The Highland Energy Community Partnership (HECP) is a partnership project to help the rural Scottish Highlands overcome barriers to home decarbonisation and fuel poverty alleviation.
Background
In December 2024, Changeworks received almost £1.5 million of National Lottery funding to work with communities in Scotland. The funding will help improve home energy efficiency and empower communities to move towards a greener future. In particular, the project will support communities that have historically struggled to access appropriate support and advice around energy efficiency. This is a significant issue for rural Scotland, where 47% of households suffer from fuel poverty, compared to 36% in urban areas.
HECP is co-ordinated by Changeworks in collaboration with six Highland Community partners. All partners will receive Lottery funding to deliver quality home energy improvements and community-scale retrofit.
Community partners across the Highlands
To ensure a lasting legacy and support retrofitting beyond project end, the HECP will make it easier for households to install green energy technologies. This will include upskilling rural communities by providing local tradespeople with greater access to training in the area.
How the Partnership came together
The partnership was established in early autumn of 2023. It was initiated by the Lochbroom & Ullapool Community Trust (LUCT), who had started developing a local project focusing on enabling retrofit. By checking EPC data and conducting household surveys, LUCT identified both their community’s concern about high energy costs and an urgent need for retrofit. They decided to partner with Changeworks as a leading energy expert.
The scale and wider relevance of the work led to engagement with neighbouring partners whose communities had similar concerns. As one partner said, the geography “feels large enough to have lots going on but small enough to be tight knit.”
Partners were unanimous in communicating similar retrofit barriers and high fuel poverty levels across their communities. Each wanted to work together to establish a local PAS 2035 accredited retrofit supply chain. This would avoid the legacy of poor quality, single measure installs and ensure quality whole house retrofit.
Whilst this is the first time all community partners have come together to work across the region as a partnership, all have a history of working together.
Building the Delivery Team
There are a diverse range of roles across HECP’s partner organisations, each working collaboratively to achieve the project’s outcomes. Changeworks provides a partnership manager and partnership coordinator to support partners. In addition, Changeworks’ team focuses on engaging with the supply chain. A further crucial role within the partnership is that of the community energy officers. Embedded within the community partners, they work on a local level to understand community experiences and overcome barriers to retrofit.
What’s next for the Partnership?
The HECP project will proceed with a phased approach. There are key milestones and activities planned throughout 2025 to ensure successful implementation and community engagement:
- From January to April 2025, the project will enter its mobilisation and design phase.
- During February and March 2025, the Partnership will engage with the supply chain to ensure smooth collaboration.
- In April 2025, recruitment will begin for the community energy officer roles.
- From April to July, community activities will commence, marking the start of on-the-ground engagement with local communities.