Each year, Heart of England Community Energy donates some of its community funds to projects which help tackle energy poverty and climate change in developing countries. For 3 years running we have made a donation to SolarAid, a charity which distributes solar lighting to remote and disadvantaged communities in sub-Saharan Africa. The SolarAid team have created this short video to highlight the impact of their work in 2021.

Pupils from three primary schools in Warwickshire have been given a behind-the-scenes insight into different careers within the renewables industry, after paying a visit to the HECE solar farm which is the largest community solar farm in the UK. Around 135 children, aged 9-11, were invited to attend a workshop at Leys Solar Farm in Stratford-upon-Avon. Taking place across four days in July, the initiative was designed to educate the next generation on climate change, while inspiring young people to think about green careers. During their visit, the pupils from Thomas Jolyffe and St Greggs primary schools took part in a range of practical activities. They were given a tour of the solar farm and got to meet the team who constructed it. They also took part in wind and solar power challenges, which saw them making a wind turbine out of old materials and using small solar cells to build a power circuit as well as exciting energy saving games to encourage positive behavioural change. Leys Solar Farm forms part of the largest community owned solar farm in the UK, which covers an area of 75 acres – the equivalent of more than 1,800 football pitches. The solar development comprises of around 60,000 solar panels and is capable of generating enough energy to power around 3,800 homes. It was designed and constructed by Reading-based renewable energy developer, Anesco, who also sponsored the school visits. Tom Wales, Regional Operations Manager at Anesco, commented: “It was fantastic to meet all the children and to talk to them about solar power and the role renewable energy has to play in tackling climate change. They were so enthusiastic, with loads of great questions! “If the UK is to achieve its net zero carbon emissions target and make the switch to cleaner, greener energy then we’re going to need a skilled workforce to deliver it and hopefully these workshops gave the children an insight into the many different types of careers on offer.” Kate Evans, Graduate Planet, who co-ordinated the initiative, said: “A huge thank you to all the schools who joined us. For the children, this was a fantastic opportunity to get a behind-the-scenes look at a solar farm and to learn about climate change through fun, practical activities. We’re sure they’ll remember the experience for a long time to come.” Kate continued: “Following the various lockdowns and a time where the children’s worlds have been so much smaller, the chance to go on a trip somewhere so unique, has not only been fantastic for their learning but also their wellbeing. We cannot thank our generous sponsors and supporters enough, as well as those who gave up their time to join us for the workshops and helped make the visits such a success.” The four-day event was funded and backed by a number of organisations including Heart of England Community Energy (HECE), Anesco, Orbit Group, Graduate Planet CIC and The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Each year HECE makes a donation to SolarAid, a charity which gets solar lighting to rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa. The £2,500 donated helps distribute 625 solar lights to households that can spend 10% of their income on kerosene. Solar lighting helps save money and tackle the health issues of lighting homes with kerosene, or not at all. SolarAid has also helped light libraries and makeshift covid units. To find out more please download SolarAid's impact report: .

Heart of England Community Energy's AGM will be held on Monday 28th June at 7pm via Zoom. Please see the RESOURCES page for details. We look forward to seeing you there.

