Renewable energy, as part of the wider switch to a low carbon economy, plays a vital part in tackling climate change and maintaining secure energy supplies.

For further details how Strateco can help with renewable energy schemes or to discuss your current situation, please contact us on action@strateco.co.uk

Biomass - an all-round description for renewable organic materials, such as wood, agricultural crops or wastes, including municipal wastes, when used as a source of fuel or energy. Biomass can be burned directly or processed into biofuels such as ethanol and methane.

Combined Heat & Power (CHP) - a concept rather than a single technology. Invariably when generating electricity a large amount of heat is also produced and it therefore makes sense from an efficiency perspective to generate electricity where the heat can be put to a productive use, rather than vented to the atmosphere.

Anaerobic Digestion (AD) - the natural breakdown of organic materials into methane and carbon dioxide, often called Biogas. This gas can subsequently be burnt to generate electricity.

Solar Photovoltaic (PV) - this uses the photovoltaic effect on a series of solar cells to convert energy from the sun into direct current electricity. With the use of an inverter this can be converted into alternating current, the same as supplied by the national grid, and used to power existing mains operated electrical equipment, or exported into the national grid.

Solar Heating - as opposed to using the solar energy to generate electricity in PV systems, solar heating uses the energy to generate hot water. This increases the environmental sustainability of an organisation through reduction, and in some cases prevention, of the use of either fossil fuels or renewable energy.

Composting - these systems take green waste (Such as garden waste or kitchen rubbish) and convert them, through biodegradation, into peat free soil conditioner. This composting process typically takes six months to convert the waste materials into fertiliser.

Incentives - the Government has already established a Feed In Tariff (FIT) scheme for some renewable electricity generation systems and is proposing to introduce the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) in 2011.