Category Archives: Energy

Energy, News

New Digital Services from Schneider Electric use Condition-Based Maintenance to Pinpoint Operational Risks and Create Business Resilience

Schneider Electric, the leader in the digital transformation of energy management and automation, today announced a new service offer, EcoStruxure Service Plans. These enriched packages combine traditional services with powerful digital services that are tailored to pinpoint and address specific customer goals, improving the performance of electrical equipment and systems.

Peace of mind for business continuity

60% of organisations are now preparing for the future by beginning their digital transformations, part of which means digitising electrical infrastructure. The goal of this digitisation is to strengthen everyday uptime and minimise risk.

Research found that 56% of electrical fires are due to a lack of maintenance. Workforce challenges are also frequently encountered, especially with respect to remote expertise and skills gaps. The new EcoStruxure Service Plans alleviate these issues by providing, in a single contract, a tailored mix of on-site services, digital services, and consulting. Schneider Electric emphasises the importance of a seamless experience for customers, who can select the EcoStruxure Service Plan best reflecting their individual needs.

“Many of our customers are laser-focused on regaining the business strength they sacrificed during the crisis,” said David Pownall, VP of UK&I Services at Schneider Electric. “That’s why we built our new EcoStruxure Service Plans., allowing us to guide them on their unique route to improve business resilience. With ideal combinations of traditional on-site services and powerful new digital services with IoT, we’re making great recipes for total peace of mind. Like good insurance coverage, it lets our customers turn their attention to their main business, knowing that their electrical equipment health and power quality is under expert care.”

The right selection of contracts to deliver on the strategy

EcoStruxure Service Plans reflect Schneider Electric’s ongoing commitment to building business resilience for its customers. Beyond traditional field services, it is an IoT-enabled bundle of expert support where data, analytics, software, and domain expertise drive substantial improvements in asset management, asset safety, resilience, operational efficiency, and sustainability.

On the ground or in the cloud, the new EcoStruxure Service Plans help improve business continuity and energy management for customers by leveraging Schneider Electric’s tremendous in-house knowledge, local expertise, and extensive partner network.

Powered by software, analytics and natively digital equipment

EcoStruxure Service plans are fuelled by connected products, such as Schneider Electric’s natively digital equipment. The company continues to bring its digital philosophy to life by equipping its equipment and retrofitting brownfield equipment with the latest sensing technologies. These provide the foundation for condition-based maintenance through analytics such as those offered by Schneider Electric’s robust EcoStruxure architecture and platform.

Energy, Investment

Engenera Green Bonds secures investment grade rating from Credit Spectrum

Credit Spectrum Corp. (CSC), the independent credit rating agency that specialises in structured finance ratings, has assigned a long-term credit rating of Baa1 (Adequate) to the Class A notes of the £100 million Engenera Green Bonds notes programme, issued by Engenera Green Bonds Plc.

Structured by Convexity Capital Partners, the first series of bonds were issued from the programme in November 2019. The initial series of bonds offer investors a 5-year senior secured, asset-backed bond, which is listed on Euronext Dublin (GEM) and the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, paying 7.00% interest.

Credit Spectrum Corp said the rating is based on the prospectus data, transaction structure, Engenera’s capacity to maintain and operate the Program, the bankability of solar PV asset finance, and the outlook for solar PV growth in Engenera’s market. Its key credit strength is the sufficiency to repay bondholders over a 3.7-year average life after applying a severe haircut to collections, and, on the operational side, Engenera’s experience and reputation. The key credit risks for bondholders are refinancing risk at the 5-year termination and operational dependence on Engenera for serving the full 20-year contractual term of the energy agreements.

It said its Baa1 rating means that expected simulated cash flow impairment is approximately 20 BPS and its repayment capacity is adequate-to-strong on the investment grade spectrum.

Proceeds from the initial series (and future series) will allow renewable energy specialist Engenera Renewables Group to install a range of renewable technologies, with a particular focus on solar photovoltaic and renewable heat, to its customers, which are typically companies and public sector bodies with a lot of roof or ground space.

