THE BDCR STORY

Bro Dyfi Community Renewables (BDCR) is a community owned renewable energy company.

We generate clean electricity to the local distribution network. We hope that this website will be of interest to our Members, to other community groups who would like to set up their own renewable energy enterprise, and to students working on renewable projects.

For an overview of the BDCR story, we have created a short video you can watch on the right. For those of you interested in the full details, they can be found here on our About Us and How We Did It pages. Thank you for your interest in BDCR.

Our Generators

Bro Dyfi Community Renewables first installed wind turbine is a Vestas 75kW machine, bought second hand and installed in 2003 on the hill above the Centre for Alternative Technology, near Machynlleth. The turbine originally supplied CAT with power, and the surplus was exported to the local electricity distribution network. For full details, please click here.

Using European funding secured through Mid Wales Energy Agency, ecodyfi and Member investments, we bought a second hand Nordtank NTK500/37 500kW wind turbine which was installed on Mynydd Glandulas in 2008. For full details, please click here.

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SUPPORT AND LINKS

If you belong to a community group who would like to set up their own renewable energy enterprise, or you are a student working on renewable projects as part of your educational course, you may find this particular page very useful in support of your endeavours.

There are a number of organisations working in the community energy sector in Wales and across the UK that provide useful support and advice for new initiatives.

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Solar pv project

BDCR is currently installing an (almost) 300kW solar photovoltaic (PV) array alongside the existing Nordtank wind turbine.  The project will substantially increase our operational assets (total 875KW installed capacity) and enable us to make an even greater contribution to carbon offsetting in the local area.

BDCR were very grateful to receive £21,800 funding from the Welsh Government Preparatory Grant to cover part of the development costs and £100k from the Welsh Government Local Energy Grant. 

Planning permission was granted in 2019, and we were then able to agree a lease with the very supportive landowner, put financing in place and start planning the technical side of the project in earnest. 

Work started on site in the summer of 2023, managed and implemented by BDCR committee member Tim Brewer

PV PROJECT UPDATE – NOVEMBER 2023

Despite bad weather, our solar project is progressing well.  Tim and his crew have been working hard over the last few months, building foundations and assembling the support structures.  These are now nearly complete, and work is progressing on mounting the panels onto the supports (see picture).  Once these are all in place, the inverters will be installed, and the connection from the panels to the inverters made.  Agreement has been reached with Scottish Power for the location for their substation, and we will be responsible for the installing the foundations.  Scottish Power have not given us a date for when the connection to the existing turbine export cable will be made, but we are hopeful that the solar project can be commissioned in the early Spring 2024.

Following commissioning, we anticipate launching another Share Offer to allow local residents to invest in BDCR, through which we hope to increase our membership and more widely share the rewards of our successful community energy enterprise.

Contact Us

Bro Dyfi Community Renewables are present and active on social media via Facebook.

If you would like to contact us via that platform, just ‘like’ and ‘follow’ our page, and send us a message. We will always be happy to hear from you. If you prefer to contact us by email, then visit our Contact page for our address.

On this page you will also find a form you can fill in and submit and we will get back to you shortly. If you do wish to follow us and contact us by social media, just click on the icon below.

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