is part of the UK Environmental Transformation Fund (ETF), which aims to bring forward the demonstration and deployment of low carbon energy and energy efficiency technologies.

Further information about the ETF is available from:
http://www.berr.gov.uk/whatwedo/energy/environment/etf/page41652.html

A series of funding guides are available on the Parish Resources website, which take you through a whole range of issues from a funding overview to 'how well did we do?' (review).

The Carbon Trust has a leaflet which explains how the concept of 'degree days' can help you work out how efficient your heating is. It's quite complicated, so not for the faint hearted! But if you are involved in the technical side of church heating, this may be very useful.

Ownergy will manage the design installation and management of renewable energy systems for all sort of buildings. They will also find finances to help fund the up front cost and may do an initial survey free for churches.

One of the key tools in trying to work out energy and cost efficient heating and insukation measure is the Degree Day. This website is a really good easy to understand explanation of what it is and how to use coupled with a database and calculator that enables you to work out the degree days where you are.

The introduction of Feed in Tarriffs which force the electricity supply companies to buy renewable energy from small suppliers at very attractive rates have encouraged a lot of churches to put solar panels on their roofs and adopt other renewable energy technologies. The return on investment is excellent at a time when interest rates are at an all time low. There are even companies around offering to do the whole thing for you so that there is no up front cost and you get free electricity! Beware - there is no such thing as a free solar panel. There are some good schemes avaiable out there but the best value for money is only available to those churches who can find the money for the investment themselves. The Centre for Sustainable Energy has produced an excellent little briefing about the questions you need to ask to ensure you get a fair deal from potential suppliers offering to "rent" your roof space. There is also guide donwlaodable from the Church of England's Shrinking the Footprint website

The Energy Saving Trust is offering up to 3 days of free expert advice on community energy projects. This can cover technical consultancy or funding advice. See the EST website for details

English Heritage have released their solar panels guidance note, which is available on their website at:
http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/professional/advice/advice-by-topic/p...

In addition the Diocese of Oxford has also produced a very helpful guide which can be found here: http://www.oxford.anglican.org/documents/Your%20Church%20and%20Photovolt...

This information sheet is produced by the Diocese of Oxford to introduce how biomass could be used to heat your church. It will help you assess the suitability of your church and provides a list of things to consider as you develop a project to install a biomass boiler and benefit from the government Renewable Heat Incentive