Lack of funding is a major obstacle for businesses looking to implement a carbon strategy. Proceeds from Engenera’s bond programme can be used to install rooftop and ground-mount solar PV Systems free-of-charge for clients who then enter into a power purchase agreement (PPA), which typically lasts for 20-25 years.

Engenera is an established operator. Since 2017, it has completed nearly 180 installations. Having initially started out by selling, installing and maintaining systems for its customers, Engenera diversified its offer to include projects installed under PPAs with the backing of a small number of investors. Engenera’s bond programme now enables the company to fund projects itself, and this has increased the number of installations it is able to achieve while also speeding up the decision-making process.

Engenera’s bond programme provides the capital that enables the company to offer the no capital outlay solution to its customers. Bondholders receive a 7.00% fixed rate of interest on their bonds with the cash to pay the coupon coming from the PPA cashflows that Engenera puts in place with its customers.

Furthermore, the deal is asset-backed to include with underlying PPAs. Therefore, once all proceeds have been successfully deployed, investors’ security is a pool of long term, index-linked cash flows. Over time as the bond programme establishes itself, Engenera intends to establish a number of portfolios, each dedicated to a specific sector.

Bryan Glendinning, Chief Executive Officer, Engenera Renewables Group, said:

“We are delighted to have successfully secured a rating on this funding programme that is so important to our delivery. The programme has already secured interest from a range of investors but this investment grade rating should give investors reassurance of the merits of the programme and what we are trying to achieve.”

Energy, Environment, Environment News, Environmental News, News

The role of SMA technology in the fight against climate change

Written by Dr. Kevin O’Toole, Managing Director and Co-founder of Exergyn

Shape memory alloys (SMAs) are a unique group of metals which have the potential to revolutionise the heating, cooling and air conditioning (HVAC) sector and more. The global HVAC sector is a multi-billion euro industry, which is growing annually by over 5 percent. However it currently has a big problem: traditional HVAC systems, such as your home air conditioning system, utilise special gases called ‘refrigerants’ to perform the heating and cooling work. Whilst these refrigerants are very efficient, they also come with a downside, namely their highly detrimental impact on the environment. The Rocky Mountain Institute, a thought leader in climate change policy, has identified refrigerant management as the number one problem which industry as a whole must address if we wish to arrest or reverse the global warming pattern [1]. 

To give some context; an indexing system measuring the global warming potential (GWP) of a refrigerant gas is used to classify and rank their impact on the environment. A GWP of 1, for example, equates to a single molecule of the refrigerant having the same impact as a single molecule of the already vilified CO2 molecule if released into the atmosphere. These refrigerants are gases, and their leakage either while being in use, or at end of life, is common and unstoppable. This is why your car needs to have its refrigerant topped up every so often, because it escapes into the atmosphere. It may surprise you to hear that almost all of the common refrigerants in use today have GWPs in the thousands! The workhorse of industry and air-conditioning is a refrigerant which goes by the name of ‘R134a’. This has a GWP of 1430. So, in effect it is one thousand four hundred and thirty times more potent than CO2 when released into the atmosphere. This is a major problem for the industry. 

Luckily, government bodies and regulators are aware of these issues. Today’s current batch of refrigerants are what we call HFCs and their GWPs range from the high hundreds to over 9000 in some cases. These came after CFCs, famously known for causing a hole in the ozone back in the 1980’s and 1990’s until their regulated removal. The GWPs of CFCs were in the tens of thousands. Regulators have laid out a roadmap over the next 10-15 years where the world will transition to the new generation of lower GWP refrigerants mostly made up of HFOs [2]. HFOs have a lower GWP (however they are still in the 10’s and 100’s), but come with the added penalty of increased toxicity, explosivity, lower efficiencies, or a combination of all three. Regulators have a tough decision as they either must choose between allowing people to live comfortable lives in air-conditioned spaces in an increasingly warm world, or potentially causing irreversible damage to the environment in the longer term, which in turn requires more cooling. It’s an impossible situation. 

