Ripple Energy wind farm?

2nd_time_buyer

Thanks very much. I suspect you are right. My suspicion is that it would just come off the overall bill anyway. And if you took away SEG payments, it would be very unlikely to be a problem anyway. Either way, it would be a nice position to be in. 

chqshaitan

Yes, that is true, my only concern though is if you are not careful, you could potentially be in credit most months, which means ultimately that paying over the odds for electric that you have not used.

2nd_time_buyer

Generally you are able to claim a refund for credit built up on an account.

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/information-consumers/energy-advice-households/check-if-you-are-owed-money-your-energy-bill

This would normally arise from overpaying on the bill. However as QrizB mentioned, it is possible to be on Octopus for export only for SEG payments. In which case you would only ever be in credit on your export account, so it must be possible to withdraw credit from SEGs too.

So in effect it would only be possible to be in credit and not be able to withdraw it, if your electricity bill is less than the Ripple payments alone. Which is very unlikely - since the retail and wholesale prices are likely to track i.e. your bill will go up as the Ripple savings go up, and there is also a significant differential between the wholesale and retail price of electricity.

As mentioned above, it might be worth asking Octopus. However, I messaged them on a separate enquiry recently and it took 3 emails, one week apart to get it resolved. And TBH I would be surprised if the eventuality has even been considered by them yet.  

TCA

chqshaitan said:

Yes, that is true, my only concern though is if you are not careful, you could potentially be in credit most months, which means ultimately that paying over the odds for electric that you have not used.

You'll only ever be charged on your bill for the electricity you've used. Buying into Ripple is effectively a price hedge, so hedging more than you consume is just that. Gas and electricity aren't separate and you should be able to get excess credit returned to your bank account.                           

smartn2

QrizB said:

I see from their home page that Ripple have sold 48% of the Kirk Hill wind farm so far.

It's not immediately clear whether that 48% is:

• 48% of the wind farm to private investors, in addition to the 30% sold to Bruntwood (ie. 78% sold total);
• 48% of 70% (=34%) of the wind farm sold to private investors, in addition to 30% sold to Bruntwood (ie. 64% sold total); or
• 48% of the wind farm sold in total, being 18% to private investors and 30% to Bruntwood.

Whichever of those it is, given that it's only been eight days they're off to a reasonable (18%/48%) to great (48%/78%) start.

I did wonder this myself so contacted ripple. They 48% is of the 70% so almost half of co-op slots gone.

TCA

smartn2 said:

I did wonder this myself so contacted ripple. They 48% is of the 70% so almost half of co-op slots gone.

Good progress if that's the case. I had assumed it was 18% of the co-op slots. As a rough calculation, co-op funding required of £24.7m using an average investment of say £2k per customer, requires around 12,350 co-op members. They were only at 2,000 new members last week, so that's a big jump if they're at 6,000 already. Impressive.      

smartn2

TCA said:

smartn2 said:

I did wonder this myself so contacted ripple. They 48% is of the 70% so almost half of co-op slots gone.

Good progress if that's the case. I had assumed it was 18% of the co-op slots. As a rough calculation, co-op funding required of £24.7m using an average investment of say £2k per customer, requires around 12,350 co-op members. They were only at 2,000 new members last week, so that's a big jump if they're at 6,000 already. Impressive.      

Exact quote as below

'The 48% refers to shares purchased by our new members of the Kirk Hill coop only. 52% of the shares in the coop are available.'

So it does look like good progress. Fingers crossed they can acquire all necessary funding without having to borrow money.

plasma01

Why would one invest in Ripple Energy instead of an existing wind/solar/battery storage company thus avoiding the complication of dividends being credited to energy bills?

QrizB

plasma01 said:

Why would one invest in Ripple Energy instead of an existing wind/solar/battery storage company thus avoiding the complication of dividends being credited to energy bills?

It's been discussed at length if you care to read the thread.

In effect, a stake in Ripple is a hedge against high future electricity prices. If wholesale electricity continues to be 15p/kWh rather than the BEIS forecast of 6p/kWh, Ripple will outperform the forecast. If wholesale electricity falls to 3p/kWh, Ripple will underperform.

Most (not all) of the big wind/solar companies have their prices fixed by virtue of FITs or CfDs, so there's no direct correlation to wholesale prices.

If you want to take a position with Greencoat UK Wind (or Centrica, or BP) instead or as well, that's your choice.

TCA

smartn2 said:

TCA said:

smartn2 said:

I did wonder this myself so contacted ripple. They 48% is of the 70% so almost half of co-op slots gone.

Good progress if that's the case. I had assumed it was 18% of the co-op slots. As a rough calculation, co-op funding required of £24.7m using an average investment of say £2k per customer, requires around 12,350 co-op members. They were only at 2,000 new members last week, so that's a big jump if they're at 6,000 already. Impressive.      

Exact quote as below

'The 48% refers to shares purchased by our new members of the Kirk Hill coop only. 52% of the shares in the coop are available.'

So it does look like good progress. Fingers crossed they can acquire all necessary funding without having to borrow money.

Just listened to last night's webinar on the Ripple YouTube channel and Sarah Merrick confirmed that the 48% quoted included the co-investors. Around 39:30 mins into the recording. A figure of 3,000 members was mentioned at some point.