Northside Community Enterprises Sustainable Energy Community (NCE SEC) receives approval as a good practice for the Interreg Europe INTENSIFY project. The project aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through intense community engagement with the Northside Community Enterprise and ENERGY-HUB as regional stakeholders and Cork City Council as a project partner.
The NCE SEC good practice engages with communities seeking to improve the energy efficiency of their homes and reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by offering professional support and low-cost financial strategies.
NCE was established in 1993 to provide education and training for people who were long term unemployed. In 2003 NCE set up NCE Insulation, a new initiative to install energy efficiency improvement measures in the homes of the elderly and low income families. NCE expanded its training offering to include the installation of Attic and cavity wall insulation. NCE has collaborated with communities throughout Ireland to reduce carbon emissions and improve the energy efficiency of their homes and buildings. In 2018 NCE set up the ENERGY-HUB a community energy support office offering guidance to Sustainable energy communities on how best to develop, finance and implement energy efficiency retrofitting projects (One Stop Shop). In the same year established its own sustainable energy community offering training and education around energy awareness.
NCE Energy Hub has help set up two other energy communities in Cork – The cathedral and Shandon SEC and the BGB SEC. The BGB SEC has just completed their Energy Master Plan.
In 2019 the hub collaborated with Credit Unions in Cork City and established Energy Union a financial instrument that enable homeowners to borrow money (Green Loan) at a low interest rate to help them finance the energy improvement works.
INTENSIFY is part-funded by the Interreg Europe programme through the European Regional Development Fund. Interreg Europe is an interregional learning programme for public authorities to promote policy learning and to exchange the experience with others in Europe facing similar challenges in order to improve their practices.
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