Direct impact investment platform Ethex becomes official registrar for three ex-Ripple Energy renewable energy generation projects.
Members of the cooperatives that own Graig Fatha Wind Co-op, Derril Water Solar Park And Kirk Hill Wind Farm can access information about their investments on Ethex’s dashboard and receive payments for generation at any location.
The first co-operative to largely complete the process is Graig Fatha Wind Co-operative, which part-owns a single wind turbine in South Wales.
“We are excited to welcome Graig Fatha members to Ethex, provide a solution to members left adrift by the closure of Ripple, and thank CfR and Graig Fatha Co-op for choosing us,” said Chris Butler, co-CEO of Ethex.
To manage the assets, Ethex is working with Communities for Renewables CIC (CfR), which provides management services for just under 50 MW of community-owned solar PV assets in the UK.
The two have a “long-term” collaboration, with Ethex’s platform is used to raise money for many of the projects CfR works with. The platform recently facilitated a fundraiser for the Britain’s first community-owned battery energy storage system (BESS)..
In March last year, Graig Fatha Wind Co-op, Derril Water Solar Park and Kirk Hill Wind Farm were all left without management – or even ‘adrift’ – when Ripple Energy went into administration.
Teams of volunteers stepped in to manage the cooperatives. Members were assured that because Ripple solely managed the co-ops and entered into agreements with utilities such as British Gas to reduce customer bills in accordance with their share of the power stations, operations would not be interrupted.
The three sites now managed by Ethex were the focus of 1st Energies, those bought Ripple out of administration in April 2025.
While the fallout from Ripple’s financial troubles set a bad precedent, there are many community-owned renewable energy initiatives that are seeing great success in the UK, the aforementioned community-owned BESS being one of them.
Community energy is a focus area of the UK Government’s renewable energy plans objectives of its flagship Great British Energy Company being supporting “more than 1,000” community and local energy projects.
The government is also currently considering introducing a subsidy for community energy storage in batteries, which, as opposed to providing network services and returning profits to the community, such as community-owned assets, will serve as localized, shared energy storage. This is a system that is widely deployed in Australia in areas with highly distributed solar installations.
