The Solar Challenge - Solar owned together!

Aim

The Solar Challenge is a community owned residential energy project, with the aim to cut energy bills & increase climate resilience for all!

Bringing the Solar Challenge into being

The ResNet team and all of its supporters have been pulling together the necessary technical (hardware and digital), legislative, financial and community aspects of the Solar Challenge with the aim to start the installation of community owned, domestic solar PV and battery systems later this year. With your help we can get to the point of being investment ready! 

Every £ you give to our Crowdfunder campaign is being matched by the Aviva Community Fund - and will bring us closer to a new way of powering our neighbourhoods! 

The story of electricity in our homes

Electricity is how we decarbonise our homes by moving away from fossil fuels. Heating, transport, cooking and everyday power use are shifting towards electrical systems. The problem is upfront costs are high, and access is unequal.

Change: Nobody is more equal!

Some households can access funded upgrades or pay privately. Most people sit in the middle: They are not eligible for free measures, but they can't afford solar, batteries, insulation or heat pumps without taking on debt. That slows the transition and leaves communities less prepared for price spikes, outages and extreme weather.

Imagine neighbours planning upgrades to their homes together, generating local energy, and financing and managing the services their community relies on. The Solar Challenge makes that practical through a community owned model that helps households cut bills and strengthens neighbourhood resilience. We will keep benefits local and design the scheme to provide fair access to all, avoiding models that rely on upfront spending, costly finance products or long, restrictive household contracts.

We will start by organising neighbourhood groups, with the aim to create a larger cooperative network, securing delivery partners and designing fair participation so that renters and lower income households are not left out. Over time, Solar Challenge communities can generate local electricity, share savings, and reinvest into the services their communities need.

How we will use the money you raise:

• Set up and governance: Legal structure, policies and community ownership model so the project can hold funds, contract safely and protect participants.
• Revenue stream: Refine the underlying financial model that allows householders to make significant savings on the cost of electricity and support the community ownership model to run independent of grant funding in the future.
• Community mobilisation: Local outreach, events and sign up pathways to build a community of households and local organisations.
• Delivery planning: Surveys, technical scoping, installer and partner selection ready for the first community solar installations.
• Fair access design: Eligibility and support rules, safeguards for vulnerable households and options that work for renters and low income households.
• Pilot preparation: A ready to launch pilot in the first neighbourhoods, with a timeline and a clear route from sign up to delivery.

From transition to revolution?

With your input, neighbourhoods across the UK will not only be part of the energy transition, but will be able to revolutionise local power - in every sense & and in all communities!

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made