The People’s Solar crowd funding platform was instrumental in the installation of solar panels on South Geelong Primary School.
The People’s Solar was a scalable, replicable model for crowd-funding small-scale community solar power, which:
- supported community development at the local level,
- bridged the gap between those who support renewable energy, and those dedicated to financial and/or social objectives, who have historically been at odds with renewable energy, and
- leveraged corporate and philanthropic funding to deliver secure financial support, via clean energy, for community benefits.
What made the People's Solar special?
The People’s Solar was a unique crowd-funding platform and the first of its kind to be used in Geelong.
The true commercial value of The People’s Solar brand, and model, was the trusted relationships and connections it created across the community – to build a clean energy ecosystem of green energy retailers and solar companies, as well as corporations seeking to enhance their brand within local communities, and offset their emissions with local, tangible projects.
In this way, The People’s Solar become an integrated social engagement and e-Commerce platform, with a focus on:
- enabling third-parties to upload and manage their own People’s Solar projects via a web platform
- generating referral fees from existing solar supplier partners, via online enquiries for residential and commercial-scale solar systems.
Outcomes of the Project
The project output and outcomes included:
- the People’s Solar received a grant from Cleantech Innovations Geelong, to design and build the next iteration of its crowd funding platform in 2015. The new crowd funding platform had enhanced functions and features including integrated project facilitation, e-commerce and social engagement platforms, to help scale the business model, throughout Geelong, and beyond. The platform was used to install solar panels on South Geelong Primary school; a project which was spearheaded by Geelong Sustainability. The People's Solar platform has now evolved and a new mechanism has been developed called BOOM!
Cleantech Innovations Geelong was a business support program to deliver economic benefits in Geelong by developing markets for cleantech goods and services. Cleantech Innovations Geelong was a partnership between the City of Greater Geelong, the Geelong Manufacturing Council and state government.
Need to know more...
Visit the BOOM! website.