Community Energy Generation Growth Fund

Applications must meet the Community Energy Generation Growth Fund objectives:

• • Contribute to Scotland’s target of 2GW of community or locally owned renewable energy by 2030.
  • Support communities to develop and be engaged in energy projects and the energy transition.
  • Deliver concrete economic benefits to communities, while also supporting Scotland’s net zero ambitions.

This funding call will target projects that can deliver a specific, significant milestone by Tuesday 17 March 2026.

Projects supported will need to:

• Install over 50kW of renewable energy, either at a site or over multiple sites, for example multiple building roofs.
• Generate and provide electricity through a connection to:
  • sell to the national grid; or
  • sell to a local energy user with enough demand; or
  • power your own building.
• OR be an electricity generation project led by a community group that owns and operates its own independent electricity grid because it can’t connect to the national grid.
• OR be an existing renewables project that is repowering.

Applications must demonstrate value for money, potential for community impact, deliverability, and a reasonable chance of success.

Where applicants are installing solar photovoltaic (PV) on their own building(s), the combined project must install over 100kW or be installing above 50kW with sufficient detail that clearly demonstrates the wider impact and benefit of the installation. These benefits are expected to be beyond the energy needs of the building and energy bill savings. The building must be owned or leased by the applicant and, if you’re a tenant, you must have a valid and viable lease in place for at least five more years after the project is completed and permission from the building owners to carry out all proposed works.

All applications must make it clear how financial savings and/or income will benefit the wider community or take forward specific projects. Failure to provide this information in your application will reduce your projects score and consequently its chances of success.

• Eligible organisations are Scottish registered and incorporated non-profit distributing organisations.
• Funding is for community groups interested in developing, owning, and operating renewable electricity generation projects.
• Support will be open to established and constituted community groups, for example Development Trusts and constituted Community Energy/Climate Action Groups.
• Charities can apply, including Arms Length External Organisations (ALEOs).
• Applicants should have a clear project plan, including details on what renewable technologies will be installed, and where they’ll be installed.

All funding applications need to be completed by you as the charity trustees/employees, not an installer or contractor acting on your behalf. If we receive such an application, it will be rejected.

The support available will cover a range of technologies, including:

• onshore wind
• solar PV
• hydro

Funding will also support projects that want to apply for support for repowering, as long as they can meet all the eligibility, and assessment and scoring criteria. Battery storage can be included if it complements renewable generation and improves the business model.

Funding can be used to help projects meet a key and achievable project milestone by Tuesday 17 March 2026. Examples of key milestones could include, but are not restricted to:

• a site-specific feasibility study
• a planning application submission
• full technical design
• grid connection agreements and payments
• land agreements
• procurement of contractors, services and equipment
• installation of renewable technologies.

Feasibility and development support will be provided via grant funding or support via CARES framework contractors. Later stage funding for installation and construction will be supported by grants and loans. Funding and example activities are set out in the table below.

Most of the funding is for capital expenditure so only staff costs relating to professional services provided to the project, for example a project manager, can be funded.

For phase 3, the intervention rate is calculated based on the total construction costs required to complete the project. It’s expected that the grant will be drawn down at the agreed percentage.

CARES funding must be applied for and agreed milestones delivered by Tuesday 17 March 2026.  Deliverability is a key scoring criteria and applicants must clearly evidence how they will deliver on time.

Some renewable energy projects will complete over longer periods, therefore applicants can reapply to CARES for further funding to continue their projects in future, but there is no guarantee that funds will be available or that a second application will be successful.

Guidance on what funding can be used to match with CARES is available in the Additional Funding Guidance.

Applications will be assessed by a panel consisting of at least two officials from the Scottish Government, at least two Local Energy Scotland staff, and at least two external panel members. Funding from the Community Energy Generation Growth Fund will be awarded competitively, based on an assessment of the information in your application form. Please ensure that your application, particularly your responses to the four questions that directly reference the Assessment Criteria, provides sufficient relevant detail to assess and score your project against the application criteria below. Your application form must clearly provide details that allow to us to:

• Assess that your organisation is eligible.
• Assess that your project is eligible.
• Score your application against each of the assessment criteria set out below.

This is a pass/fail assessment.

Eligible organisations are Scottish registered and incorporated non-profit distributing organisations including the following structures:

• Community Benefit Society (BenCom)
• Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO) (ideally this should be two tier)
• Community Interest Company (CIC)
• Company Limited by Guarantee (CLG)
• A wholly owned subsidiary of such organisations.
• Charities, including Arm’s Length External Organisations.

The organisation should have:

1. Community focus: A geographic community whose boundary is clearly defined. For example, it could take the form of a community council area, parish boundary, local authority ward or could be defined using postcodes. Communities of interest will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
2. Social purpose: The organisation’s main purpose must be consistent with furthering the interests of the community.
3. Community control: Must be demonstrated at both membership and board level. There must be a minimum of three unrelated persons on the organisation’s board and more than half of the voting seats on the board must be made up of community directors resident within the defined community/community of interest.
4. Non-profit distributing: Surplus funds or assets must be reinvested into the organisation’s work to further its objectives. In the event of the organisation being wound up, its assets at dissolution must be passed to a non-profit distributing body with similar objectives. This should be stated in the governing document.
5. If you employ people you must comply with Fair Work First guidance, this is a requirement for all public sector grants.

The organisation eligibility assessment will involve reviewing your submitted governing documents and the information provided within your application form. Assessors may also check information available online.

This is a pass/fail assessment.

The funding can support community owned renewable electricity generation projects that:

• Can generate and sell electricity, either through a connection to the national grid or through a connection to their own site or a local energy user/off-taker with appropriate demand.
• Have a clear and deliverable project plan.
• Will complete one or more project milestones and claim funding by Tuesday 17 March 2026.
• Comply with subsidy control.

The project eligibility assessment will be based on the information provided in your application form. In particular, please ensure that responses to the four questions that directly reference the Assessment Criteria provide the key information relating to each of the points noted below in the assessment criteria table.  Please note the panel will only review information in your portal application when scoring your project.

Expectations of the information to be provided when scoring your application will be proportionate to the project stage and progress made on the project. Applicants should detail their approach to meeting each of the four criteria in the assessment questions on the CARES project portal.

The application will be scored based on the information provided within the entire application form, with key questions, labelled Assessment Criteria 1-4, relating to the numbered assessment criteria in the table below.

If projects propose to work with preferred or existing contractors for lower value works, for example feasibility, project management and development works, there must be clear rationale as to why this is appropriate at this stage, and you must demonstrate how you will achieve value for money. For larger scale and construction works, it’s expected that an appropriate procurement exercise will be undertaken to test the market and allow a fair process.

Round 2 will open in August. The application period is relatively short to allow longer delivery timescale. Applicants will be notified of the decision in October.

If you require assistance, our team of CARES development officers are happy to help you with your application.

We understand that community energy projects are challenging, and a degree of flexibility is required to help projects progress. We want to make sure that CARES funding can support community organisations to fill gaps, support a range of projects and address project challenges outside of the timings of the Community Energy Generation Growth Fund.

The CARES Resilience Fund is now open. You can apply if your project meets the guidance for the Community Energy Generation Growth Fund (except meeting application deadline dates) and you can evidence an urgent deadline for funding to keep your project on track, and where you have an existing CARES award and Local Energy Scotland has confirmed it should be managed through the Resilience Fund rather than a change process.