The CHEESE Project CIC wins Community Energy England award.
Community Energy England (CEE), founded in 2014, is the leading voice for the community energy sector in England, representing over 300 organizations delivering community-led energy projects. CEE works to enable the sector to thrive by providing resources, facilitating knowledge-sharing, and building capacity through initiatives like the UK Energy Learning Network.
CEE advocates for supportive policy and regulatory frameworks, engaging with government, think tanks, and stakeholders to address barriers to growth and highlight community energy’s positive impacts.
July 2023 – June 2024 Season
We were pleased to welcome two new directors to the Project. Joshua Mudie, who also took up the role of Treasurer, and Geoff Hunter. We were sad to say goodbye to two directors who made a crucial contribution to the development and success of the Project. Jamie Hanlon, one of our earliest directors, who set up our database and CRM, whose commitments to a growing family and new job understandably took precedence. Also to Roz Thomas, who developed our outstanding training course for Heatview® surveyors, due to promotion in her high-profile day job. See The Team.
A major difference for this season was the arrival of Retrofit West CIC, funded by the West of England Combined Authority, which was set up with The Centre for Sustainable Energy to promote retrofit of homes to those with the ability to pay. CHEESE being accepted as one of their partners meant our customers became eligible for substantial discount vouchers off the cost of a survey. Till January 2024 this was £250. Then the voucher was reduced to 2/3rds of the cost up to a maximum of £250. Thanks to a backlog of customer demand, and Retrofit West’s marketing, we were able to carry out a record 278 surveys, employing a maximum of seven surveyors on self-scheduling contract.
Please use this link for a detailed analysis of our performance during the season.
July 2022 – June 2023 Season
173 surveys carried out
45 were funded by grants and a Housing Association -CURO
We were invited to attend a community energy event set up by Darren Jones MP for Bristol Northwest, who was then Chair of the Energy Select Committee. He asked us to survey his own house.
We were excited that Ameresco won the bid to BCC for the City Leap project, because CHEESE had been built into their bid.
“Our CHEESE survey informed and kick started our retrofit plans. A really clear and well-planned service, all the information and thermal imaging video provided for your records, and a brilliant focus on all the many small ways you haven’t realised that you are leaking heat – with practical and low-cost suggestions for solving them. Can’t recommend this enough – we’ll be back for another survey when we’ve completed our current plans, to check the results – and plan the next steps!”
