About this group
Our project will:
- Provide reliable, long-term funding for community projects that will enrich and improve the lives of those most in need in one of the 30% most deprived areas in Britain
- Move closer to our ultimate aim of becoming carbon neutral, and help us to help other community buildings do the same
- Make a real difference to people in fuel poverty, by helping them to do simple and effective things to reduce their energy use, using our community centre as a real-life example
We are currently raising funds.
About the Cornerstone
The Cornerstone is a community centre run by All Saints’ Church. Wokingham is consistently ranked as one of the towns in Britain providing the best quality of life for its residents. However, this is not the full picture. The Cornerstone Community Centre is located within the Norreys ward of Wokingham which contains a large area of social housing and is in one of the 30% most deprived areas in the country, for income, education, employment and crime. It is also an area where energy consumption is above average for the borough. Fuel poverty is a fact of life.
We are using the huge roof of the Cornerstone to host over 40 solar panels. This will halve our bills, and generate thousands of pounds each year from the Feed-in-Tariff (despite cuts).
There are wonderful community projects in Norreys, run by local residents who are determined to develop community spirit and offer people hope, help and inspiration, but Government funding is at an all time low. Services for those with social care issues and problems associated with poverty are in short supply and increasingly have to be run on a voluntary basis with intermittent charitable funding.
We want to use our feed in tariff to generate a reliable long-term income stream to help plug the funding gap, as well as to continue to provide high quality facilities at prices people can afford.
Read more about Norreys Ward:
http://www.getwokingham.co.uk/search/hpsq/10/1/113/%20%20Norreys
Helping those in Fuel Poverty
For some residents of the Norreys estate, "saving the planet" is necessarily low on their list of priorities. They are busy concentrating on feeding their families and making ends meet. In fact, in conjunction with social services an emergency food parcel scheme is run from the Cornerstone, for people in the area who for one reason or another find themselves temporarily unable to feed their families.
We want the Cornerstone to be a living example to help us spread the word about energy conservation in an accessible way to help hundreds of people cheat fuel poverty. We have 1200 users a week, and we will use the Cornerstone as a base to reach out to the community to help them to do simple, cost-effective things to reduce their energy usage and take up incentives and grants for insulation and other energy saving items.
The beauty of our project is that it demonstrates that “green thinking” is not just for the wealthy. We say that “green thinking” benefits everyone, no matter what their circumstances, and what is more, the financialandsocial benefits of a renewable energy and energy saving strategy are long term and sustainable.
Helping the Rest of the Community Embrace Renewable Energy
We are also committed to helping other community buildings in the area achieve renewable energy and energy conservation projects. We will share the experience of our team and actively help others to get their own projects up and running.
How Many People will Benefit from our Project?
The 1200 weekly users of the Cornerstone who will continue to have access to good facilities at a reasonable price and witness the benefits of renewable energy at first hand
8532 Residents in Norreys Ward who will benefit from funding for community projects and assistance in implementing strategies that can help them cheat fuel poverty
500+ Members of the All Saints’ Church Congregation who will also benefit from reduced running costs for the Cornerstone and other church buildings and learn more about renewable energies and energy saving strategies
30,403 residents in the Borough who will be able to seek support and expertise via our project team (from 2001 census);
Energy type