Working in conjunction with our global HVAC partner, we have proven that SMA can match the performance of R134a as a HVAC material, and that viable alternative HVAC systems can be developed using SMA. Currently we have a 50kW demonstrator unit in operation. For reference, a 50kW system is large enough to provide heating and/or cooling to up to 20 standard 2-bed apartments. Crucially, SMA based systems have zero GWP, meaning they have no detrimental impact on the environment. They also offer other advantages such as silent, safe operation. They are non-toxic and non-flammable. Rudimentary calculations show that if all of the refrigerants in the world’s HVAC systems were replaced by SMA, we could knock up to 1oC off global temperatures. In a world where we are trying to limit temperature rises to less than 2oC as a best case scenario, this is huge! 

Using SMA for heating and cooling provides regulators with the ideal solution to their dilemma, one that allows for comfortable living combined, with efficiencies (and therefore costs) in line with current systems, and with zero environmental impact.  We haven’t even considered the possibilities for the technology in other related fields such as automotive, aerospace and power generation, all of which are suffering from similar environmental issues. The opportunities are numerous.

SMA’s themselves are a super interesting technology. They are metal alloys primarily made of Nickel and Titanium and which exhibit two distinct states – one called Martensite and the other, Austenite. From the outside both states look the same, but at a micro level, they are almost like two different metals. By applying and releasing an external load onto the material, we can force the material to cycle between these states. This causes the cyclical release or absorption of a huge amount of heat, which in turn results in a heating or cooling effect. So, in a lot of ways, they do what refrigerants do, only SMA does it as a solid, leak-free, zero GWP, clean material. 

We haven’t even scratched the surface of what’s possible with SMA yet. In many ways, the world of SMA is akin to the wild west. There are some well understood SMA blends, but there are many many more awaiting discovery. Our current systems and predictions of future performance are based solely on the few well understood blends available to us today. These already compete with the best performing refrigerant based systems today. However, who is to say that these are the most optimum blends? A minor change, for example, in the ratios of the metals in the SMA can have a profound impact on its behaviour. Our teams are actively scanning the blend landscape everyday, in doing so they are peering into the future. New blends are emerging all the time with unique advantages which can be retrofitted into the existing design, causing an uptick in efficiency. 

Our goal is to inspire industry to choose the cleaner, more environmentally friendly SMA option – not because they feel they must, but because it makes the most business sense to do so. My feeling is that this logical appeal to the pockets of global businesses, coupled with regulators realising they have options, will drive a cleaner environment as a by-product of its adoption. It’s a win-win for everyone.

 

[1] https://www.drawdown.org/solutions/refrigerant-management/technical-summary

[2] https://www.icscoolenergy.com/guide-to-f-gas-regulation-and-the-hfc-phase-down/

 

Energy, News

Pure Planet and bp launch new digital carbon- information services for householders and motorists

Today 100% renewable energy supplier Pure Planet and bp are launching a new digital service that allows households and drivers of petrol, diesel and electric cars to accurately see the financial cost and the emissions of their personal energy use.

The new service is free to all Pure Planet Members on their app from today and gives users unrivalled insights into their energy consumption, ways to reduce energy use and save money.

For the first time, Members will be able to link their home energy tariff and their electric vehicle (EV), giving real-time cost per mile data, cost per charge and CO2 emission savings compared with a petrol or diesel car. Non-EV drivers will be able to see potential savings from switching to an electric vehicle.

The service comes as new research from Pure Planet shows a strong desire from UK households to help the UK reach the Government’s Net Zero target.

The Pure Planet People and Power report found three quarters of UK adults (75%) want to reduce their environmental impact but nearly a quarter (24%) don’t know how. This new digital app-based service is intended to help change that.*

From today, Members can access features powered by bp that enable them to:

  • Understand and access personalised insights into energy consumption, cost and carbon emissions associated with their home and related to mobility in one place
  • Discover life with an EV by comparing the fuel costs and CO2 emissions of their current vehicle with a suitable EV
  • Connect their EV to their Pure Planet’s app and understand their total cost of charging,home and away, along with remaining battery charge and miles remaining.

