Marlow and Bisham Hydropower - A River of Potential, A Community of Change

Dear supporter,

Bridge Hydro are a community-led, not for profit team of local people, working alongside other sustainability focused teams in our community. However, Bridge Hydro is 100% focused on a single challenge: To try to find a hydropower scheme that is right for the Thames at Marlow & Bisham to help contribute to reducing our overall community CO2 emissions and help address the climate emergency.

Community Energy is growing as a movement across the UK. Encouraged by government policy and Net Zero targets, local groups like ours are working up and down the country to harness their local resources, helping to decentralise power generation and find more sustainable ways to power our 21st century lifestyles without harming the planet.

The River Thames is our powerful, natural resource running through our community. Every day, millions of tonnes of water move almost silently past Marlow & Bisham, its potential energy untapped while somewhere else unseen, gas and coal is still being burned in the UK to help us keep our devices powered, homes running and electric cars charged.

When we first formed as a small group of friends in May 2023, the discussions started along the lines of - we all use electricity; shouldn’t we be doing something to generate power locally by harnessing this locally available natural resource? And… why hasn’t anyone else done this before? So we set ourselves a challenge: Could we come up with a scheme that was palatable to everyone and make hydropower a reality in our community?

And so began our journey into the unknown…

None of us were experts in hydropower at the start but we have gradually assembled a passionate, committed team of intelligent, professional people from the local area, with a carefully curated set of skills all determined to assess the feasibility of such a scheme on behalf of the community at large and to make a suitable scheme happen.

We quickly became aware that a previous, commercial hydropower scheme had failed to materialise in 2013 when it met with local resistance. But ours is a different, community-based scheme with a totally different approach. We are proposing a business model which envisages that any power generated by such a scheme is sold and that any profits generated are reinvested in the local community through a system of charitable grants. This could help enable cash-strapped organisations such as schools and community groups to invest in energy-saving technology and improvements and so reduce both their running costs and carbon footprints.

The last 22 months have been a steep learning curve. We have learned a huge amount about hydropower, the various technologies and related issues. As a non-funded team, we have put our hands in our own pockets to cover all costs to date, but we have also been fortunate to gain pro-bono support from a broad range of experts in the various fields required (power/civil

engineering/archaeology/sustainability etc.) and regularly call on their time for

support and advice.

We have now reached a point where we think we have a viable proposal and technology solution to test in theory and working alongside another local community group, MaidEnergy, a “pre-application” to the Environment Agency has been submitted. The purpose of the “pre-application” is to gain an understanding of the EA’s point of view, whether the sort of scheme we’re proposing would be deemed feasible and could ultimately be approved by them. (It’s important to note that in

design and concept terms, nothing submitted is set in stone at this point in time.)

We are genuine in our efforts to be consultative and over the last 18 months, we have started to engage with the local community through publications, events, talks and many, many meetings. Now, as we move from our initial period of studying the feasibility of such a scheme into a period of more in-depth consultation, we are engaging with a variety of concerns and points of view:

• Riverside residents are concerned about the possibility of a scheme spoiling the sights and sounds of the landscape

• Other riverside residents are concerned that the project doesn’t result in an increased risk of flooding. (The issue is conflated with considerable frustrations with and lack of faith in regulators, to effectively manage flooding.)

• Anglers are concerned about disruption to the river environment and protecting our native fish species (their concerns are sensitised due to their expert local knowledge of a river environment already under many pressures and an apparent lack of effective pollution policing by regulators)

• Canoeists and kayakers are concerned about losing access to white water and a means to descend into the weir pool beyond the weir

• Conservationists are concerned about the protection of the heritage and visual landscape of the area

• Others simply don’t want any change at all.

These are in some cases passionately held views, and in many cases for very good reasons, so we are working hard to properly understand different points of view and where possible, to take them into consideration in designing a scheme that best answers and mitigates their concerns.

But overall, the key question for us is this: Is it fair that Marlow & Bisham should resist change and squander the potential good that could come from the immense natural resource that runs through our community?

On the positive front, we have had many, many expressions of support from a huge variety of people who are very concerned about man-made climate change and think we should be doing more as a community to reduce our collective CO2 emissions. These people are from many different walks of life. Some are riverside residents, some have kids and grandchildren, others don’t. Many people have said how they have wondered for years why we don’t have a hydropower scheme like those at Caversham and Windsor and Oxford (there are many other examples across the UK

and Europe). Many have offered their time and expertise. And community organisations are of course positive about the potential for money to become available to them in the future to help them reduce their carbon footprints and costs, through grants for better insulation, solar panels, heat pumps etc. And with a lifespan of many decades, this hydropower investment in our community could generate payouts for generations with zero carbon emissions.

Of course, it is possible that during this journey, we conclude that it simply isn’t possible to harness an optimum level of power from the river at this location because there is simply too much resistance, too many hurdles and not enough enthusiasm for raising the funds required. But does our community want to have to explain to future generations why Marlow & Bisham are absent from the list of towns & villages that have made sacrifices for the greater good, in the fight against man-made climate change? Finding a realistic, palatable solution will require compromise,

understanding and patient communication between many parties. This is a real exercise in community engagement, and we genuinely hope that we can find a way to satisfy everyone.

Ultimately, we are determined to deliver on the challenge we set ourselves at the start and we firmly believe that one way or another, we will find a viable solution that inspires other communities to do something similar.

The Bridge Hydro team