2018

RENEW040 - Staff salary sacrifice scheme for low emission vehicles - 20.06.18

This authority is interested in finding out if any others utilise a salary
sacrifice scheme for low emission or electric vehicles.

They would also like to hear from any who have considered it and
decided against it.

 

RENEW039 - Better Care Funding for fuel poverty measures – 30.05.18

This authority is currently exploring the potential to access Better
Care Funding (BCF) for fuel poverty and energy efficiency home
improvements. This funding is provided to local authorities and
traditionally used for Disabled Facility Grants and other adaptations.
They understand that some other local authorities may have already
done something similar and allocated some of their BCF to fuel
poverty measures.

They are very keen to hear from others who have done so and are
willing to share their experience, including impact evaluation
information to enable them to build a case.

 

RENEW038 - Care workers access to electric vehicles - 30.05.18

This authority is considering options for the provision of electric cars
to care workers whilst they are at work. The intention is to reduce
the need for a care worker to own their own car and potentially
assist with parking (so the car would be recognised for parking
permit purposes). The employee would pick up the car at a park and
ride and then only use it for client visits so there would be no
personal use.

They think this may assist with recruitment and retention as they are
having difficulties, as many others are, with retaining care workers.
Their care workers are currently employed by private, voluntary and
aided sector and they want to understand potential costs, liabilities
for HMRC and other relevant issues.

They are keen to hear from any other local authorities who have
either taken this or a similar idea forward or have considered and
rejected it and the reasons for the decision. They would be grateful
to hear from anyone with thoughts or information relevant to this
issue.

 

RENEW037 - Allocating electricity costs for EVs - 04.04.18

This local authority is investing in electric vehicles and are
concerned about arrangements for paying for electricity.
With their petrol vehicles, each service would pay for their own fuel
with a fuel card. However with EVs they have no method of
accounting for the electricity used. This is because the charge
points are simple so do not record which vehicle has been plugged
in, drivers use various charge points and drivers might just use a 3-
pin plug to tap in to an electricity supply. As a result the electricity
isn’t being recharged to the service and is being paid for corporately
out of the utility budget.

They are interested to hear what arrangements others have in place
to allocate electricity costs to individuals and departments. And
internal recharging.

 

RENEW036 - Local ‘green’ trading scheme – 27.03.18

This authority is considering establishing a local trading scheme,
based on building a local ‘green economy’.

The proposed scheme aims to encourage local business to
business trading within the energy and sustainability sectors.
The intention would be that the scheme would encourage discounts
or favourable terms for businesses purchasing ‘green’ products
from local businesses.

They are keen to hear from other local authorities who have
developed and / or operate such a scheme or have considered it
and decided against it.

 

RENEW035 - Carbon Budgeting - 27.03.18

This authority is looking at carbon budgeting (or carbon accounting)
and want to hear about the experience of others.
The questions they are interested in are as follows

• How does carbon budgeting fit with financial management systems?
• How are benefits of carbon budgeting managed or balanced between competing priorities (such as short term capital expenditure vs long term revenue savings)?
• How does carbon budgeting impact on financial budgets?
• What lessons have been learned from developing and implementing carbon budgeting systems?

 

RENEW033 - Metering and access to data on smaller council sites - 09.03.18

This authority has installed AMR on their larger electricity and gas

supplies and were about to roll-out AMR on smaller electricity and
gas supplies at sites such as sports pavilions, public toilets and car
parks.

They have identified that the SMETS1 and Advanced Meter
Exception end dates have been extended to 5 October 2018
(https://utilityweek.co.uk/beis-extends-installation-deadlinesmets1/).
After this date third-party AMR cannot be installed on
profile 1-4 electricity supplies and gas supplies consuming less than
73,200 kWh per year.

Only SMETS2 meters can then be installed. All data from these
meters will flow through the Data Communications Company to the
supplier. There is uncertainty around how and if end users will be
able to access their consumption data and to what level of detail
from the Data Communications Company as well as if there will be
a cost to access this data.

In light of the smart meter roll-out and the planned phase out of
AMR they are reluctant to commit to a large capital outlay for
metering that could soon become redundant.

They are keen to hear how other local authorities have addressed
this issue and any other comments on it for example, others’
understanding of the regulations and options around AMR going
forward.

 

RENEW032 - Energy accreditation schemes - 15.02.18

This authority is considering establishing a local accreditation
scheme to encourage the uptake of energy efficiency measures and
energy awareness within local businesses. The intention would be
that the scheme focuses exclusively on the local authority area and
on energy related topics initially.

If the scheme shows promise it may transition to wider
environmental topics in addition to energy.

They are keen to hear from other local authorities who have
developed and / or operate such a scheme or have considered it
and decided against it.

Equally they would like to hear from others who have encouraged
local businesses to take up energy efficiency measures by different
means.

 

RENEW031 - Power purchase agreements and local authority experience - 120118

This authority is considering installing solar PV on some of the
leisure centres that were previously the Council’s but are now run by
a different organisation and on industrial estate properties. They
intend to sell the electricity to the leisure centre/tenant via a power
purchase agreement. They are keen to hear from other authorities
who have experience of a similar situation and are willing to share
an example PPA and their experience.

 

RENEW029 - Energy price increases – 12.01.18

This authority has seen energy price increases and has been
informed of a possible 12% rise in electricity costs mainly due to
government levies.

They use a public broker to purchase energy and find it extremely
difficult to compare energy prices due to a lack of transparency
across brokers and different purchasing strategies.

They would like to hear the experiences of others with regard to
increases in energy prices and specifically what others know about
future increases – is 12% a common expectation?