Happy Christmas and best wishes for the New Year to all our members and bondholders. Energy Generation As we approach a wet mid-winter, it’s a good time to remember that we had another sunny summer which our solar arrays made the most of. Following a strong spring quarter, irradiance levels continued to surpass long-term projections by 5.7% across the July – September quarter. This led to generation across the HECE’s solar arrays being 2.8% above the long-term average projections. Electricity prices crashed in early 2020 due to the Corona crisis and the oil and gas market slump in late 2019. Whilst two of our three solar farms benefit from a minimum export price, the third does not. Prices had recovered in September and we were able to enter into a 12-month price fix at a good rate. Bondholder and Shareholder Payments Bondholder interest was paid at 5% in May and shareholder interest at 6% in July, meeting our intended interest payments in full for the second year. Following the successful refinance in 2019 we are planning to launch a further community share or bond offer. This has been delayed due to the Corona virus crisis and will launch in 2021. AGM Our online AGM in June worked well. If you were not able to attend you can find the presentation and minutes on our website. Local News 2020 has been a challenging year for many of us. Heart of England continues to support local energy charity Act on Energy to help local households struggling with fuel poverty. We have provided funding to Citizens Advice South Warwickshire to help their vital support services to those hit hard by the Corona virus crisis and recession. We have made another donation to Solar Aid and, in the build up to Christmas, we made a donation to Stratford Upon Avon Foodbank towards Christmas hampers including Christmas puddings/cakes, tinned potatoes and personal hygiene products. The donation helped the Foodbank to complete 40 hampers. Queries relating to your share or bondholding Ethex Registry are the key point of contact in relation to any matters of member shareholdings and bondholdings. Ethex store your share and bond certificates in a digital format and you are able to access your records online and print out certificates at any time via the Ethex Registry Portal - https://registry.ethex.org.uk/ . Or if you have any questions at all about your holdings, please don’t hesitate to contact the team at Ethex for help either by email at registry@ethex.org.uk or by phone on 01865 403304. If you have any queries about your shares or need to change your email or bank details please contact our share registrar Ethex as above. We hope you have a happy winter break and we look forward to life starting to become more normal in 2021! Best wishes John Stott on behalf of the HECE board

Dear Heart of England Community Energy Shareholders and Bondholders We hope you are keeping well and coping with the difficult times we are all sharing and enjoying the sun and wildlife when you can. Energy Generation Following a wet and stormy winter, the spring has been one of the driest on record, with April and May both breaking records. Whilst this adds to the ringing of climate alarm bells, generation in April and May were 18% and 29% respectively above the long-term average. February and March also exceeded projections leaving the year to date 20% ahead of the long-term average. This upside in generation is countered by a substantial drop in electricity prices due to the lockdown and the global oil price crash which started before the lockdown. Two of our solar farms (Poplars and Willows) benefit from a guaranteed price for electricity under the FiT Export Tariff. The other, (Leys) does not receive the Export Tariff. Instead, it sells power at market prices which are currently roughly half what they were a year ago. Since power sales provide approximately half its revenue (the rest coming from the Renewables Obligation subsidy), the impact of the reduced prices is less than first appears. Bondholder and shareholder payments The Board has approved the payment of 2020 bondholder and shareholder payments in accordance with the 2018 share and bond offer documents. Bondholder interest was paid on 31st May for the period 1st May 2019 to 30th April 2020 at 5%. Shareholder interest will be paid by 31st July for the period 1st January 2019 to 31st December 2019 at 6%. Queries relating to your share or bond holding Heart of England Community Energy’s Shareholder and Bondholder Register is administered by Ethex Registry. For any queries relating to certificates, interest and capital payments, holdings, probate matters or withdrawals, please contact Ethex Registry directly: registry@ethex.org.uk or phone 01865 403304 AGM Heart of England Community Energy’s AGM will be held at 19:30 on Weds 24th June via a Zoom online meeting to discuss the agenda below: 1. Welcome 2. Heart of England Community Energy update: a. Performance of our solar farms b. Payment of share and bond interest c. Community projects supported d. Future bond offer plans 3. Resolutions/ Extraordinary Resolutions: a. To present Heart of England Community Energy accounts for the year ending 31st December 2019. b. To delegate to the directors the authority to appoint auditors c. To elect the board of directors 4. Guest speaker Beth Nicholson of Citizens Advice South Warwickshire will give a short presentation about their work. 5. AOB 6. Close Heart of England Community Energy’s consolidated audited accounts will be available on our website shortly: www.hecommunityenergy.org/resources If you would like to attend the AGM please register via the Eventbrite link below. Once registered you will be emailed a link to the Zoom meeting. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR HECE'S 2020 AGM Helping to alleviate hardship caused by the Covid 19 emergency Heart of England Community Energy learned that Citizens Advice South Warwickshire has experienced a big increase in demand from people in difficult circumstances caused by the Covid 19 lockdown. Citizens Advice South Warwickshire was limited in its ability to help reduce this hardship by a shortage of Administrator time. The Board therefore allocated funds to pay for an extra day per week of administrator time so that help can be given to more people who find themselves in hardship The expectation is that many more food parcels will be made available as a result of the funding provided and assistance can also include provision of bed linen for people coming out of hospital and washing machines for new single parents. We’ll be letting you know what this funding has achieved in a later newsletter. Local News Despite the Corona virus lock-down, activity on solving the ”Climate Problem” continues amongst Stratford local pressure groups such as Friends of the Earth and Stratford Climate Action. Two of HECE’s directors are members of these groups. Two very interesting discussions were held using the online Zoom meetings app - not quite as good as being in the same room but not bad. The discussions focused on a book “The Case for the Green New Deal by Anne Pettifor”. In the book Pettifor says that we can and must change what we do in the short period of time we have left to avert Climate Breakdown. Such a change sounds impossible, but the book points out that rapid change has happened before so it can happen again. Examples of rapid change mentioned are the large reduction in smoking despite opposition from the tobacco companies and the explosion of the internet as a radical change in the way we communicate. Also, the “New Deal” in 1930’s USA which, by means of massive government spending, brought about recovery from the depression. The discussion group concluded that the Covid 19 pandemic emergency has shown that the government can find the money to tackle emergencies. If there is any bigger emergency than this it is the climate emergency. To quote Anne Pettifor, “But how is this extraordinary programme to be achieved? A first in the many steps that must be taken if we are to harness the latent power of people is to spread public understanding. People cannot act to transform that which they do not understand.”

