Rough Guide to Community Energy (free download)

Impressively comprehensive on this subject, showing an excellent range of replicable examples of what communities have done.

The Rough Guides have been our companions over the years across continents and into strange new cultures. Now they're accompanying us on perhaps the biggest journey of all - out of the comforts of our fossil fuel addicted ways and into the unknown realms of energy descent. Hats off to the team there and for M&S for sponsoring them.

Here's a short quote from the opening section.

Climate change, rising energy prices, economic austerity, dwindling social cohesion – the world faces a number of challenges that can often seem depressing and intractable. Scratch the surface, however, and there are plenty of seeds of hope.

Across the UK and wider world, people are coming together with their neighbours and showing that, with a bit of dedication and community spirit, it’s possible for ordinary people to make real progress on a whole range of big issues.
There are countless types of community projects, of course, but perhaps the most exciting at the moment are those focusing on energy – both saving it and generating it. The beauty of these projects is that they can help deal with so many problems at once, making a difference at the local and global levels simultaneously.

This book is designed not just to explain what community energy projects are and to help readers set one up, but also to celebrate and showcase some of the pioneering schemes that have been launched so far. These projects should be a source of inspiration for anyone interested in getting involved in tackling climate change or building communities – and they come with a wealth of insights into what does and doesn’t work.

We reckon this guide will definitely be applicable beyond the UK where it originated.