GB Energy to invest £200m in solar panels for hundreds of hospitals and schools as part of first major project
21 March 2025, 09:05
Hundreds of schools and hospitals will have solar panels fitted as part of the first major project for publicly owned Great British Energy.
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A £200 million investment from the clean energy company's Government-funded budget will put rooftop solar on schools and NHS sites in efforts to save hundreds of millions of pounds on energy bills and free up cash to reinvest in frontline services.
The investment also includes funding for councils and community groups to build local clean power projects, such as community-owned onshore wind, rooftop solar and hydropower in rivers.
Hospitals and schools have faced soaring bills in the face of the energy crisis, driven by volatile fossil fuel prices, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) said.
The NHS is the single biggest public sector energy user with an estimated annual bill of £1.4 billion - a cost that has more than doubled since 2019.
In England, around £80 million will support 200 schools to install solar panels, while £100 million will go to 200 NHS sites, cutting bills and providing the potential to sell excess power back to the grid, officials said, with estimated lifetime savings of up to £400 million over 30 years.
In addition Scotland will get £4.85 million, Wales £2.88 million and Northern Ireland £1.62 million for power projects including community energy and rooftop solar for public buildings.
And there will be nearly £12 million to fund local authorities and community energy groups to build local clean power projects that can help drive growth, which could generate profits that could be reinvested into communities or cut people's bills, the department said.
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The first panels are expected to be on the roofs of hospitals and schools by summer 2025, and the DESNZ said a typical school could save £25,000 a year, while the average NHS site could see savings on bills of £45,000 if they had solar panels installed alongside technology such as batteries.
Funding will target areas most in need, with selected schools primarily clustered in deprived areas in the North East, West Midlands and North West, as well as at least 10 schools in each region.
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Speaking to LBC's Nick Ferrari at Breakfast, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said: "This is a sign of what clean, renewable energy can do for our country, school by school, hospital by hospital, community by community."
He continued: "The total investment is something like £180million and we estimate it will save £400million over the lifetime of the star panels for the schools."
Responding to Opposition leader Kemi Badenoch's claims that the move will "bankrupt the country", Mr Miliband said: "The costs of not acting on climate change are much greater than the costs of acting.
"These costs we store up for future generations are huge and the truth is that, at the moment, we're stuck on fossil fuels.
"And so we're subject to this rollercoaster of gas prices, controlled by petrol states and dictators and the answer, as the schools and hospitals example shows, is clean homegrown power that we control."
Great British Energy chairman Juergen Maier said: "By partnering with the public sector as we scale up the company, this will help us make an immediate impact as we work to roll out clean, homegrown energy projects, crowd in investment and create job opportunities across the country.
"We will work closely with communities to learn from the scheme so we can scale up energy projects across the country."
