Community Fund Projects

Our Community Fund has donated a total of £69,700 to local projects up to the end of 2022. We have several projects currently being explored, including LED lights for Balcombe Primary School and the Victory Hall, and a Youth Eco Forum school magazine for Sussex Green Living.

With our much simplified application process now working well, we will advertise the fund more widely in 2023 within our target area.

Please find below brief details of each of the local initiatives we have helped with our Community Fund. Simply click on each for further information.

Please note that we are in the process of updating this information to cover all the initiatives we have supported.

  • LEDs Light Up Turners Hill
    Having started to spread the word about the availability of grants from Repower more widely around the communities surrounding Balcombe, our first application arrived in March 2023 from Turners Hill Parish Council. As a Parish Council, we have been working on a project to upgrade 
  • LED Lighting for Balcombe School
    Last December we received a phone call from the school asking for advice on how best to spent some new government funding, targeted at reducing their energy needs. Our chairman, Tom Parker, toured the school with our thermal imaging camera, highlighting where the school was 
  • Repower Sponsors Youth Eco Forum
    One of the founding principles of Repower was to support education about climate change and how we could all make a contribution. Sussex Green Living asked us to support their Youth Eco Forum (YEF), a group aged between 14-21 years old, of environmentally concerned people, 
  • Repower Balcombe supports Ascension Food Larder
    Back in November 2022, we heard about a new Food Larder being set up in Haywards Heath, at The Ascension Church, scheduled to open in December. With our next quarterly meeting not due until January 2023 we had to act fast. The Church rapidly completed 
  • Repower Balcombe grant lights up St Mary’s Church
    As we approach the winter months, St Mary’s Church is so grateful to Repower Balcombe for the generous £2,368.45 grant donation that was given in August 2022. The church will see the benefits particularly around the lychgate area and the steps leading out to the 
  • LED Lights for Balcombe Parish Room
    Whilst restrictions on social contact related to Covid were in place, we decided to focus on simplifying our Community Fund application process. Once launched on our website we were delighted when the Balcombe Parish Room management committee approached us for help in completing their conversion 
  • Repurposed laptops for St Wilfrid’s
    Addressing climate change is not limited to reducing our dependence on burning fossil fuels for energy by replacing them with renewable energy. We can also help by recycling. We are pleased to report that, with a grant of £1,247 from our Community Fund, we donated 
  • Low Energy Fridges for Bentswood Hub Community Larder
    With a grant of £900 from our Community Fund, REPOWERBalcombe are pleased to have been able to help Bentswood Hub obtain some new, energy efficient fridges and freezers to help to store donated frozen and chilled foodstuff. By choosing low energy appliances we can all 
  • Repower Balcombe supports Forest Row Community Fridge
    Repower Balcombe seeks to use its Community Fund to support local people in close proximity to Balcombe, in their actions towards achieving a ‘green’ future. Initially we considered installing a solar array on the Community Fridge building, but we then discovered they were using old 
  • LED Lights for Balcombe Club
    Our Community Fund helps Balcombe Club to install LED lighting in the Forest room
  • LED Lights for Bramble Hall
    Visitors to Bramble Hall may have noticed the many high floodlights, the primary source of lighting for the hall. But you may not know that there’s an Energy Group within the Parish Council. Apart from covering activities at the Lower Stumble oil exploration site on 
  • LED Lighting for Crawley Down School
    REPOWERBalcombe returns to Crawley Down School to help with their lighting conversion project. The school was given a grant of £4,373 for LED lighting in their corridors whilst they paid for lighting in the main hall. The higher efficiency of LED lights coupled with their 
  • REPOWER’s new Cuckfield School Solar System in the press
    REPOWERBalcombe provided a grant of £17,858 from its Community Fund for a solar PV system at the school. It is predicted that this will provide up to 20% of the school’s electricity, saving them about £1000 pa (at time of installation) on their electricity bills. 
  • Holy Trinity C of E Primary School – Generating
    We’re Generating! Thursday 15th February 2018 Despite the inclement weather earlier this week, all the panels have been installed and are now generating. Well done to everyone involved in the project. Another great success for the Cooperative. Wednesday 14th February 2018 “Good progress has been 
  • LED Lights for West Hoathly School
    During the autumn of 2017 REPOWERBalcombe provided a grant of £9,049 for the installation of LED lights in areas of the school where the lighting needed updating. This will reduce electricity consumption by about 5000kWh of electricity each year, saving an estimated £500 pa (at 
  • REPOWERBalcombe installs battery storage system at Turners Hill school
    Turners Hill School, near East Grinstead, East Sussex, has recently installed 12kWh of battery storage to capture much of the spare electricity generated by the various renewable energy systems at the school. A grant of £16,158 to install the battery system was provided from REPOWERBalcombe’s 
  • Renewable co-op REPOWERBalcombe installs energy-saving lights at Imberhorne school
    REPOWERBalcombe, the Sussex renewable energy Co-operative, has provided a grant of £11,075 from its Community Benefit fund to install 158 new LED fittings and 18 PIRs (passive infrared sensors) at Imberhorne School, in East Grinstead, East Sussex. This is predicted to conserve more than 19,500