Solar Street
A free browser game where you play a community energy group deciding which roofs get solar panels.
Community energy is easier to explain when people can try it for themselves. In Solar Street you play the community energy group: you’ve raised money from a community share offer, and you decide where the panels go. Then you run the year and see whether the plan works.
Each roof has a sun score, a cost and a payback. Some buildings use most of their own power, like a supermarket that’s open all day; others, like a school in the summer holidays, send most of it to the grid. The local substation can only take so much on a sunny afternoon, so batteries and upgrades come into play.
The numbers come from published sources, including Great British Energy, the Midlands Net Zero Hub’s guide to community energy, Bath & West Community Energy, Ofgem and the European Commission’s PVGIS. The game is a working prototype, and community energy groups are being invited to pilot it.
