– Innovative financing exceeds £10 million target –
Britons have proved their appetite for Green Energy remains undiminished – with Ecotricity’s innovative ecobond two bypassing the success of ecobond one.
Britain’s leading green energy company was seeking £10 million of funding from customers and the public to help accelerate the building of new Green Energy projects such as windmills and green-gas.
By the offer deadline (5pm on Friday 16 December), more than 2,000 people had between them applied for £16.2 million worth of ecobonds, making it oversubscribed by 62%, and exceeding the success of ecobond one last year. ecobonds are a radical idea to raise funding that gives people the opportunity to share in the financial benefits of the green energy revolution and cuts-out the banks at a time when they are paying low interest rates to savers and charging much more to borrowers.
Ecotricity founder Dale Vince, recently named Best Green Entrepreneur at the International Green Awards, said: “It’s fabulous that ecobond two has exceeded the success of ecobond one and confirms that this radical idea was not a flash in the pan.
“We’ve found a way to raise funding that is resonating with the British public and expect to do this annually in order to ramp up the Green Energy sources that Britain desperately needs.”
Ecotricity set out to make ecobonds accessible to as many people as possible, and following feedback from its customers, this resulted in a minimum investment of £500 and an initial term of four years. Ecotricity also offered a preferential rate to its customers – 6.5% as opposed to the 6% for non customers (itself a decent rate).
Vince said: “In deciding how to allocate ecobonds we’ve put our customers first, and chosen to pay the extra half percent, gladly.”
Ecotricity has a strong pipeline of new Green Energy projects waiting to be built including 19 windmills with planning approval – plus a further 78 windmills for which it is seeking planning approval (that’s enough to power over 100,000 homes) – and a target of having over 200MW of operational capacity in the next five years. It also intends to increase its investment in other renewable energy technologies, including wave-power and green gas made from organic waste.
Ecotricity was named ‘Company of the Year’ last month at the Growing Business Awards and is committed to changing the way energy is made and used in Britain. Established in 1995, Ecotricity operates a ‘not-for-dividend’ model, re-investing the money from customers’ bills back into building more new sources of Green Energy.
Ecotricity now supplies Green Energy to over 55,000 customers from 53 windmills at 17 wind parks (and one Sun Park) across the UK which, together, prevents over 50,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere every year.
Media contacts:
Stuart Brennan, Ecotricity stuart.brennan@ecotricity.co.uk or 01453 761 302.
