Community Power Agency leads a collaborative effort to maintain the most up-to-date database of Australian community energy groups. This data is then available for publishing into maps, sharing with other data-sets of community energy and for researchers and policy makers.

The Australian community energy database records the Groups (the organisations who organise projects), the Projects (the endeavours which result in sustainable energy installations) and Sites (the individual locations where sustainable energy has been installed).

If your community organisation is planning (or has completed) a project to install sustainable energy, such as renewable energy, energy efficiency, energy infrastructure or energy services, then you’re probably a community energy group. Typical examples include solar, wind, bulk-buy programs, energy efficiency, electric vehicle charging stations or even becoming a community-owned electricity retailer.

So long as it’s community behind the project then you’ll meet our definition of being community energy – that means the community has conceived, developed, owns or operates the project. Sustainable energy products or services targeting communities or community members doesn’t equate to community energy – the community needs to be actively involved in the delivery of those products or services at some point. Community-developer partnerships are valid, as are community-council partnerships.