Members will also benefit from personalised suggestions to reduce their personal carbon footprint, such as using EV, solar, batteries and smart heating, as well as carbon offsetting services, to help them reduce their costs and reduce or offset CO2 emissions from their energy use. A video showing the new features in action can be found below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBPVTVEebFs

A series of new features are planned over the coming months, exclusively enabling Pure Planet Members to better understand where their energy comes from and how it is used across their home. Forthcoming features will enable Members to:

  • Optimise their home energy consumption and use energy management solutions to maximise savings
  • Model how smart energy solutions can reduce their costs and CO2 emissions associated with their energy use, helping them to play their part in the UK’s energy transition and Net Zero by 2050 target.

Andrew Ralston, Pure Planet co-founder and CEO, said:

“As a leading renewable energy supplier, we’re excited to be launching a suite of ground- breaking services to enable carbon-lowering for our Members today. This new tech, which we’ve built in partnership with bp, will help people cut their energy bills at home and on the move, reduce the CO2 emissions from their energy use and ultimately help to get to net zero.

“Pure Planet has already saved its members more than one and a half million tonnes of CO2 since its launch. This new service will supercharge the speed at which we reach our next million by helping people manage their energy better by giving them all the information they need to reduce their emissions.”

Felipe Arbelaez, bp’s senior vice president for Zero Carbon Energy, said:

“Equipping home energy users and drivers with the understanding and tools to act on their energy costs and emissions will help us all support the UK’s transition to net zero. This new digital service can help members better understand their energy world in a personalised way and take their own first steps towards energy solutions that can help improve their lives and reduce their environmental profile.”

 

References

*Stats taken from the Pure Planet People and Power Report, published here:

https://purepla.net/blog/the-pure-planet-people-power-report-2020

Energy, Engineering, Environment

Technology leaders to launch revolutionary water pipeline invention at virtual event

INNOVATIVE new technology will continue to revolutionise the global water industry and save billions of pounds in waste and environmental damage every year.

An international company with patents worldwide – and offices in North Wales, Jersey, Singapore and the Philippines – iVapps launches the latest addition to its award-winning pipeline application at a live virtual event from its UK research and development hub on Tuesday June 29 at 10am.

The unique digitised enabling solution brings networks in line with the development of ‘smart cities’ and meets demand for an answer to the ongoing water leakage crisis.

The mechatronic solution features the world’s first recyclable smart cartridge, complete with inflow real time technology sensors to digitise pipelines and control and monitor temperature, flow, pressure, turbidity, quality and more.

Already trialled in the UK, the design can monitor water flow and identify problems including leakages, contamination and bursts that cause billions of pounds in financial and environmental damage each year.

National Business Manager for the UK and Europe, Nigel Roberts, believes this is a landmark moment for mechatronics – uniting mechanical engineering and electronics – a step forward in the fight to preserve and manage the earth’s most precious resource.

“The iVapps smart cartridge is a true engineering future-proof revelation that delivers a solution to the industry’s current challenges, but also has a place in the development of the next generation of smart cities and towns,” he said.

“We have been in discussions for some time with a range of private and public sector organisations – from water companies, their infrastructure partners to the pharmaceutical, chemical and food industries – and they are fully supportive of the system and the benefits it will deliver.

“What our smart solution can do via digitisation and data management, while doubling up as a valve, is a game changer and meets the needs for a workable system that can be introduced here in the UK and internationally.”

However, time is not on their side. With one in nine people globally having no access to safe water – and as the UK strives to address its centuries-old infrastructure – England and Wales continue to lose 3.1 billion litres of water a day.

“In past months we have upscaled our research and development and tested our process successfully at different sites, so it is mechanically proven and ready to be introduced into the pipeline network,” said Nigel.

“We have received a lot of collaborative interest from some of the UK water companies and are excited about the future of our solution, because we know it will make a massive difference to the environment, and to people’s lives.”

He added: “We hope people will join us for the webinar to find out more, and to witness this revolutionary system for themselves.”

The live virtual event will feature real-time footage of the iVapps portal and smart cartridge at work, further information and a Q&A with iVapps CEO Simon Humphreys, (pictured) from Conwy.

