As the newly elected Chair of Community Energy Birmingham, I was tasked with writing about our recent business planning meetings to decide our new strategy moving forward. As well as publishing the below on the CEB website, I thought I’d post it on my website too.

After our AGM last year the elected board of CEB started to meet to determine the future strategy of CEB. Our previous model of putting Solar Panels on community buildings with the main source of income for CEB coming from the Feed In Tariff is no longer viable. This is because the Feed in Tariff no longer exists. The Board knew that CEB needs to go in a new direction. Fortunately, the bigger picture is changing when it comes to action on the Climate Emergency and Community Energy is being increasingly seen as part of the solution to our energy needs.

We have have business planning meetings where we have discussed what we want our future strategy to be and have finalised our strategy for 2021. There are some sharp steps away from our previous model, but we think that the big picture is changing enough for us to take on new challenges, Our new strategic goals are listed below. If you have any thoughts on the strategy or have any ideas or contacts as to how we can best enact our new strategic goals then please get in touch.

1. Take the lead on approaching other energy cooperatives in the region, propose collaboration with them in creating a PT regional Business Development role, open up a dialogue with WMCA about funding it
2. Seeking to define one or more project types that we are likely to be able to deliver, such as renewable heat, EV charging, large-scale solar – think big
3. Reconsider our trading area and updating our rules, while maintaining Community Energy Birmingham as our brand
4. Launch a paid home energy advice service to householders; allocate a volunteer resource to promoting it; allocate a small budget for any marketing costs; offer paid work and training (PAS 2035) to people who could deliver it
5. Hold a formal external board member recruitment exercise, outside our existing networks, to increase the diversity and skills of the board – making a difference, being part of something
6. Position ourselves as a critical friend to BCC
7. Review progress against these objectives at each board meeting.

If the new strategy of Community Energy Birmingham interests you and you would like to either join CEB or comment on the new strategy please feel free to do so.