Technology: Solar photovoltaic

Location: Bullionfield (north of the A90 on the western approach to Dundee)

CARES funding: £10,000 feasibility study grant, £17,000 enablement grant and £115,990.20 loan

Date installed/operational: October 2024

Background

Dundee Renewable Energy Society (DRES) registered as a Community Benefit Society (BenCom) in August 2018 after a group of locals in Dundee were motivated to develop a community energy project dedicated to promoting sustainable community energy and alleviating fuel poverty in and around the city of Dundee.

Following the first the meeting, Dundee Courier published an article about the proposed solar meadow, which led to The James Hutton Institute contacting DRES. After several on-site meetings, an agreement was reached for DRES to raise £2 million for the project to install the solar array at Bullionfield, land owned by The James Hutton Institute, and to look at a power purchase agreement (PPA) with the institute. The James Hutton Institute had recently expanded its campus and discovered that the grid couldn’t support its increased energy usage. The contract now in place means that the electricity generated from the solar meadow is being delivered to The James Hutton Institute and the system has been designed to maximise the institute’s on-site consumption and will minimise the export of electricity to the grid.

Project aims and objectives

After the BenCom was formed, DRES contacted Local Energy Scotland in the early stages of the project. In 2019 DRES was awarded a £10,000 grant for a feasibility study to determine if the proposed site was optimal for the solar array installation.

This involved Locogen looking at key planning issues and investigating the feasibility of running an electricity cable under the A90 dual carriageway to the James Hutton Institute. The feasibility study found that the panels would be better sited on land closer to the institute, to run as short a wire as possible. This resulted in trees needing to be removed from the new site and replanted in the field that had been initially proposed. Despite this additional work, the costs were still cheaper than running a longer wire.

In June 2020, DRES was awarded a £17,000 CARES enablement grant to be used for initial advice and consultation, and to further understand the formal legal agreements with The James Hutton Institute and Energy4All. The group began working with Scene Connect, who provided support from the detailed technical design through to the construction of the solar array.

Outcomes and achievements

A full procurement process was undertaken and Munro Wilson was appointed as the main contractor of the project. Munro Wilson suggested there was an economic case for installing 2.6MW solar PV panels rather than the proposed 2. With some redesigning and a slight change in tilt, DRES successfully installed 2.59MW at the end of 2024. It’s anticipated that 2,214MWh of electricity will be generated each year with 94% of the electricity generated to be sold to The James Hutton Institute.

With the help of Energy4All, DRES has so far raised more than £2.7 million over two phases of community share offers, with the second phase open until 30 April 2025 with a target of raising an additional £300,000. . The minimum investment value is set at £100, with the maximum set at £50,000. Although the shares are open to anyone, DRES is encouraging Dundee residents in specific postcode areas, as well as employees of The James Hutton Institute, to invest in the project.

The solar meadow is expected to generate community benefits of around £1.4 million in total over the lifetime of the project. This community benefit will be spent on projects to promote sustainable energy and alleviate fuel poverty in the local area, which includes Invergowrie and Dundee.

Lessons learned

DRES has learnt that a project like this can’t be delivered without being ready and willing to meet challenges. The site was on the opposite side of the A90 from The James Hutton Institute campus and a private wire had to be laid under the road using directional drilling. This added significantly to costs and had to be negotiated with Transport Scotland.

Other challenges faced included:

  • The removal of trees and planting replacement trees elsewhere.
  • Dealing with a false alarm over a possible archaeological discovery on site.
  • Negotiating a small amount of grid capacity for electricity not required by The James Hutton Institute.
  • Negotiating legal arrangements which brought comfort to all parties involved.
  • Development costs that proved to be higher than initial expectations so careful financial management was required.

The relationship with The James Hutton Institute, and collaboration with the institute’s staff was a key factor in completing the project.

Published March 2025