To register for the free webinar on Tuesday June 29 at 10am, please visit www.attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3857308207621300747

For more on iVapps, visit the website www.ivappstech.com and follow @iVAPPST on social media.

Energy, Environment, Insurance, News

Aviva CEO admits becoming Net Zero by 2040 will be ‘the most difficult thing we have done’

Group CEO of Aviva Plc, Amanda Blanc, has addressed a record number of guests at the latest Cardiff Business Club webinar, speaking about her 32-year career in insurance, working in a post-Covid world and Aviva’s Net Zero ambitions.

Amanda has been CEO of the UK’s leading insurer Aviva since July 2020 and was recently named as HM Treasury’s new Women in Finance Champion. Other impressive accolades include featuring on the 2020 Forbes Power Women list and on the 2019 list of the HERoes Top 100 Role Model Women Executives from Yahoo Finance. Amanda was also named Woman of Achievement by Women in the City and voted as the Insurance Times’ UK Insurer CEO’s CEO of the Year twice.

Aviva has over 600,000 customers in Wales, with one in four adults in the nation insured by the company. Aviva recently announced its ambitions to become a Net Zero carbon emissions company by 2040, a challenge even Amanda admits is a huge undertaking. Amanda said: “It’s certainly the most difficult thing we will ever have to do. We have £350bn of assets to invest and have a responsibility to do that in a sustainable way. We are looking at green infrastructure and investing in offshore energy, as well as community housing. We recently invested around £100m in social housing in Wales and are focused on investing our assets in Britain, and not just in the south.

“Now more than ever we need to be sustainable, and I firmly believe that to do this successfully we need to work together.”

Speaking about Britain’s recovery post-pandemic and how she envisages Aviva’s working practices evolving, Amanda said: “The pandemic is as much about inequality as it is about the actual virus. Deprived areas have been worse hit than wealthier areas both in terms of illness and unemployment.

“Going forward, Aviva has already made the decision to change the way we’re using office space and has committed to reduce its property portfolio by 30% by the end of 2021. We will still have offices, but they will be used as collaborative space rather than rows of desks.

“There’s no doubt the world is changing, but with this change, comes opportunity.”

The full address and Q&A can be viewed by the following link: https://youtu.be/YpCMTyrC3Bg

Cardiff Business Club’s next event will take place on Wednesday May 19 with Founder and Chairman of Internova Travel Group Michael Batt speaking. To secure a place or find out more about the Club visit www.cardiffbusinessclub.org/events.

Energy, News, Sustainability

Enabling Energy Markets for Net Zero

Gemserv has today published the latest in its series of papers on reforming governance of the UK energy market.

With the energy transition to net zero rapidly accelerating, many of today’s market rules, standards and change processes governed through energy ‘codes’ are looking increasingly dated and must be reformed. This is essential to ensure market governance continues to be a key enabler, rather than a barrier to a net zero future.

Widescale reform will take time and Gemserv is encouraging BEIS, Ofgem and the industry to take forward some ‘no regrets’ recommendations now recognising that more fundamental reforms will take longer to implement.

Trevor Hutchings, Gemserv’s Director of Strategy, said:

“We think that there are several opportunities to act now, making demonstrable improvements to code governance which will unleash further innovation, competition and efficiencies in the market.  This can be done without jeopardising wider reform over the longer term.”

Bob Hull, energy industry expert and lead author of the paper, added:

“Energy codes have successfully underpinned the energy system since the late 1990s but have become complex and change is slow. In the meantime, markets and technologies have moved on and they need to be modernised to help drive the transition to net zero.  Our recommendations should deliver early benefits and can provide a strong catalyst for future change.”

Gemserv is recommending action in three key areas:

  1. Strategic guidance and co-ordination – Ofgem should issue strategic guidance to Code Panels and Code Managers to ensure they aligned and co-ordinated with government and industry priorities for net zero and consumer outcomes.
  2. Accountable and incentivised code management – this includes the introduction of reputational and financial incentives to improve performance, with greater transparency, and competitive tendering of code managers to ensure value for money.
  3. Simplification and accessibility – harnessing the power of digitalisation to reduce regulatory burdens, make rule changes more accessible to market participants and steps to simplify the rule book.