We hope you are keeping well and coping with the difficult times we are all sharing. Our community solar farm continues to generate electricity from the sun and our operations contractors are continuing near-normal operations. We are still planning to launch a new community bond offer later this year and will be posting updates once things get moving.

A good year for energy generation and re-financing ------------------------------------------------------------ As 2019 comes to a close, we look back at a successful year for Heart of England Community Energy. We exceeded generation targets despite low sunshine in the normally good month of June. Across Heart of England Community Energy's solar sites, we generated around 15,200 MWh in the year to December 2019. This exceeded long-term average projections by 695 MWh. In September we completed a 9 month-long process to replace the short-term loans from Close Brothers with new long-term lower cost loans from Triodos Bank UK. Social and Sustainable Capital have also extended their loans and reduced the interest rate at which they lend to us. The £16.3 million refinancing has significantly reduced our annual interest costs. A further community bond offer will follow next year. Read More about the refinancing here (you can also download this newsletter as a pdf here) . We’ve had some data discrepancies with one the pyranometers (light meters), so HECE’s Chair John Stott got on-site with his sextant to work out if it is something to do with winter shading from that tree. Supporting people in fuel poverty ------------------------------------------------------------ As winter settles in, a recent statistic from National Energy Action points out that on average 11,400 people die in the UK every winter as a result of an unsuitably heated home. Heart of England Community Energy continues to provide funding to Warsickshire-based energy advice charity Act on Energy . Act on Energy provides impartial advice on energy conservation, as well as providing information on grants available for improving the energy performance of homes. HECE attends first ever Stratford Town eco market ------------------------------------------------------------ In late November, Heart of England Community Energy was represented at an eco market run by one of our investors, namely the Stratford Town Trust whom we also partner to fund Act on Energy in their fuel poverty alleviation work. Chairman John Stott manned a full size solar panel with a control box which allowed live demonstration of the panel’s power curve. The panel attracted visitors and provided opportunities to tell people about Heart of England Community Energy. On 29th November, FOUNDATION House which is owned by the Town Trust, welcomed the local community to its first ever eco market. Twenty stalls offering environmentally friendly products attended, enabling people to swap their usual shopping basket contents for more sustainable and ethical alternatives. Stalls included environmentally friendly soap, make up, cleaning products, reusable nappies and delicious vegan cakes. Also present were local campaign groups including Friends of the Earth and Extinction Rebellion. Fran Donnelly, Community Hub Manager said: “We are so pleased with the success of the eco market. It’s a great way for people to try out products that have less impact on the environment and support local businesses too. The response has been really positive and as a result, we plan to hold eco markets regularly in 2020.” In May, bondholders were paid 5% interest plus the 1% first year bonus for early investors. Shareholders were paid 6% interest in July. The June AGM minutes and presentations are available on the Resources page of our website. Performance ------------------------------------------------------------ Across Heart of England Community Energy's solar sites, we generated around 15.2 GWh in the year to the end of November 2019. This exceeded projections by 695 MWh. This generation figure amounts to the equivalent of the electricity used by about 3,800 homes and was achieved despite June being less sunny than expected. Change of address or bank details? If you have recently moved or need to update contact or bank details then you can do this via the Ethex Registry Portal. Simply log in, using your email address and password and click the grey pencil icon next to your Heart of England investment on the Main dashboard. From here you can amend your contact information, home address and bank account details for future repayments. If you have any questions or have any trouble using the portal then you can email Ethex at registry@ethex.org.uk (mailto:registry@ethex.org.uk) , call them on 01865 403304 or write to them at The Old Music Hall, 106-108 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 1JE, UK.

