Purpose

Surrey County Council
(SCC) recently ran a grant programme called LoCASE (Low Carbon
Across the South and East) to help Small and Medium-sized
Enterprises to decarbonise.  It provided
a grant towards the cost of a range of energy efficiency, heating
and lighting improvements. This grant covered 50% of total costs of
decarbonisation.  Between September 2021
and June 2023, the programme funded over 200 businesses and
invested £1.2m, which helped to provide a reduction in carbon
reductions of 1290 annual tonnes of C02e and annual energy savings
of around £890k to businesses.
 
As LoCASE programme
has now finished, Surrey County Council have developed an SME
Decarbonisation Loan ‘proof of concept pilot’ programme
to test whether providing loans to SMEs can help them to
decarbonise.
 
The loan programme
would fund energy efficiency measures including heating, lighting,
insulation and second hand electric vehicles which in turn will
reduce carbon emissions and provide financial savings to the small
and medium sized businesses. 
 

Content

Decision made:
 
To
award a contract for the SME Decarbonisation Loan Management
Programme pilot to Capitalise Business Support Limited Trading as
Let’s Do Business Finance.