Funded Energy Redress Projects

The Energy Advice on Prescription project will provide expert energy advice and support to assist vulnerable consumers in Bassetlaw to make better decisions and improve their current situation/crisis. Delivery will include an in-depth ‘Energy Advice on Prescription’ for individuals via face-to-face appointments, home visits and digital channels, liaising and negotiating with energy suppliers, coordinated social media campaigns to raise awareness and open pathways towards our energy team, community presentations and ‘pop-up’ events to consumers/front-line workers, increased partnership working with local voluntary/public sector organisations to educate on energy issues, targeting clients affected by fuel poverty.

Warmer Torfaen will support vulnerable clients with energy advisors to improve energy efficiency in their homes and source practical solutions to help client’s keep their homes warm. They will work closely with Building Resilient Communities within the local area. The Building Resilient Communities team provides emergency assistance, such as food vouchers and cash grants before signposting clients for further support. In addition to this, they will also provide education sessions to our partner organisations and community groups to raise awareness of energy efficiency and highlight the issues our vulnerable clients may have when dealing with their energy providers. These education sessions will result in further referrals being made to our adviser.

The Lancashire Women’s Energy Advice service will offer home visits allowing advisors to better understand service users' situation and ensure that those who cannot afford, or do not have confidence to come into centres still receive help and a robust energy advice assessment. To support this, they will employ a female handy-person who can perform minor repairs and installations so that the safe reputation of our service for women remains. They will deliver informative events and sessions in the community to target groups (Low-income families, carers, 60+, 16-25s) that will help educate and prevent crisis situations from occurring.

The Energy Advocate Powys project is a partnership between Severn Wye, Powys County Council and community organisations like The HIVE, Pobl, The Bracken Trust and local foodbanks. It will provide targeted support to hard-to-reach people in rural areas who often fall through the net of conventional fuel poverty programmes. The project will embed trained Energy Advocate's within three areas in Powys covering Newtown, Llandrindod Wells and Brecon, areas have been selected based of higher level of need. The advocates will work alongside the council services, integrated health and community organisations to support people through the energy crisis, aiming to both alleviate and prevent fuel poverty. The partnership services will be able to refer directly to our Energy Advocates who will conduct home visits, provide energy efficiency advice, billing support and support with grant applications, and holding appointment-based and drop-in surgeries in partner hubs. This project will be essential for these communities to face the energy and cost of living crisis.

Sustainable Seacombe will support vulnerable residents in an area of highest fuel poverty, and low average income, to better afford their fuel bills and maintain adequate warmth in their home.

It is a twenty month highly focussed programme of activity that will overcome barriers faced by vulnerable residents and directly link them to the full range of support available.

A key element is to visit every home in Seacombe to inform residents of the opportunities available to them to access financial support for improvement measures, register for support such as Warm Home Discount, better understand how to switch supplier and the benefits of smart meters, as well as access support when facing fuel debt or other broader issues.

Working with our partner, Wirral Council, we will use a wide range of communication and engagement methods including home visits, weekly community events, social media, print and radio media, joining forces with other community groups’ activities, and word of mouth by residents.

We are taking an innovative approach of creating 52 “micro-areas” of 150 homes each receiving co-ordinated support. Residents will be encouraged to share their knowledge and experience with neighbours, creating the potential legacy of localised community support linked with other programmes such as Seacombe Lives. This will be supported by offering accredited training to residents.

Sustainable Seacombe is projected to support over 5,000 vulnerable residents and lead to reductions in fuel bills of over £50,000 per year. It will also see the installation of over 1,000 energy efficiency measures.

The Birmingham Energy Affordability Project (BEAP) will provide energy advice and advocacy for clients in vulnerable situations, focussing especially on fuel poverty hotspots in the north and east of the city. A dedicated team of trained energy advisers will address the growing demand for energy advice and support from vulnerable residents in Birmingham due to increasing energy and living costs, and the ending of COVID-19 support. The project will address the root cause of fuel poverty and deliver long term solutions by developing robust referral pathways to further support vulnerable clients to access energy efficiency measures, income maximisation and wellbeing support from both in-house services and specialist agencies.

The Cornwall Energy Advice Service will expand provision to support more vulnerable consumers across Cornwall at risk of or experiencing fuel poverty, combined with proactive outreach to support the most vulnerable..Over the next 2 years, outreach work across Cornwall, targeting support to harder to reach households and combined with increased marketing activity, will see the service provide tailored support to over 3,500 households. Households will be able to reduce their energy consumption, and financial savings will be made to help manage energy bills and reduce the risk of debt. Vulnerable consumers and their households will benefit from improved health and wellbeing with warmer, more energy efficient homes.

The Lime House Project Energy Efficiency Adviser will give face-to-face energy assessments for particularly vulnerable and hard-to-reach clients Additional service will online and in-depth energy advice workshops, follow up meetings and support with individual casework an energy training workshops for other local agencies working with local citizens struggling with financial issues. They will educate vulnerable clients, many of whom are living in poverty and unfamiliar with what the energy markets can offer them. Word-of-mouth is a very strong form of communication amongst local BAME communities and clients supported and educated about energy issues will champion the project's work, passing on knowledge learned and advocating others to participate in the project.

The Royston Community Energy Project will employ 2FTE Energy Advisors, they are ensuring the Royston community has access to personalised energy advice and advocacy and that this is linked to wider services delivered from the Hub. They will provide a dedicated drop-in/appointment service for 800 people to access first-hand advice and crisis support in relation to energy advice and undertake home energy assessments for 175 properties, supporting households to understand energy usage; make savings to bills, reduce carbon emissions and undertake a series of small practical solutions to reduce energy consumption. They will also develop a series of environmental workshops on topics including: living well in an energy efficient way; understanding energy bills; awareness of the Priority Service Register. Delivered within the Hub and recordings posted on a YouTube channel-aiming to drive behaviour change across all Royston residents.