Margaret Taylor
A COMMUNITY in the Highlands is to be one of the first beneficiaries of a
new crowdfunding platform being launched by ethical bank Triodos today.
The bank’s entire ethos is built on the crowdfunding model, with the cash
its customers deposit in its accounts being used to lend to businesses that
meet its ethical criteria.
Triodos Crowdfunding will operate slightly differently by allowing
customers to actively pick the specific projects they want to put their
cash towards.
There are currently five projects on the bank’s crowdfunding site, ranging
from a Bristol-based organic food business that is looking to raise
£350,000 to a solar-energy farm in Somerset that hopes to raise £1.8 million.
They are structured as peer-to-peer loans, with the capital paid back over
terms of varying lengths and each paying interest of between four and seven
per cent.
The Highlands project, which is looking for a total investment of £1.7m to
pay for a wind turbine in the remote community of Coigach, north of
Ullapool, will go live in the coming weeks.
The community’s 500 kW turbine was installed last year and is expected to
generate 2,020 MWh of electricity every year.
It is not clear yet how much interest will be paid to investors in the
scheme or how long the investment term will be.
The bank’s managing director Bevis Watts said the platform would allow
“everyday investors” to make a “positive choice to shape the world they
want to live in”.
“In that sense money can be a hugely powerful form of democracy if invested
directly into renewable energy, social housing, charities or social
enterprises,” he said.
“Social investment needs to be more accessible to UK investors, who
increasingly recognise the power of money to create change.
“We’ve been crowdfunding since before it became a well-known term. With the
new Triodos Crowdfunding platform we’re recognising the huge potential of
crowdfunding and responding to demand for Innovative Finance ISAs.
“Investors are looking for opportunities that allow them to support
progressive companies, social enterprises and charities making a positive
impact, while also receiving good long-term returns.”
Triodos, which was founded in the Netherlands in 1980, has a long history
of supporting businesses and projects in Scotland, providing loans to 130
of them by 2016.
Among those it has provided finance for are the Hoprigshiels community
windfarm, a project that was developed by Berwickshire Housing Association
(BHA) as a means of funding new homes for social rental.
A joint venture between the housing association and charity Community
Energy Scotland (CES), the three-turbine scheme supplies energy to the
National Grid,.
It is expected to generate £20m of funding for BHA and £10m for CES over
the next 25 years.
The former will use its income to build 500 new homes while the latter will
use its share to fund its work helping other communities develop similar
projects.
A similar scheme in the Outer Hebridean islands of Barra and Vattersay saw
Triodos put up almost £2m in finance for a wind turbine that generates
between £50,000 and £100,000 for the local community.
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