The full report can be read here: http://bit.ly/30QDa3H

Energy, News

Vaccine rollout and Brexit certainty mean business is booming for some renewables firms

Despite the ongoing economic challenges caused by COVID-19, one renewables specialist has reported its busiest period ever for both new enquiries and deals being signed.

Bryan Glendinning, Chief Executive Officer, Engenera Renewables Group, believes the surge in demand is a result of the certainty offered by the Brexit deal and positivity stemming from the rollout of vaccines in the UK.

Engenera Renewables, which installs a range of renewable technologies including solar photovoltaic and renewable heat, is executing the rollout of a £100 million war chest, the proceeds of which allows it to install renewable projects for free for clients.

The company has access to a £100 million bond programme that provides the funds to install a wide range of renewable technology projects at no outlay to the customer and which provide long-term (c 25 years) stable cash flows as the investment return.

Convexity Capital Partners, the arranger of the £100 million Engenera Green Bonds notes programme, issued by Engenera Green Bonds Plc, has already signed up local authority pension funds as investors and is in due diligence with several more.

Proceeds from the programme allow Engenera to install its renewable technologies for free to its customers, which are typically companies and public sector bodies with a lot of roof or ground space. The clients then enter into a power purchase agreement (PPA), which typically lasts for 20-25 years.

The costs of the electricity under the PPA is usually around 20-25% less than charged by the incumbent energy provider, but importantly it includes the cost of the equipment, the installation and the maintenance during the term of the PPA. At the end of the PPA, the ownership of the equipment is transferred to the customer.

Engenera is an established operator. Since 2017, it has completed more than 200 installations. Its bond programme now enables it to fund projects itself, and this has increased the number of installations it is able to achieve while also speeding up the decision-making process.

Glendinning said:

“It has been a challenging 12 months for everyone; there was much uncertainty last year with both Brexit and the pandemic and many projects were put on ice while decision makers awaited clarity.

“Since the New Year, with a Brexit deal being done and the vaccine being rolled out, we are now seeing many businesses willing to make decisions and push forward. This is good news for us. Our bond programme means that we can self-fund projects, meaning no capital outlay for customers.

“This programme combined with a new sense of positivity in the renewables sector opens up so many new possibilities for us as a company. At Engenera Renewables Group, we truly believe energy efficiency is for everyone. This is why we have created partnerships with UK businesses and Government bodies to implement a renewable energy strategy, which can drastically reduce energy costs and environmental impact.

“Within the domestic sector we are helping private homeowners, landlords and tenants to implement a range of technologies, to save money and ensure warmer homes for all. This ethos has driven the Engenera team and I to create a robust 5-year vision with a profitable yet ethical approach. This bond programme will help make that vision a reality.”

Lloyd Lawson, Business Development Director of Engenera Renewables Group, said:

“It is important to recognise exactly where we are at in the UK with regards to energy, carbon and overall strategy. Government legislation on environmental responsibility and carbon reduction is an ever-changing landscape and is the responsibility of business owners and senior management.

“Having already utilised LED Lighting, and employed the services of energy procurement specialists and assessors, what is the next organic step for companies?

“It is our belief that every business in the UK, large or small, will have to embrace some form of renewable technology within the next five to seven years. Not all companies or organisations have the capital or want the responsibility of such systems – this is where companies like Engenera can help.”

Acquisitions & Partnerships, Energy, News

Gemserv acquires Ecuity to accelerate ‘net zero’ drive

Professional services firm Gemserv has acquired Ecuity Advisory Ltd as part of its drive to expand services for clients seeking to accelerate the transition to net zero.

Ecuity’s extensive expertise in energy, mobility and environmental policy complements Gemserv’s established role as a manager of high-profile projects in the energy and other sectors.

The acquisition of the Birmingham-based firm, for an undisclosed sum, will create a combined group with some 220 staff and annual revenues of around £30m.