In late November, Heart of England Community Energy was represented at an eco market run by one of our investors, namely the Stratford Town Trust whom we also partner to fund Act on Energy in their fuel poverty alleviation work. Chairman John Stott manned a full size solar panel with a control box which allowed live demonstration of the panel’s power curve. The panel attracted visitors and provided opportunities to tell people about Heart of England Community Energy. On 29th November, FOUNDATION House which is owned by the Town Trust, welcomed the local community to its first ever eco market. Twenty stalls offering environmentally friendly products attended, enabling people to swap their usual shopping basket contents for more sustainable and ethical alternatives. Stalls included environmentally friendly soap, make up, cleaning products, reusable nappies and delicious vegan cakes. Also present were local campaign groups including Friends of the Earth and Extinction Rebellion. Fran Donnelly, Community Hub Manager said: “We are so pleased with the success of the eco market. It’s a great way for people to try out products that have less impact on the environment and support local businesses too. The response has been really positive and as a result, we plan to hold eco markets regularly in 2020.”

Domestic energy efficiency should be designated a national infrastructure priority for any new government, claim groups combating fuel poverty. Following political parties’ launching their political manifestos, National Energy Action has launched its own. According to the government, a household is in fuel poverty if spending on required fuel cots is above average and meeting those costs would leave the household below the poverty line. Figures from the government show that between 2003 and 2017 there has not been much progress on tackling the issue as the number of households in fuel poverty has remained stable between 10% and 12% of English homes. Heart of England Community Energy's community fund has given funds to the Act on Energy charity to combat local fuel poverty. Act on Energy staff do outreach sessions and support to save money on energy, home assessments, and are running a pilot to work with GPs to identify people whose poor health is partly down to fuel poverty. Maria Wardrobe, Director of Communications at National Energy Action, said: “This winter, thousands of people will fall victim to the cold. It’s invading our homes and causing breathing problems, strokes and heart attacks. It’s making people’s lives stressful and miserable, and preventing our children from thriving. ‘‘But we can cure this. A Government-funded, national heating and insulation scheme would vaccinate our homes against the cold. Giving incomes a boost would also mean that people could afford to switch on their heating and stay warm and healthy.” The full Manifesto for Warmth can be found here.

