Campaign group Power for People has thanked local Kenilworth and Southam MP, Sir Jeremy Wright, for voicing his support for community energy at a recent Parliamentary debate

Last month the former Attorney General spoke at a debate on the energy bill, as the government rolls out a £10 million fund for community-led renewable energy projects across England.

A consultation on the barriers such projects face when setting up and a commitment to annual reporting were also announced following support from a large chunk of the House of Commons.

Sir Jeremy praised the Government for the new fund and called on them for urgency in their consultation to remove the barriers hampering the growth of community energy projects across the UK.

"Community energy has fantastic potential to help local people across the country, while delivering towards our Net Zero targets," he said.

I will continue to support measures to create much needed growth in local generation and I am pleased to see the Government is taking active steps to help the sector.

"I hope that they will begin the consultation on removing the preventative barriers to community energy soon."

Currently, community energy accounts for less than 0.5 per cent of total UK electricity generation capacity.

But campaigners say the potential is vast, saying it could create many new skilled local jobs, "supercharge local economies" and ensure that local people benefit from the UK's transition to renewable energy through cheaper energy bills and better support for vulnerable customers.

The Community Energy Revolution campaign has been calling for the Local Electricity Bill to be made law, which would enable local projects to be able to sell their clean energy to local people.

Power for People's director, Steve Shaw, said: "Sir Jeremy has been a great supporter of community energy.

"We thank him very much for his work to promote local-led renewable energy initiatives, which if allowed to thrive would do much good for local communities across the UK.

"To realise the massive growth potential of community energy schemes, regulatory reform is needed. We urge the the Government to urgently start the consultation into barriers the sector faces."