Ecuity has clients across the public and private sectors, including companies serving the energy industry, government departments, and trade associations. It is highly active in rapidly evolving areas such as hydrogen and decentralised energy, and the two businesses already work together on the government-funded Heat Networks Investment Project.

Alex Goody, Gemserv’s Chief Executive, said:

“Climate change is an existential threat to our way of life. Organisations must adapt, bringing forward progressive policy and new business models, and acquiring Ecuity reinforces Gemserv’s position as a leader in supporting clients with the transition to net zero.

We have been looking for the right match to meet our growth ambitions and to support our purpose of tackling social and environmental challenges. Ecuity is a great fit in terms of services, clients and the impact we want to have in transforming markets in the face of dangerous climate change”.

James Higgins, Ilias Vazaios and Dave Sowden, Partners in Ecuity, who all take up senior positions in the combined business, said:

“Becoming part of Gemserv offers an incredible opportunity to see evidence-based insight delivered through new transformational programmes and interventions.

Over the last 10 years, we have helped clients across many sectors grow their businesses and position themselves better for policy and regulatory change. That has given us valuable insight which we can now deploy at scale by joining forces with Gemserv.

Becoming part of a larger organisation will also offer greater career development opportunities for our talented and committed team”.

Energy, News

Valda SmartChoice puts energy supply control back in hands of SME businesses

Oxfordshire-based B2B energy supplier Valda Energy has launched Valda SmartChoice, a unique energy proposition which gives SME businesses in every sector access to competitive prices, the latest smart meter technology and flexible payment options.

The financial fallout of Covid-19 has resulted in traditional energy suppliers exercising caution regarding which businesses they are willing to accept as customers. Through no fault of their own, businesses in such sectors as hospitality, travel and many more have found that signing up for competitive energy deals can be problematic. Valda Energy has addressed this issue with SmartChoice – a solution which enables customers to purchase energy in advance and only pay for what is used.

Valda SmartChoice is a real industry first, putting payment control firmly in the hands of business users. Customers make an initial payment pre-live which immediately shows as credit on their account. They can then monitor their usage via the Valda Energy app or web-based portal. The customer can choose for automatic payments to be taken when the account dips low, or to take full control and top-up themselves via debit or credit card, standing order or Direct Debit.

Taking payments in advance enables Valda Energy to keep its own operating costs low and to pass those savings back to SmartChoice customers.

Steve James, CEO, Valda Energy, comments: “With SmartChoice we’ve developed an innovative energy solution that aligns perfectly with the needs of all smaller businesses. The solution serves an immediate need by providing businesses who might be struggling to find sensible energy deals right now with access to competitively priced, 100% renewable energy. But additionally, SmartChoice enables every SME to take back control of its energy spend, to buy what it needs up-front and to avoid any surprises that can arise from monthly bills.

“Small business owners need flexibility from service suppliers – solutions that recognise that these businesses may be seasonal or may have to close on certain days or might require room to negotiate cash-flow bottlenecks. SmartChoice provides exactly this level of flexibility, enabling businesses to pay for what they need and to grow and develop at their own pace.”

Valda SmartChoice is a smart meter solution, with the latest SMETS2 meters installed for every customer – where one isn’t already on site. Once the meter is in place, the customer is given the option of complete account management control and can pay how they want, when they want, via the app or website customer portal. Alternatively, customers can choose to remain on automatic based payments, triggered when the account is running low.

Using the app or web portal customers can track usage, see their current balance, download invoices and set up payment options. This instant, holistic view of their energy account enables businesses to make quicker, more informed decisions about energy consumption and drive towards improved energy efficiency.

Launched in 2019 by a senior management team with over 20 years’ industry experience, Valda Energy is a British-owned B2B energy supplier operating in the SME market. Based in Bicester, Oxfordshire, the company focuses on cloud-based technology, customer focused solutions, 100% renewable energy and outstanding customer service with its UK-based customer services centre, to bring customers the best energy solutions available.

To learn more, visit www.valdaenergy.com