Ripple Energy wind farm?

Martyn1981

Raxiel said:

Exiled_Tyke said:

Raxiel said:

I'm a bit confused. I paid my £25 for a reservation last year, and I've had the announcement email, but the site is still just telling me I'll be able to turn my reservation into ownership when the share offer opens. No kind of quote or anything else.

Are existing owners on other projects getting first pick or something?

No you are not being disadvantaged. Everyone is in the same boat.  It looks like they've decided on a project and got far enough ready to purchase land and be able to connect to the grid etc..  I guess they wanted to announce asap and are now preparing the documentation for us all. 

I see the quote page now, its on the public bit of the site as a "this is what you could get" example, not on the account side.

Hi Raxiel, and sorry. Should have explained this was an estimate quote, and whilst I've paid a deposit, can't yet 'buy' anything. So no queue jumping. Just wanted to quickly show that the site had changed their calculations, which were applying wind costs and calculations, to PV, by mistake.

I've always thought mistakes are fine, and a great way to see how a company acts. They were great on line when I explained that <2kW couldn't generate 6,000kWh pa, and quickly confirmed my guess that the calculator was still wind based.

I think their friendly and open discussion, and quick revision of the calculator suggests good things. Plus, I was lucky to get to visit the first wind farm scheme on one of the open days (as a guest), and the Ripple staff there were brilliant.

Miss.Twizz

I was so close to buying in to the wind farm but I unfortunately missed out. I spent time figuring out what it would mean for us, best & worse case based on our average usage etc. I was so excited when the email dropped in but been completely thrown by it being a solar farm and the implications of this. I'm not relishing the prospect of starting the thought process all over again! In simple comparison terms, has anyone run their compassions? I know it's very individual and depends on your investment and usage, but in general would you expect to end up with more, less or similar savings? 

70sbudgie

I bought into Kirk Hill windfarm for 40% of my current usage. It cost me a little over £1,000 and the dashboard is currently predicting an income of £110 in the first year with an annual saving of 1714kWhrs for 25 years The calculator for the solar farm is suggesting that another 40% would cost about £1500, for 1700kWhrs annual saving for 40 years and £166 in the first year. (I've rounded the numbers a little).

The difference in timescales could be relevant - I may or may not move before Kirk Hill ends, but I will definitely move before the solar farm ends.

mamoulian666

Unfortunately I'm disappointed by their pricing model. Their prioritisation of a stable saving pence-per-kwh means members aren't protected from the volatile energy market and don't get the reduced bills they could.

They negotiate their wholesale price and a members pence-per-kwh saving yearly with suppliers (e.g. Octopus) but then members' electricity bills are subject to the suppliers' standard tariffs which go up and down with the market (and suppliers' desired profits) across the year. As the supplier is still buying the project's energy at the agreed wholesale price and applying the same pence-per-kwh saving any tarrif increases go direct to the supplier's pocket!

So, sadly, not moneysaving enough for me :-(

From a purely investment point of view: their calculator estimates a £3835 investment could provide £10,397 savings over 40 years assuming 'extended high' energy price forecast. That same amount invested as cash would earn £10,495 interest over 40 years at 3.3% and the original investment would still be there. If after 40 years the equipment cannot be refurbished using operating costs then the original investment's value is gone which would give an overall effective return of 2.5%.

paul991

The point is its not a purely investment point of view.The same when we had pv fitted in 2014 and put money in to Graig Fartha but both now look like very good investments

thevilla

Assuming project 3 follows the same principle as Kirk Hill, all investment is returned over the expected lifespan of the project. After 40 years all original investment  has been returned to the investor.  20 (or 25?) for Kirk Hill.

Why bad mouth an investment before it has been published?   Wait for the share offer.

mamoulian666

paul991 said:

The point is its not a purely investment point of view.The same when we had pv fitted in 2014 and put money in to Graig Fartha but both now look like very good investments

The first half of my post is from a 'not as investment' point of view. I WANT to co-own my green energy supply but my head needs to get involved as well as my heart. Despite co-owning the energy generation my bill would still be driven by the wholesale energy market that should be no longer relevant. The supplier gets to take an easy no-risk profit of whatever they like.

Yes that's great for those on the earlier projects. But the new project 3 calculator takes into account the current and forecast high prices so unless it turns out that the energy market exceeds that it's going to be that 2.5%.

Martyn1981

mamoulian666 said:

From a purely investment point of view: their calculator estimates a £3835 investment could provide £10,397 savings over 40 years assuming 'extended high' energy price forecast. That same amount invested as cash would earn £10,495 interest over 40 years at 3.3% and the original investment would still be there. If after 40 years the equipment cannot be refurbished using operating costs then the original investment's value is gone which would give an overall effective return of 2.5%.

I'm not sure those numbers are fair. Putting in £3,835, the calculator suggests a first year return of £415, but the long term returns are mostly £248 pa.

3.3% of £3,835 is £126.55 pa, so roughly half.

To get your figure of £10,495 interest, you need to apply compound interest, leaving the capital and interest to grow. So let's do the same with the Ripple example and reinvest the annual returns (like compounding the interest). I'll ignore the higher early figures (though those would actually get the most growth) and simply stick with £248 income pa, at 3.3% on the slowly growing fund for 39 years:

So at the end of y1 you get £248.
end of year 2, you get the balance multiplied by 103.3% = £256.18 + £248 = £504.18
repeat and end of year 40 you have a total of £20,024 ......is that roughly correct?

What the hell, let's pop in all the Ripple annual estimates, and you get £21,265 ..... does that check out roughly too?


Edit - For anyone interested, the growing Ripple fund, overtakes the interest account at the end of yr20.

andyg9053

When I signed up to the first wave, I bought 1900 ish and was expecting less than 200 pa. I have had about 270. At that rate I would have had my money back at the 7 year point. This coming year I should get about 800as the price has been volatile. It will be over half paid back in less than 2 years. My shares on the stock exchange have gone down dramatically in the last 3 years and getting 3% interest in a savings account at the moment is possible but wasn’t last year. Nothing is guaranteed apart from death. However I have helped make some green energy for the benefit of my grandchildren. That could be priceless 

Coastalwatch

andyg9053 said:

When I signed up to the first wave, I bought 1900 ish and was expecting less than 200 pa. I have had about 270. At that rate I would have had my money back at the 7 year point. This coming year I should get about 800as the price has been volatile. It will be over half paid back in less than 2 years. My shares on the stock exchange have gone down dramatically in the last 3 years and getting 3% interest in a savings account at the moment is possible but wasn’t last year. Nothing is guaranteed apart from death. However I have helped make some green energy for the benefit of my grandchildren. That could be priceless 

Thanks Andyg9053, that's priceless and why we invested too.

Probably, for investors interested in high returns only then Community Energy projects are unlikely to be for them.