My train of thought on green energy

Helen Dunk

08 February 2011

Working for Friends of the Earth I've heard lots about how homes in Blighty lag behind the rest of Europe on harvesting their own power from the wind and sun.

Travelling through the EU by train over Christmas, I saw for myself what a difference proper incentives for families to 'grow their own energy' really make.

As we hurtled through the snowy Bavarian hills, it wasn't just the fairytale castles nestling on the wooded slopes that caught my eye.

Almost every other one of the neat, brightly coloured houses had one side of its roof covered with solar panels.

I could also tell which families had proper insulation - most rooftops were still smothered with a thick layer of white snow, unmelted by central heating escaping upwards.

I realised politicians here had cottoned on long ago that it's madness not to help people to generate their own energy, eventually for free. So the Government has schemes in place that ensure getting started with the right equipment makes financial sense.

As we wound onwards through Romanian villages with hens scratching in the rusty soil, even the most ramshackle of country dwellings featured basic solar thermal technology - double or triple solar panels propped on the roof, facing the sun, alongside a tank of water. The same was in evidence in the bigger towns, on top of concrete blocks of flats, where people were also harvesting the energy of the sun.

Back in London, our energy expert Alan tells me that 9 months in, Britain's own 'guaranteed cash-back' scheme to encourage households to install green energy is under attack.

The Government launched a review earlier this week - and those who don't want to see the investment put in are saying it's being soaked up by large solar farms, not ordinary households. But surely the answer to this lies in ensuring such schemes have significant community involvement before getting the money - not derailing the whole scheme before it's got a full head of steam.

- Helen Dunk, Communications & Media Team