The Directors of Heart of England Community Energy ltd are very pleased to announce we have completed a £16.3million refinance. We have replaced the short-term loans from Close Brothers and Social and Sustainable Capital (SASC) with new long-term lower cost loans from Triodos Bank UK and SASC. The transaction was managed by CfR CIC. The transaction was undertaken to secure long-term, lower-cost finance for our solar projects, with reduced loan repayments allowing more money to be used to support community projects. The total package of £16.3 million combines senior loans of around £12 million from Triodos Bank UK with junior loans from SASC of around £4.3 million. SASC provided capital to fund the community acquisition of the solar farm in 2016. A community bond offer will be launched next year to raise around £1.5million to repay some of the SASC junior debt and complete the long-term finance package. Heart of England Community Energy uses profits from the solar farm to support a fuel poverty advice service run by local charity Act on Energy and a community grant fund. The community grant fund has so far provided funding to Harbury e-Wheels, a Warwickshire-based community transport charity, and SolarAid, a charity working in Africa to provide solar lights. Heart of England Community Energy Chairman: "I am delighted that we have reached a new stage of maturity for Heart of England Community Energy. Together with our partners we have been able to secure more favourable financing that will allow us to contribute more to our community fund." CfR Director Jake Burnyeat said: “CfR and the Heart of England Community Energy board are very pleased to have reached this milestone. The loans from Triodos Bank and Social and Sustainable Capital provide a long-term lower cost finance solution which will help increase surplus income generated by the community solar farm to support local projects. It is also important that the funders share our values. Look out for the community bond offer which will launch next year and give an opportunity for people from the local and wider community to get involved!” Philip Bazin, Environment Team Manager at Triodos Bank UK, said: “This transaction proves that community energy schemes can be delivered and financed at scale. It also demonstrates our expertise at financing solar projects co-located with batteries, and at combining different tranches of finance. Such schemes have multiple positive impacts, not only do they help the clean energy transition, but their profits also benefit local people. By driving down the cost of finance, we have helped Heart of England solar to operate more profitably and increase its financial contribution to the community.” Krishna Chokshi, Investment Manager at SASC, said: “We are delighted to renew our investment in HECE, whose performance has significantly exceeded our expectations since coming into community ownership two years ago. This is a great community-owned project with an outstanding local board of trustees who are overseeing its governance and performance. HECE is providing real financial benefits for individuals and families living in fuel poverty in the region through the distribution of community benefit. Work done by HECE unlocks significant additional grants for fuel efficiency, leveraging in as much as seven times the amount of funding generated by the project.” “Community energy projects like this are essential as communities look to provider greener energy solutions and surpluses for the benefit of their local area. It is fantastic to see social investment providing finance that is enabling projects like this to thrive.” Legal counsels on the transaction were TLT, CMS, Michelmores and Lux Nova. Technical due diligence on the transaction was provided by Green Cat Renewables. The solar farm was built by Anesco who provide ongoing service and maintenance services. The co-located batteries are owned and operated by Zenobe. About Communities for Renewables CIC Communities for Renewables (CfR) CIC is a mission-led community interest company which helps communities to set up local energy enterprises and works with them to develop, finance and manage their own renewable energy generation. CfR has managed the development and financing of around £56million of community solar projects and manages 50MW of community solar projects for 7 different community energy enterprises, including Heart of England Community Energy. www.cfrcic.co.uk About Social and Sustainable Capital SASC provides simple finance for extraordinary charities and social enterprises. We believe greater access to the right kind of investment makes charities and social enterprises better able to tackle society's most pressing challenges. Our funds provide flexible capital to enable social sector organisations to grow their social impact, improving the lives of disadvantaged people across the UK. SASC is a social enterprise. About Triodos Bank Founded in 1980, Triodos Bank has become a frontrunner in sustainable banking globally. As an independent bank that promotes responsible and transparent banking, it does not see any conflict between a focus on people and the planet and a good financial return. Instead it believes that they reinforce each other in the long-term. Triodos Bank has banking activities in the Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, Spain, Germany and France as well as Investment Management activities based in the Netherlands and active globally. Triodos Bank co-founded the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV), a network of 54 sustainable banks. Together these banks want to grow sustainable banking and its impact on the real economy substantially.

Investment in renewable technologies around the globe quadrupled installed generation capacity in the decade to 2019. In total $2.6 trillion was invested in renewables since 2009, of which the UK accounted for $122 billion, According to the Global Trends in Renewable Energy Investment 2019 report. Solar capacity saw the biggest growth in that period – a 26-fold increase in 10 years – and accounted for half of the total investment. This shift to renewable investment has resulted in renewables accounting for 12.9% of global generation, and avoided an estimated 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide. “Investing in renewable energy is investing in a sustainable and profitable future, as the last decade of incredible growth in renewables has shown,” said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme. Renewable’s potential to combine profitability and reduce carbon emissions was highlighted by the University of California (UC) as it announced divestment from fossil fuels. UC announced that its endowment fund of £13.4 billion would be fossil free by the end of September, with its £70 billion pension fund following shortly.