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Sustainability is higher on most people’s agenda and includes switching to more use of energy from renewable sources. Many initiatives begin at a grassroots community level, where there can often be more enthusiasm than funding to actually make progress. Crowdfunding allows community projects, and business startups, to raise funds and begin to make a material impact. Successful community projects can be copied elsewhere. Successful startups can plan to scale. This article looks at renewable energy initiatives that have used crowdfunding to support solar, wind, tidal and cleantech battery storage developments.  

This does not mean that large energy corporations are not getting involved. One example is E.ON’s joint venture with municipalities, local banks and citizens to build new energy infrastructure in Germany to produce regional renewable energy. A key element of it is a crowdfunding platform where end-users can directly invest in a wide variety of renewable projects. Some investors may be energy providers as well as users, which has given rise to the term “prosumers.” A recent E.ON crowdfunding project is an open-space solar farm with an installed capacity of 800 kW, or enough solar energy to power 300 homes. It will be located on a currently unused site in the Freyung-Grafenau municipality in the southern German state of Bavaria.

However, a great example of grassroots action at a community level is a London couple who were sleeping on the roof of their house in November and December 2022. Their aim was to stay there until they had raised £100,000 through donations to their crowdfunding project. They will use the money to provide homes in their street with solar panels to create “a local power station.” Over 1,200 supporters donated more than £111,000. Crowdfunding empowers ordinary people to take positive action.

A London couple slept on their roof to raise money through crowdfunding for solar panels.
Image source: Crowdfunder

Specialist crowdfunding platforms

Renewable energy projects almost always begin as small to mid-scale projects at a local community level. Mainstream energy companies are usually structured around centralised energy production infrastructure, and the sums involved are often insufficient to warrant a bank’s involvement. Crowdfunding is a solution that gets local projects off the ground. It opens access to consumers’ savings accounts and rewards those consumers with higher returns than those offered by high-street financial service providers.

This personalised form of impact investing also draws in like-minded supporters who align themselves with projects on a cause-related basis. Crowdfunding brings a sense of community ownership to renewable energy projects. When residents have a stake in projects and track them from start to finish, they become closer to sustainable energy production and care about energy transition in a more meaningful way. They can be motivated to offer ideas and suggestions, or volunteer to carry out duties. 

With these factors in mind, a number of crowdfunding platforms across Europe specialise in renewable energy, and sometimes other sustainable projects. They include:

• UK; Abundance and Triodos Bank
• Netherlands; WeShareSolar, Oneplanetcrowd, and LendaHand (for investing in projects in emerging economies)
• Germany; Bettervest, and Frankly.Green (for investing in projects in Africa and South America)
• France; Lumo
• Italy; Ener2Crowd

Crowdfunding solar energy developments

The Dutch platform WeShareSolar is the largest crowdfunding platform in the EU for community solar projects. It has crowdfunded €3.0 million to enable the completion of 36 projects that in total cost €5 million, and enabled the installation of 22,000 solar panels. Using more solar energy is definitely a cause-related trend, and thousands of people have supported these projects. Crowdfunding allows any like-minded person to contribute to projects, and this platform even encourages them to rent out their roof space for solar panel installation.

This is because more than 43% of Dutch households are unable to install solar panels; they live in apartments, don’t own the building, or have too much shade on their rooftop. WeShareSolar connects people who want to own solar panels, but cannot install any at their own premises, with people who want to rent out usable space. This can create an income stream for organisations including schools, churches and sports stadiums.

Making a financial contribution to other communities’ projects can give great personal satisfaction through making a tangible input to a cleaner energy future. The money, aggregated and offered as loans, also provides a modest return through annual interest payments, until repayment of the principal amount on project completion. This mechanism enables WeShareSolar to help plug a funding gap for community-based solar projects.

WeShareSolar’s efforts have been recognised by the United Nations.

A current solar power crowdfunding project running in The Netherlands.
Image source: WeShareSolar/ZonnepanelenDelan B.V.

Tidal energy

Seawater funnelling between islands in the groups off the coast of Scotland creates ideal conditions for harnessing renewable tidal energy. The UK Government estimates the UK has half of all Europe’s tidal energy resources and has pledged to invest £20m a year in tidal energy. As well as being clean, tidal energy also provides predictable certainty and security.

Energytech startup QED, founded by a former naval architect, has developed a disruptive, self-deploying, turbine platform called Subhub. It saves up to 60% of traditional turbine deployment, installation and maintenance costs, and increases yields by up to 48%.

In the summer of 2022, QED ran a crowdfunding project that offered 9.6% of equity for £500,002. The money would be used for various purposes, including: completion and validation of the performance results of their existing products; expand their team to support designing and procuring the next generation Subhub; and match fund further EU investment. The project went on to raise three times its target, over £1.5m, from 1,435 investors.

Since completing the crowdfunding, it has been reported that QED has applied for a seabed lease in the Sound of Islay with Islay Energy Trust. In an important step towards scaling to industrial capacity, the Sound of Islay Community Tidal Project aims to install a Subhub platform with 10-metre diameter tidal turbines, generating up to 1.35 gigawatt hours (GWhr) of tidal energy from each platform.

Subhub, QED’s self-deploying, turbine platform.
Image source: Seedrs

Another Scottish tidal energy company, Orbital Marine Power, launched a £4 million crowdfunding campaign on the Abundance Investment platform in May 2022. In total it raised £8m from the Scottish National Investment Bank (£4m), plus over a thousand individual investors signed up for a 12-year debenture offer.

Wind power

In September 2022, the Spanish renewable energy company EDP Renovaveis SA launched a crowdfunding initiative on the Italian debt crowdfunding platform Ener2Crowd. The energy company is building a 28.8-MW wind farm near the Italian city of Casalbore. By installing six turbines, EDPR estimated the wind farm would be able to generate 65,000 MWh annually - enough to power approximately 22,000 homes.

Until September 26, the crowdfunding was open only to residents of Casalbore, Benevento, and neighbouring towns, in order to give local communities the first opportunity to be involved. From September 26 to the end of October it was open for anyone to support it.

Crowdfunding raised €252,108 from backers who will receive a basic return of 6% a year from November 2023, with their capital repaid in November 2026. With a minimum investment of €200 it was possible for a wide range of people to get involved.

An EDP Renewables wind turbine.
Image source: Renewables Now/EDPR

Cleantech energy storage

Renewable energy storage when the sun is not shining or the wind is not blowing is an important element of the energy equation.

Joule Case received the first ever “Clean Tech Deal of the Year” award at the inaugural US Equity Crowdfunding Week 2022 Awards in November 2022. Large scale examples of using their scaleable, portable battery system include powering live event stages and food trucks, and work on construction sites. Other business use includes any mobile service providers who operate in private homes and prefer not to use their clients’ own power source. Examples of more personal usage include going camping, outdoor work of any nature, and as a backup in the event of domestic power outages. All this is possible, and convenient,  without using a fuel-driven generator.

Earlier this year, Joule Case completed a successful crowdfunding campaign that raised over $1.1 million from 920 investors. It then opened a second $4 million round on the equity platform Wefunder, and this time raised a total of $5 million (through Reg CF and Reg D investments) to expand into new markets. There were also investor perks of a 5% discount for anyone investing a minimum of $2,500, and a 10% price reduction for backers investing $10,000 or more.

About us

CrowdInvest will be a cross-border equity crowdfunding platform offering UK-based sophisticated investors opportunities to invest in impact-driven, high-growth tech startups operating in emerging economies. You can join the waitlist today at https://www.crowdinvest.com/ to stay up to date with developments on how to be involved.