Diolch, Llywydd, and good afternoon, Deputy Minister. If I could continue the theme of renewable energy.

5. What support is the Welsh Government providing to small and community-owned renewable energy projects? OQ57877

Thank you for the question. We've successfully supported community energy since 2010. We currently provide support through the Welsh Government energy service and by grant funding Community Energy Wales. We are scaling up our support for local and community energy by implementing the recommendations of the renewable energy deep dive.

Diolch yn fawr iawn. Last year I had the opportunity to visit Hafod y Llan hydroelectric project, the National Trust's first large-scale renewable energy project. On my visit, the project team highlighted that the financial opportunities available to small schemes like theirs in Scotland would really help boost the sector here in Wales. The Scottish Government established the Community and Renewable Energy Scheme to encourage local and community ownership of renewable energy projects across Scotland and to help maximise the benefits of renewable energy systems, whether commercial or community owned. May I therefore ask what financial support will you look to bring forward for small renewable energy projects, such as those in Hafod y Llan, to deliver the programme for government commitment to expand renewable energy generation by public bodies and community groups in Wales? Diolch yn fawr iawn.

Well, as Jane Dodds rightly mentioned, we have that target to increase energy generation by over 100 MW between now and 2026 by public bodies. We've seen the excellent example of Morriston Hospital, where a solar farm has now been opened that is powering the hospital entirely for a significant amount of time. We are very committed to working with community energy groups, because, as I said, the principle coming out of the deep dive was that not only do we need to meet our climate change targets, but we need to do it in a way that retains wealth within our local economy, and we don't want to see a repeat of extractive economic development that we've seen in previous industrial revolutions happen this time. So, community energy is essential to that. And there is much to admire about the Scottish Community and Renewable Energy Scheme. We have our own scheme, the Welsh Government's energy service, which provides technical and commercial support to community-led projects. We've recently awarded £2.35 million to the Egni Co-op to deliver another phase of its excellent rooftop solar programme, which I visited in Caerleon recently, and that will be delivering a further 2 MW of locally owned capacity and providing, crucially, a community share offer. So, not only are these public buildings getting cheap and free electricity, they're also getting a share in the co-op. It's an excellent example.

So, in terms of the Scottish example, our own local energy grant and our local energy loan funds, in fact, offer more generous support than the Scottish scheme does. But I think their community outreach model is a very interesting one, and one I'd certainly be interested in looking at further myself. So, thank you for bringing that to our attention.

In preparation for this supplementary question, I thought I'd take myself to the Welsh Government's community energy webpage to see what the latest information and guidance was for the people of Wales who are looking to play their part in developing green and renewable energy for themselves and their communities. And given that, in the response to the Member for Mid and West Wales, the Deputy Minister said community energy is being scaled up, I was expecting a website full of all the latest and most up-to-date information, given the urgency we need to transition to renewable energy. Cue my surprise, then, when your website, the Welsh Government's own website aimed at supporting the people to develop community energy, hasn't been updated since September 2019, with some information such as feed-in tariff guidance and renewable heat incentive guidance stemming all the way back to 2015, before the Deputy Minister was even elected to this place. You may talk a good game, Deputy Minister, but isn't it the truth that what this Government says and what this Government does are two very different things?

Well, I very much enjoyed the Member's meanderings through the information superhighway. I'm not sure it entirely hits the point, though, but I'm willing to look at that, because, obviously, that does need updating. But as I mentioned in my answer to Jane Dodds, we are funding Community Energy Wales to be the focal point of providing advice on how to take forward community energy schemes, and their website, I'm pleased to tell the Member, is fully up to date.