A revolving fund at Marrickville Council is helping the municipality reach its climate change goals.
The Tom Foster Community Centre (TFCC), which helps support the community through providing Meals on Wheels, is one of the most recent locations in Marrickville to have solar panels installed.
The panels will produce enough energy to power five average Australian homes and the project is part of Council’s target goal of reducing emissions by 25% by 2025.
Financial support for the project came from Marrickville Council’s Resource Management Reserve (RMR), a revolving fund that provides a complementary funding source to support projects that deliver against water and energy use reduction objectives.
The financial savings from these waste reduction projects are reinvested into the fund to assist in financing further sustainability initiatives. It is the main funding mechanism for the Council’s Climate Change Plan.
The reserve has been up and running for almost two years and has funded over $122,000 worth of projects with $19,000 worth of annual efficiency savings being returned. That’s an average payback of 6.5 years.
Jim Fraser, Manager of Environmental Services, said, “Marrickville Council is proud to have an internal investment fund known as a revolving fund.
“That means this project was financed by electricity cost savings from previous energy efficiency projects.”
The establishment of a resource management reserve brings greater accountability to the claims of efficiency and financial savings from sustainability projects, as well as demonstrating a clear link between efficiency and financial benefits.
The TFCC solar panels are the latest in a long line of solar installations by Council, other locations include: Council’s Administration Building in Petersham, which has 80 solar panels and produces an amount of energy equivalent to taking seven cars off the road; the Annette Kellerman Aquatic Centre, which contributes excess electricity to the local grid; and the Council Works Depot in St Peters, which produces the equivalent of six homes’ worth of
energy each year.
